The Girl in the Garden

by Melanie Wallace

  But Iris came to need June’s help, perhaps as much as Iris needed Luke to love, and June eventually came to feel settled, secure. Now, behind her back, Iris and Luke began to laugh, the child wanton with joy, and June smiled to herself, mashed the boiled potatoes with milk and butter, then cut up one of the pork chops she’d fried—Iris was no longer able to handle a knife and fork in tandem—and hesitated before cutting the other, asking over her shoulder: Will your daughter come to lunch? Or should I make something else for dinner?

  No and no, Iris replied in a cartoon character voice, as if her answer were part of the story she was reading to Luke. The mashed potatoes and pork chops would last, then, through tomorrow: Iris hadn’t had an appetite in months, ate little and erratically. June—whom Oldman had told of Claire’s impending arrival—wondered how shocked Claire must have been upon seeing her mother. No matter that seventeen years had passed since they’d last laid eyes on each other, what ailed Iris had little to do with aging. Iris refused to name the illness or discuss it—she’d finally seen doctors over the last year, Duncan arranging the appointments and secreting her off to offices and hospitals for consultations, tests and diagnoses Iris never mentioned—and was tight-lipped about her progressive debilitation and the prescribed drugs she was given. Her tremors were now pronounced, the fingers of one hand had curled uselessly inward, and she’d suffered muscle and weight loss so extreme that her bones appeared to erupt through her papery skin. She relied on canes, more often on a walker, not only because she was weak and given to spasms but also because there was no telling when she’d lose what little balance she had; and despite this, Iris insisted on rising alone and washing herself, dressing herself, putting herself to bed, on being on her feet and about although she could no longer cook for herself. Toward late summer she’d finally succumbed to sitting rather than working alongside June in the garden—harvesting the vegetables and fruit, weeding, pruning, composting and turning over the soil—which had moved June to a pity she didn’t dare reveal.

  Lunch, June announced when Iris and Luke had finished with the book, but Iris shook her head, told her, I’ll eat later. Me too, Luke said, and June retrieved him from Iris’s lap, carried him toward the door and quelled his protest by observing that Iris was tired and now needed to nap. Iris waved goodbye with her good hand, blew the child a kiss, and then June stepped into the dead chill with Luke in her arms, let him squirm free on Iris’s patio, watched him race into the garden to check for any sign of the turtle. She took a deep breath, savored the air’s frigid sting: she has come to love this time of year, when autumn lies on the cusp of winter, shoulders into the next season, and the garden is fallow, the fruit trees without fruit, the rosebushes bursting with fat shiny hips, the maple and birch and ash and oak almost stripped of leaves that had flamed yellow, orange, red, or rusted to sepia before fading and dropping. The frost was already powdering the garden at night, and although winter might continue to lurk around the corner, there was no telling; that first fall at Iris’s the snow had come before the deciduous trees were completely denuded—there had been a prolonged Indian summer—and June had been shocked at how winter had simply erupted without warning, the snow falling straight and heavy and silent, unlike how it fell sideways—blown on wailing winds—where she was from.

  There hadn’t been a whisper of a breeze, and June had woken to a snow-blanketed world of silence and windows laced with crystalline freeze. The garden was beautiful—its bushes bowed beneath weighty clumps of shimmer, the underside branches of its trees wetly dark, the leaves on those branches wearing coats of crinkled powder—under that layer of alabaster. She’d broken through the foot-deep snow with Luke in her arms and delivered him to Iris exactly on time, then taken a shovel from the shed and cleared a path to the cottage porch, then to Iris’s, and swept the snow off the patio edges before shoveling a lane to the outside door and clearing the driveway to the mailbox and street. She had warmed to the rhythm of the work, enjoyed the heft of the snow, marveled at the glowering unbroken cloudcover. For the first time at Iris’s, she felt as though she were earning her keep. And, for the first time, Iris said more than hello and goodbye to her, telling June in a conversational tone that the first snow often heralded Thanksgiving, which happened to be the next day.

  I take it, Iris had gone on, that Duncan’s made arrangements for tomorrow that include you.

  Oldman Smith invited us to dinner in the afternoon.

  I expect you’ll still bring Luke in the morning.

  Yes, of course.

