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I needed nettle and dandelion greens, and those ingredients came from the garden.
The sky was gray. Rain had been pummeling the earth for days. Rivers of mud flowed between plants.
Now, there was only a fine mist in the air when I stepped outside, and the cool damp refreshed my oven-warmed skin. I raised my face to the sky and allowed myself to bask in the feeling for a few moments, letting the deepening drizzle reinfuse me with the energy I’d poured out into dinner.
The stone patio was slippery as I circled the firepit. I followed the pea gravel paths around the proliferous vegetable plots, toward the shed.
It took a moment for my eyes to adjust after I opened the door and flicked on the overhead lights. I was used to living with half of the bulbs burnt out. Gus must have replaced them. Now it was bright and cheery—as cheery as the green-tinged lights could be.
I spun around and gasped. He’d also tidied up.
No, that wasn’t right. That didn’t fit the extent of his efforts. It was downright clinical with precision organization and cleanliness.
The overturned can of hinge oil in the corner by the door was gone. My hands always seemed to be full on the way to and from the shed, so it had become just another thing I hadn’t bothered to fix. The scattering of dirt, bone meal and blood meal, and stray seeds dotting the old linoleum had been cleaned up, too. You could practically eat off these floors.
Gus had even organized and labeled all the tools according to purpose and frequency of use. All the bins were uniform in design, thick white plastic, arranged from small to large, with little printed labels, letting me know where to find my shears, trowels, and snippers. Two large, wheeled bins under the potting bench contained organic fertilizers and garden soils.
My heart weighed nothing. My whole body was light as a feather. I could have floated out of here on just the thought of Gus toiling away, creating a better system for my silly little plants. Because he knew how much my garden meant to me. Just as I knew how much taking over its care had meant to him.
Darker thoughts tried to creep in. Like,he was probably just trying to avoid spending time with his dad, orhe had to work out all that pent up sexual energy since he wasn’t expelling it with me. But I ignored them. It felt right to bask in this for a while.
Even if he hadn’t done this forme, he’d done it for the space we shared together.
Our house.
The words sounded too nice, too cozy. For once, I didn’t fight to banish them from my vocabulary as quickly as they had materialized. I wanted to wear them like a thick sweater, wrap myself in the comfort that maybe this thing—this marriage—wasn’t such an awful idea after all.
I grabbed the scissors and gloves from the correct bins—making a mental note to replace them when I was done, instead of tossing them back onto the potting bench like I normally would have.
The rain was falling harder, now. As soon as I stepped out from the shelter, it soaked through my sweatshirt and chilled my skin. But I didn’t care. I opened myself to the downpour.
Icy drops fell heavy on my scalp and shoulders. It was a releasing rain, a cleansing rain. Like there had been forty-eight tabs openon my brain’s browser and someone accidentally closed them all. Shocking at first, but after releasing what wasn’t needed, there was room for so much more new stuff.
Water ran down my scalp as I harvested the dandelion greens, shaking the drops from their tender leaves. Donning my heavy leather gloves, I stepped around the roots of the old-growth trees to the nettle patch.
Stinging Nettle was a noxious plant. Fine hairs, tipped with acid, covered the leaves and stems, and if you even looked at it the wrong way, it would reach out and bite you. But once cooked, the leaves lost their sting and were as nutritious as spinach. I spoke to the plants, asking them to release their most potent magical benefits into the stems I cut.
Since I had hoped this meal would begin the process of Gus’s emotional release, I was pulling out all the stops.
I took the herbs inside and wiped the soaking strands of hair away from my face.
Across the living room, Gus stood in the open doorway, unmoving, his hand on the knob.
“Gus?”
He seemed to be in some kind of a daze. “I’m okay.”
Clearly, he wasn’t.
“How... was it? Seeing him?” I crossed the house only to stand in front of him, unsure of what he needed. I wanted to touch him, hug him. Instead, I shifted on my bare feet. God, I hated that it was always so awkward between us at the start of every encounter.
“It doesn’t seem any different. Except I kept repeating ‘He’s dying. He’s dying.’ to myself every time I looked away. George and I took him out for beers. No point in denying him his favorite beverage anymore.”
“New information always changes a relationship. He won’t be the same person he was to you yesterday, because you have knowledge that you didn’t have before. But it can still grow into a different kind of wonderful.”
He straightened his shoulders and slipped his mask back into place. “Dinner smells great,” he said, signaling the end of the conversation. He turned to the steps but stopped as his foot touched the bottom tread. “Did you light church incense?”
“Frankincense helps lighten the spirits.” I didn’t tell him about the magic floating on the air around us. The magic I’d designed to kick his denial and jumpstart his healing. It probably wouldn’t work anyway.
