Top Story, chapter 11
As soon as Newsroom is over, I find Mia and ask, “Hey, want to stop by Jenni’s to get our first free smoothie?” I smile at her and hope she’s not intimidated.
She smiles back, looking surprised, as she answers, “Sure! Oh, but I left my staff card at my desk. I’ll meet you down there!”
“Great!” I exclaim and offer her one last grateful smile before running off to go get Haru and ask him the same thing.
After Haru and I get settled at our table, I see Mia getting her smoothie from the counter. “Over here!” I say, waving my arms. “What flavor did you get?”
“Raspberry?” she guesses, sitting down.
Up close, she looks a bit sad, so to cheer her up, I say, “Hey. It’s just our first day. I thought your question about the view was good!”
“That wasn’t my question. It was Timothy’s. I wanted to ask about the impact on all the mom-and-pop businesses,” she says flatly.
“So why didn’t you?” I ask. She falls silent.
I exchange a glance with Haru, then quietly point at her smoothie. “You know . . . I’m pretty sure that’s actually thimbleberry! It kind of looks like raspberry, but the flavor’s more intense. And you know the thing about thimbleberry?”
She shakes her head, sipping her smoothie.
“They’re only ripe for one day in the summer. Sometimes you just gotta take your chance.” I bump her shoulder lightly, and she smiles.
“Like the cherry blossoms in the Japanese Tea Garden in Golden Gate Park!” Haru exclaims. “They only bloom once a year. It’s so beautiful. My dad always takes me up to see them.
“Do they have Japanese gardens in Los Angeles?” I wonder.
“You’re from LA too? Where?” Mia asks Haru.
“Yeah, I live in Little Tokyo,” Haru says. “It’s near downtown. My dad works at the Japanese American National Museum-I help out there too. It’s a wonderful museum, you should come check it out!”
“I will!” Mia promises. “We live in Anaheim, but I bet my dad will take me after we get back.”
“We’re launching a new exhibit in January. It’s called Dear Miss Breed. It’ll showcase all these letters-two hundred and fifty of them-that were written by Japanese children during World War Two.” He starts explaining the touching story of these kids who got sent to internment camps after Pearl Harbor.