  Good, Iris had responded. She disentangled a strand of her hair from Luke’s grasp, held him high and jostled him in midair, making him laugh, then gave him to June. Tomorrow then, she affirmed. And as June opened the door, added: You might want to stack some cordwood on your porch rather than running out for an armful every time you feel like using the fireplace.

  I didn’t know it was okay to use the wood. Or make a fire.

  Go right ahead. I no longer do.

  And while Iris had Luke the next morning, June swept the paths she’d shoveled the day before and stacked cordwood on the cottage porch, then retrieved her son and dressed them both for Oldman’s. Duncan arrived in Oldman’s Studebaker as she was locking the outside door behind her, and he got out and opened and closed the rear door for her and Luke, introduced her to Meredith, who was in the front seat—and who, Duncan said, teaches high school. Luke was quiet, watchful, as they drove the plowed road that gleamed darkly between the snowbanks edging white-strewn fields and pastures and tinseled forests and snowcapped roofs atop homes and farms that reminded June of Christmas card scenes. She too was quiet, watchful, as always somewhat awkward with Duncan, now shy because of Meredith, and apprehensive because she didn’t know what to expect; she’d never been to Oldman’s and had never celebrated Thanksgiving, hadn’t ever even heard of Thanksgiving before going to school, where she and the other children were taught to draw blackclad Pilgrims in buckled shoes and strange hats, enormous brown turkeys with fanned tails and red crests, and were introduced to the holiday’s mythology and the feast to be reenacted, which her mother, whether at the trailer or not, ignored. We didn’t come from Pilgrims, what crap, her mother spat out upon glancing at the only Pilgrim-turkey-wilderness drawing June ever took home. What lazy bastards teachers are, her mother continued in a fury, instead of teaching they sit around with their feet up while you kids draw stupid stuff.

  Auntie, to whom June had later given the drawing and who had taped it over one of the windows already covered with newspaper, told her: Problem with your mother is that she ain’t ever thought she’s got anything to be thankful about, except maybe her own two feet. Now, my people were grateful to feast whenever they could, but they never did take to the notion of setting aside one day a year to celebrate their thanks, especially as there was no telling whether there’d be anything on the table. You can’t count on good times just because you’re supposed to, and there’s no pretending otherwise.

  And the pristine scenery flowed slowly by, Duncan behind the wheel, June wondering if her mother still lived in that trailer heavy with cigarette smoke, the rug stained with beer and coffee and liquor spills, the smell of burning dust given off by the electric heater; and if she was still alive, whether at this moment she was walking off, wordlessly passing by Auntie and maybe those two men who came and went in that high-cabbed truck, her mother not looking at them standing near the drive, refusing to see them and heedless of the wind that buffeted her gait and made the electric wires sing and the trailers shudder and creak and list, her mother heedless and just heading off as she always did, following a spiraled circle that led from the outside in, the one—Auntie always said—June’s mother had been marked from birth to walk. Which was, according to Auntie, not June’s path.

  And it won’t ever be yours, June promised Luke silently as they pulled into Oldman’s, the sight of which astonished June. The farmhouse seemed to her immense, picture-postcard perfect; but she foun
d herself even more astounded by one of Oldman’s dogs that materialized to greet them, for it was so similar to the dog which had harried and rescued her and Luke at the shore—it had that creature’s coloring and shagginess and size, the same gold-specked dark eyes, and it circled her and Luke in the drive with the same bounding joy she’d never forget—that she later couldn’t quite bring herself to believe Oldman when he told her he’d had the dog for many years and that it had never left the property. Or later bring herself to quite believe that for the rest of that day, at Oldman’s with Duncan and Meredith and Luke, she hadn’t been under a spell.

