by Leslie Gould
The next time Jill opened her eyes, Rita and Summer and Lonnie sat beside the bed.
They’ve come to pay their last respects.
“We’re still praying for you,” Summer said.
Before they left Jill called out to Rita. “Come here,” she said. Rita lowered her head. “Thanks,” Jill whispered.
The hospice nurse stood beside her, checking the pump, slipping a new cassette of morphine into the holder. “Dr. Scott increased the dosage…”
31
Caye rocked Simon as he drank his bottle. She watched Jill sleep. She felt as though they were all part of a somber wake. The Fellowship members tromping through. At least no one, except Marion, felt that they needed to shush the kids. If Jill was dozing, she was out. She woke only when the pain became intense.
Hospice Helen, as Rob referred to her, had come and gone. “She’s deteriorating quickly,” she’d said. “She’s progressed quite a bit since yesterday.”
The social worker stopped by before Helen left. She gave Rob the name of a counselor who specialized in children. “Each child reacts differently to grief,” she said. “Liam is going to think that his mommy’s death is temporary. Simon will wonder where she’s gone. Hudson is just at the age where he can start grasping that it’s permanent.”
Caye had pulled Hudson’s cake from the oven before she settled down with Simon. They were going to barbecue burgers and have a party—just a family party. Hudson was furious. “I want my friends from school to come!” he’d shouted.
Nathan and Andrew had gone out to buy presents. Hudson was upset that he couldn’t go too. Rob put Hudson in the baby seat on the back of Jill’s mountain bike and took him for a ride to calm him down. Hank read stories to Liam and Audrey in the kitchen while Bev made a potato salad. Marion poked around in Jill’s garden.
Simon closed his eyes. Caye kept rocking. She felt his body relax. It was all so dreamlike—Jill on the bed, sleeping, her hair fanned over the pillow. All of them milling around, doing mundane chores, planning a party. The contrast was, to use a Jill word, galactic.
She rolled the baby onto the bed beside Jill and stood over the two of them, staring. Jill, with her jaundiced, olive skin, looked beautiful. She instinctively moved toward Simon and pulled him to her and brushed her lips over the top of his head. Caye pulled up the railings and went upstairs to get her camera. She’d had Nathan bring it so she could take photos of Hudson on his fifth birthday.
She took pictures of mother and child as they slept and then put the camera on the mantel. She’d take more after Jill awoke.
“That’s so macabre,” Marion said as Caye clicked the shutter. Caye ignored her.
“Someday the boys might have vague memories of all of this. The photos will help,” Jill said. It was an effort for her to talk.
Liam sat on the bed beside her and giggled.
“Come on, Hudson,” she said, motioning to him.
He stood at the end of the bed and shook his head.
Marion walked into the kitchen. “That Hudson is such a pill,” she said to Bev.
Jill couldn’t hear Bev’s answer.
“Let’s eat outside tonight,” Jill said to Caye. “For Hudson’s birthday.”
“Can you go that far?” Caye asked. “If you help me.”
They ate outside. Jill sat propped up in her lounger with her sunglasses on. Caye took a photo of Hudson holding his pirate ship cake standing next to Jill. Jill smiled; Hudson frowned. Next she took a tender photo of Rob and Jill. Rob stood above Jill, his arms draped over her shoulders.
Caye thought about what the hospice nurse said, about all of it coming together, about Jill’s body shutting down as she readied herself to let go, to pass from this life to the next.
I can see you taking her, God. The realization felt holy. So sad and so holy all at once.
When Jill woke during the night, Marion sat beside her bed. “How’s the pain?” her mother asked. “Okay.”
“When your father was so sick, he was always in pain. They didn’t manage it as well back then.”
“Don’t let them take me away without the kids knowing. Okay?”
“Mommy, look at my drawing,” Hudson said, waving the paper in front of her face. It was morning.
Hudson had drawn a pirate ship beneath the water. Skeletons covered the ocean floor.
Jill looked through the rail of the bed at Hudson. “Hey, you,” she whispered.
“You kept thrashing around last night,” Marion said, nodding toward the rail. “I didn’t want you to fall out of bed.” She stood with a basin and a washcloth. “Do you want to get cleaned up?”
Jill reached for the switch and raised the bed.
“I was just in a garden, a beautiful garden,” Jill told Caye. “When?” Caye asked, tucking her hair behind her ear. Just now.
