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the Land make their own T-shirts? Would they mix up their own medication, resort to Native American-style poultices and inhalants?
And yet, the literature said people thrived living this way, even
    chronically sick people with cancer and diabetes and autoimmune diseases. That was another story for the lineup: an interview with a doctor who had treated several people before they moved to Back to the Land and then tested them again once they’d been living there for a year. The improvements were amazing. Allegedly the lifestyle’s simplicity and lack of commercial pollutants had remarkable healing powers. But it had to be a placebo effect, Charles thought. They got better because they wanted to. He didn’t believe in any of that New Age nonsense. The power of positive thought couldn’t save you. Circumstance was circumstance, and you had to make due with what you were dealt.
    After the meeting, Charles went outside to get some air. He took the elevator eleven flights down and walked through the marble lobby, exiting onto Market Street. There was a traffic jam outside the building; the cars wedged at odd angles, honking. Suburban Station loomed across the avenue. A hot dog and a pretzel cart lined the sidewalk. Two cleaning women in pink smocks and white athletic shoes paused at the corner, talking animatedly with their hands.
    The meeting had been especially difficult to sit through and not just because he found the concept ridiculous; his mind couldn’t stay focused on work. He kept returning to what was happening, what might be happening, what his brother might have done. All he could think of were the worst case scenarios: a secret society of sorts, a band of boys abusing one another for kicks, for power, with Scott at the helm. Not that he had any proof that this was happening—he hadn’t been able to get any details out of his mother, and it was possible that even she didn’t know. It was unclear whether Scott even understood the magnitude of the situation. It only took a few bad decisions to ruin everything. But reputation meant nothing to Scott. Neither did history nor tradition. Or, well, family. Charles recalled how, long ago, he’d been ordered to look after Scott at one of their parents’ Fourth of July parties. Scott, then about six, grabbed a pack of matches teetering on the side of the grill and struck one. He waved it near the old trellises, threatening to set them on fire. “You can’t do that to the house,” Charles hissed, appalled. It was the equivalent of harming an old relative.
    Scott struck the match anyway, a cruel smile on his face. The trellises rotted; their brittle timber just waiting for an excuse to burn. Their father blamed Charles for not watching his brother more carefully, and Charles, frustrated and confused, said, “I tried to stop him, but he didn’t care.” And then, after a moment, “It’s because he’s adopted, right? Because he’s not one of us?”
    His father flinched. Even today, at thirty-one years old, Charles could still conjure up his dad’s red, looming face in his mind. “Don’t you ever say that again,” his father growled.
    And now, almost certainly because of the conversation he’d had with his mother last night, Charles’s old girlfriend, Bronwyn, was on his mind, too. Various images of her had been flashing through his mind all morning—Bronwyn on the living room couch, outlining the type of cummerbund Charles must wear with his tux so it would match her prom dress. Bronwyn standing on the patio next to the grill, trying to make small talk with Scott when his brother had unwittingly arrived home when Charles was entertaining a group of friends. Diplomatic and eager for everyone to get along, Bronwyn always tried to invite Scott into the conversation. It’s not going to get you anywhere, Charles tried to tell her. He chooses to be an outcast.
    And, of course, Charles envisioned Bronwyn in the mud room, standing behind Charles as he held Scott by the