  They’d feasted, and she never told them that this was her first Thanksgiving meal, that she was overwhelmed by Oldman’s table, with its fish and fowl—he explained to her that he tried to be as true to the first Thanksgiving as possible—and corn pudding, squashes, potatoes, mushrooms, baked apples. They made her feel welcome, Oldman and Meredith—and even Duncan, as much as he trusted himself to—fussing over Luke, no one asking anything of June, no one mentioning Iris, and she sat and ate and listened to the others talk over the course of the afternoon about local people and affairs June knew nothing about. She wasn’t uncomfortable at all, but wasn’t drawn into the conversation until late in the day, when Meredith—who had a passion for handmade quilts and had knocked on the doors of families who had what she described as one-of-a-kind heirlooms, which she wanted to document before they disintegrated or disappeared—was told by Oldman that June had been taught to sew by hand as a child and did so yet. Meredith didn’t hesitate, she immediately asked June if she’d be interested in examining the quilts she’d found, explain to Meredith the various stitches, perhaps even duplicate them? Oldman, she said, had already offered to photograph the quilts, create an archive of what he called Meredith’s rescue-from-oblivion project. When June hesitated, Meredith—thinking her reluctance might be due to having no one to watch Luke—told her of course she expected June to bring the baby along, no one would mind; but it was Duncan who, with a meaningful look, said he’d make sure Oldman and Meredith respected what he called, in his lawyerly fashion, June’s legitimate obligations. At which Meredith had told June: You know, we could arrange to do it on Sunday afternoons, it’s easiest to see people then—

  And afterward have dinner here, Oldman interjected, at which June caught Duncan’s surprised expression; he’d raised his eyebrows and sat back, ruminating as if disturbed. June didn’t know that Duncan had only recently broken his longstanding tradition of spending Sunday afternoons alone with Oldman, for he’d brought Meredith into the mix, and was simply reacting to the notion that those Sunday afternoons would now include June and Luke as well. Not that Duncan would have said he objected to Meredith’s suggestion, but Oldman’s swift reaction, his obvious attachment to the girl and her child, left Duncan to again consider that Oldman appeared to be repeating history by taking to this girl who now lived at Iris’s, in what had been Claire’s cottage; indeed, Duncan was so wary of Oldman’s eagerness to include June, nestle her ever more firmly under his wing, that he later, when alone with Oldman, said emphatically—not to admonish but to clearly state—Oldman, she’s not Claire. To which Oldman as emphatically replied, That’s what I’m counting on, despite sensing that his rejoinder might have cut to the quick, suspecting that Duncan—who had never admitted to Oldman or anyone else that he hadn’t allowed himself to utter the words that would have stayed Claire, kept her close—had, for many years and perhaps even now, felt Claire’s absence as his loss.

  June—because of Duncan’s expression, the backward shift in his chair—hesitated, but Meredith continued on, telling June how she’d come to be interested in such an arcane craft no longer practiced by hand and almost dead now—hardly anyone made quilts anymore—pausing only when Oldman left to answer the phone and then going silent when he returned and said to Duncan, Claire’s on the line. Duncan didn’t excuse himself, just peremptorily placed a hand on Meredith’s shoulder as he rose, then wordlessly left the room. Meredith looked suddenly abashed, somewhat lost, and it took her a moment to recover, manage a smile, return to persuading June to join her, them, on those future Sundays. June didn’t yet know who Claire was, and she didn’t ask, instead watchfully listened to Meredith again until Meredith interrupted herself when Duncan returned to the table and remarked to Oldman, So she’s quit the newspaper—you never said.

  Well, after all, Oldman stated evenly, she’s always had a way of letting you know in her own time.

  Duncan didn’t respond, and Meredith looked to hold her breath. I’m going to show June the rest of the house, Oldman said, and he took June and Luke through the rooms on each of the three floors. He didn’t hurry, took his time reminiscing as to what the house had been like when three generations lived in it, which rooms had been inhabited by his parents and paternal grandparents, how the place had been added on to, what he’d done to repair and restore the flooring and wainscoting in places; how, despite having electricity since he could remember, they’d had iceboxes rather than a refrigerator and a woodstove in which—the summer heat be damned—his mother and grandmother baked bread twice a week; that they had indoor plumbing and running water in the upstairs bathrooms but a hand pump, long since replaced, in the kitchen; that the curtains had been sewn by his mother and her mother, the rag rug hooked by hand, the farm implements now hanging on the walls mostly forged by blacksmiths. June was silent, seemingly intimidated, until they came to examine the quilt in what he called the museum room, at which she came to life as he encouraged her to indeed agree to be a part of Meredith’s—and now his—plan.

  Which she did. It took time for June to grow used to being part of a small circle, to understand that she was useful to Meredith—she was adept at copying the quilting stitches and patterns—and that Oldman, whose reasons for looking out for her she never questioned nor quite understood, delighted in her company, that even Duncan slowly gave over to being less officious with her. And that Iris, removed from that circle, had eventually opened herself—not her arms, only Luke was allowed her embraces—in the only way she could to June, which was through her evolving needs and ongoing illness and her dogged absorption in raising and loving Luke.

