Digging In: A Novel(31)
Byron continued to complain, and I knew what he was really doing, which was throwing all of his energy into whining. It was what we “creatives” did when we were stuck. And we were all stuck. Cranky, distracted, and impatient, the six of us had spent the morning bouncing around on our exercise balls like a bunch of toddlers, rudely bumping into each other, as if we could smash a good idea out of ourselves. We’d even settle for a halfway decent idea. Lukas knew what was going on and wisely left us alone. If he breathed down our necks at all, we’d all probably have simultaneous nervous breakdowns.
“This cheese is amazing,” Rhiannon announced, bending over to throw out the biodegradable sample cup. Once the bearded, suspendered cheese man got a good look at her cleavage, she slowly rolled up and winked at him.
“A vile display,” Byron seethed. “But . . .” Byron’s eyes glazed over, and he got the look, the one that said that an idea had finally burst into the right side of his brain. He grabbed Rhiannon’s hand. “Let’s go back to the office.”
“What?” She yanked her hand back. “Don’t touch me.”
“Sorry,” Byron said, sheepish for once. “But I’ve thought of something.”
Rhiannon’s whole demeanor changed. “You did?” With a final wink at the confused cheese man, she pushed Byron in the direction of Guh. “Run. Now. Get it down on paper.”
After they left, a restlessness hit us, and we went our separate ways, searching for our lightning bolt idea, hoping a little bit of Byron’s magic had leaped to us. My mind moved in endless circles, and I wandered through the stalls, not really seeing anything.
“Your boss has got some issues,” a voice said, and it took me a moment to realize it was Mykia. I’d been drawn to her stall, again and again, but I was simultaneously avoiding Lukas.
“Did you give him some dandelion greens to help him out?”
She laughed. “I think he needs some stronger stuff.”
“He’s a stress case,” I agreed.
“I think there’s more to it than that.” She shrugged. “But what do I know? Let’s talk about you. How’s the garden?”
I described the raised beds her men had constructed, the rows of tomatoes, the blackberry bushes. When I got to them, I told her about the metal box and the treasures we found inside.
“Glynnis and Jackie think my neighbor might be a serial killer.” I should have included myself in that theory, but I sensed the story was less tabloid sensational and more plain old human sadness.
“Did you ask him?”
“No! That would be . . . awkward. And anyway, he’s furious I started the garden in the first place.”
“I say ask him. What do you have to lose?”
A secret, I thought. Finders keepers. It felt good to hold something inside that didn’t have anything to do with grief.
Mykia tossed a bundle of peppermint at me. “Make some tea with this. But don’t plant any in your garden.”
“Why?”
“It’s invasive, and you’re not experienced.”
“But I like mint.” I smiled at her. “What would a mojito be without it?”
She shot me a measured look. “You want something else in control of your garden, or do you want to be in charge?”
“Well, when you put it that way.” I found my reusable produce bag and started to fill it with Mykia’s produce. I chose randomly, focused on a variety of colors instead of using my supermarket strategy of planning meals in my head. My sense of smell helped—the sharp tang of onions, the earthiness of asparagus, the childhood-memory-inducing sweetness of ripe strawberries. My grandmother always made shortcake. It was Jesse’s favorite.
“What are you making tonight?” Mykia asked.
“I hadn’t thought of it. Maybe I’ll just mix all this stuff up and call it dinner.”
Mykia paused before saying, “I can come over and help you out. You’ll have to pay attention, though.”
That was usually a problem. Jesse’s death diminished my attention span to zilch. Mykia would get frustrated with me. Why bother?
But then I thought I should try.
Jesse and I were never a social couple. We’d had to lean on each other for so long that we’d gotten used to being a duo. Our uniquely shared history made it difficult to get to know another couple in a meaningful way, and our innate distrust of strangers made it hard to get to know us very well. Sure, we went to school fund raisers, and when Trey was younger, I met up with some of the neighborhood moms for coffee or drinks. Jesse coached Trey’s T-ball team, but Trey’s athletic career was short-lived, and Jesse missed out on most of the bonding rituals of the local dads. He didn’t stop off for a few with the guys after work, and I usually worked late, even on Fridays. When I got into my car after such a long day, it never even occurred to me to head anywhere but home.
Typically, Jesse and I loved being homebodies. We ordered in and rented a movie on most weekend nights, especially after Trey discovered a social life of his own. Once in a while we’d splurge and go into the city in search of some new hot spot Jesse had read about in Chicago magazine. Some might have seen our life together as boring, but we knew how valuable boring was. Like order, boring was safe. We could rely on it.
We were happy together. We lived in a bubble.