“No. You were here. In your bed.”
Jill paused. “There’s someone waiting for me in the garden.”
“Who?” Caye climbed on the bed beside Jill.
Jill closed her eyes again. “I don’t know.” She reached over and took Caye’s hand. “You’ve shown me love. You’ve been my anchor. I’d spent my whole life bobbing along, unconnected, until I met you.”
“Oh, Jilly,” Caye said as tears stabbed at her eyes. She turned her head and kissed Jill’s cheek. There was so much she wanted to tell Jill—like that she didn’t believe Jill ever bobbed along. Jill always had a plan. The difference was that Caye gave her someone—a girlfriend—to live her plan with, to share the daily domestic stuff, to turn it into run. She wanted to say that she’d never imagined a friend like Jill was possible. She wanted to say that there was so much between them—a garden of love and faith and history and stories and children and husbands and God and jealousy and commitment and dreams. There was so much there that Caye couldn’t believe there would be anything left of her if Jill didn’t live.
“I want to sit in the garden,” Jill said to Caye. “Will you help me out?”
Caye took the pillows and afghan out first. She helped Jill stand and then slipped the morphine pump into the pocket of her silk jade robe. They walked slowly down the hall, through the kitchen, and out the back door. They struggled along, taking the deck stairs one at a time, Jill leaning her thin, thin frame heavily against her friend.
Jill settled onto the lounger as Caye tucked the afghan around her.
Jill closed her eyes. “Where’s Rob?”
“He went for a run. He should be back any minute.”
“Where’s Nathan?”
“Over at our house.”
Hudson, Liam, Audrey, and Andrew ran through the garden on their way into the house. “Hudson and Liam,” Jill said weakly.
“Hudson and Liam,” Caye called after them, “your mommy wants you.”
They ran back and stood beside the lounger.
“I love you,” she said.
Liam nodded and twirled around until his cape twisted around his boots. Then he twirled the other way until it unwound.
“I know,” Hudson said, shifting from foot to foot. “Can I go play with Andrew?”
Jill nodded. Hudson and Liam ran up the deck steps into the house.
“Where’s Simon?” Jill asked. “Down for his nap.”
“Would you have Rob wake me when he comes back?”
Jill smiled up at Rob.
“I’m here,” he said. A trail of sweat ran down the side of his face. She wished he wouldn’t run in the heat of the day.
She closed her eyes.
“I’m going to take a shower,” he said.
“Wait.” She forced her eyelids open.
He stroked her fingers that were poking out of the afghan.
“I’m sorry,” she said.
“Why?” he asked, kneeling beside her.
“Sorry to leave.”
The garden grew larger. I
t obliterated the house, covered every inch of the courtyard. Wisteria vines wound their way around the lounger, the afghan, Jill’s body Orange day lilies grew as large as sunflowers. Purple dahlia pompoms rose as tall as trees. The red and pink tulips grew as big as the children. There were no snakes in this garden.
She could feel the person waiting, waiting for her.
“Is it time?” she asked.
Are you ready? The voice came from behind the gate. Was she ready? Ready to die? Yes. Ready to leave?
All things. I can do all things through Him who strengthens me.
Caye sat on the window seat and watched Rob walk down the steps of the deck. His hair was wet. His feet were bare. She watched him bend down to Jill. Watched him put his cheek against her mouth and nose. Watched him sink to his knees.
Caye stood and started out the door. And then stopped. She grabbed the phone and hit the speed dial.
“Come quickly,” she said to Nathan as she opened the screen door. “We need you.”
32
Jill had said she wanted a memorial service in her garden. “Scatter my ashes in the Siskiyous,” she had said. “But talk about me in my garden.”
Thomas led the service. The scent of the roses hung sweetly in the air. They started by singing “Be Thou My Vision.” Thomas read the Twenty-third Psalm. Neighbors, parents from Hudson’s preschool, and the Fellowship members, except for Joya, filled the courtyard.
“She didn’t come,” Rita had whispered to Caye before the service started. “That’s all Thomas would say.” Tears filled Caye’s eyes again. There were so many things she did not understand, could not understand.
Nathan stood on one side of Rob. Rob’s parents stood on the other.
“We should have come sooner,” Rob’s mother had said earlier to Caye as she dabbed at her eyes. “We had no idea.”