  Three years on, and none of them—Oldman, Duncan, Meredith, Iris—had ever asked June about her past or about her future, which she only considered in terms of continuing what she was doing and in terms of what she would feel when Luke began school. Oldman eventually saw to it that June opened a savings account and became an indispensable member of his Sunday clique, and he watched her admiration for the craftsmanship he and Meredith documented evolve into a confidence in her own talents, for she was now quilting, creating her own patterns, and making bedcovers for Oldman and Meredith, Iris and Mabel, Luke; and she hadn’t forgotten her abandonment, but the anguish with which she’d been crushed had lessened, she’d learned to trust the present, which allowed her fear of the future to diminish, so that now—June looking out over the garden, sitting on the porch stoop and watching the squirrels busy themselves, calculating that their heavy coats presaged an early, hard winter—with Claire present because Iris had called and told her It’s time, I need to see you, and without June knowing the reason but suspecting, sensing, the change to come, June continued to draw on an inner strength born of the stability she’d been granted here by chance.

  And Iris was right: Claire didn’t appear for lunch or dinner or at all, not that day or the next. Iris didn’t mention her daughter further, and June didn’t ask. She wouldn’t have known that Claire had finally returned to see her mother had Sam not knocked on the cottage door to tell June that Claire had asked him to let her know they were here, that she might be a while with Iris, that she wanted to speak to June, that she’d be by later. Hands in pockets, Sam hunched in the chill—he was wearing a woolen hunting shirt June recognized as Oldman’s over a light sweater—and stood just beyond the door June hadn’t fully opened. She caught the scent of woodsmoke from her fireplace’s chim
ney and saw it wisp by in blue strands above and beyond Sam, who looked away as if in embarrassment, then cleared his throat to ask if he might come in, wait for Claire, and for a few seconds she stood dumbstruck until Sam awkwardly added: If it’s no bother—I mean, she might be a while. Of course, how rude of me, come in, June apologized, and closed the door behind her first visitor; Oldman has never set foot in the cottage, this haven has remained inviolable out of June’s respect for Iris’s privacy and also because she’s never considered having company here, not even Meredith. And now, she thinks, this: this tall, lean man, a perfect stranger, whom Luke is delighted to see and who seems even more uncomfortable and shy than June but who pulls up a chair and sits at the table with the boy, talks with him as Luke finishes putting the final pieces of a puzzle in place while June adds a few pieces of cordwood to the fire and then sits before it. And within a half-hour—they haven’t spoken, he’s been involved with her son—Sam takes a seat in the other armchair that faces the blaze, Luke settling into his lap: and she is, as always, amazed at how loving Luke is, how trusting, having long enjoyed both Iris’s and Oldman’s arms and attentions, as he now leans back against Sam’s chest, the two of them silently gazing at the flames. Sam doesn’t turn to her—the damaged side of his face and that eyepatch are to the wall, the profile she sees is unblemished, even handsome, the man has high cheekbones and an aquiline nose, full mouth, chiseled jaw—when he speaks, just stays as he is and says, It’s been a long time since I’ve held a kid. How long? Luke asks, and Sam takes a deep breath, breathes out. About six years, he answers. He doesn’t explain—but he later told Oldman—that the last child he had in his arms was in Vietnam, when the company he was in was charged with winning hearts and minds, which meant wrenching villagers from their homes in hamlets that were to be destroyed, relocating them in compounds where they were expected to re-create their lives with whatever they’d carried and whatever was on hand, Sam and other GIs helping the mothers by carrying their smallest children—the kids were mostly naked, he recounted to Oldman, and so thin, their bodies were as light as birds, you saw all their bones—but he doesn’t mention this to June, just feels Luke’s small body resting into him, feels his own limbs loosen, almost becomes drowsy because of the warmth thrown off by the fire and by the flames’ mesmerizing effect. He shakes off his impulse to close his eyes, brings himself to comment on how strangely fire fascinates. Oldman claims it stirs something in us we can’t quite remember, June replies quietly, something ancient that’s born with us. Oldman, Sam says, resting his chin atop the boy’s head as Luke reaches up, touches Sam’s hair, is a remarkable man.