Caye had patted her shoulder and said, “None of us did.” She had no desire for Rob’s mother to feel guilty. It wouldn’t have helped if they had come sooner. Now was when Rob needed them. Caye and Nathan had moved back to their house. Rob’s mom and dad and Marion were all staying at Jill’s. At Jill’s. It would always be “at Jill’s.”
Hudson, with his arms crossed, stood quietly in front of Rob. Andrew stood beside Hank on the deck; Scout sat at their feet. Stephanie stood a few feet from Liam and Audrey as they played under the wisteria with the Matchbox cars. Caye held Simon.
Marion stood beside Bev.
Thomas kept the service short. Caye looked at Nathan’s program, created by Rita last night. “In the Garden” was the last song.
“I come to the garden alone, while the dew is still on the roses…”
Simon rubbed his nose against Caye’s shoulder. She looked down at the baby and then off toward the fading purple wisteria blooms against the brick wall.
“And He walks with me, and He talks with me, and He tells me I am His own; and the joy we share as we tarry there, none other has ever known,” the mourners sang.
Jill is your own, Caye prayed, looking back toward Thomas.
And so are you, came the voice from inside. You are my own.
It was so easy for Caye to see God loving Jill.
I love you, too, said the voice.
I feel so alone.
I know.
Simon began to fuss. Nathan put his arm around Caye’s shoulder and patted the baby’s hand.
Thomas said the final prayer.
Bev walked into the kitchen and brought out coffee. Caye knew that trays of fruit and pastries would soon follow.
Rita hugged Caye and Simon. Summer stood back. Caye stepped forward and gave her a hug, sandwiching Simon between them. Gwen materialized and reached out to Caye.
“Are you doing okay?” she asked.
Caye smiled. She could not talk. I will never stop mourning, is what she wanted to say. I will never be okay.
She looked over at the tulip bed. She was embarrassed that the garden was in such poor shape. The tulips had never been cut back. The stalks had shriveled and dried into thin, grayish twigs. They looked like brittle bones. The forget-me-not blossoms had faded, and the foliage had withered into a silvery tangle.
Caye stepped toward Nathan and handed him the baby. She headed through the side door of the garage and found Jill’s green-handled trowel on the potting bench.
Dropping to her knees in front of the tulip bed, Caye plunged the trowel into the soil, popping up a clump of bulbs. She shook off the dirt and slipped the five bulbs into the pocket of her maternity jumper. She would plant them in her own garden, plant the bulbs, plant the faith and love and dreams that God had given her through Jill.
Caye returned the trowel to the garage and then walked toward the house.
Simon saw her and began to cry She reached out her arms to the baby.
About the Author
Leslie Gould lives in Portland, Oregon, with her husband, Peter, and four children, Kaleb, Taylor, Hana, and Lily Thao. Leslie held the position of curator at the Swedenburg House Museum in Ashland, Oregon, before becoming a mother. She enjoys backpacking and camping with her family. She currently works as a writer and editor. This is her first novel.
To learn more about WaterBrook Press and view our catalog of products, log on to our Web site: www.waterbrookpress.com
GARDEN OF DREAMS
PUBLISHED BY WATERBROOK PRESS
2375 Telstar Drive, Suite 160 Colorado Springs, Colorado 80920
A division of Random House, Inc.
All Scripture quotations, unless otherwise indicated, are taken from the Holy Bible, New International Version®. NIV®. Copyright © 1973, 1978, 1984 by the International Bible Society. Used by permission of Zondervan Publishing House. All rights reserved. Scripture quotations marked (NASB) are taken from the New American Standard Bible®. © Copyright The Lockman Foundation 1960, 1962, 1963, 1968, 1971, 1972, 1973, 1975, 1977, 1995. Used by permission. (www.Lockman.org)
The characters and events in this book are fictional, and any resemblance to actual persons or events is coincidental.
Copyright © 2003 by Leslie Gould
Library of Congress Cataloging-in-Publication Data
Gould, Leslie, 1962-
Garden of dreams / Leslie Gould.
p. cm.
1. Gardening—Fiction. 2. Friendship—Fiction. I. Title.
PS3607.O89G37 2003
813’. 6—dc21
2003000612
eISBN: 978-0-307-55297-6
v3.0_r2
