A Different Blue(122)

could tell. Women have a sense about these things. There was something going on between Wilson

and me. And she knew it. I just shrugged. Not my problem.

“Really, Pammy. Head on up to my flat. I'll just be a minute. There's no reason for you to

stand in the cold,” Wilson insisted.

It wasn't really very cold, although December in the desert can be surprisingly nippy. But I

guess if I was wearing a tiny tennis outfit instead of jeans, work gloves, and a flannel shirt I

might be cold, too. I didn't know what Pamela was worried about. My hair was a ratty nest. In

fact, I was pretty sure I was sporting a few twigs. My nose was red, my cheek scratched, and I

wouldn't be turning any heads, including Wilson's. Pamela must have arrived at the same

conclusion, because she gave me a long look and flounced away, calling that she would just turn

on the “telly” for a bit.

“Pammy?” I mocked, rolling a four foot section of a tree I'd razed down my makeshift ramp.

“When we were little, everyone called her Pammy. It slips out every now and again.”

I snorted, not having anything to say but feeling disdainful anyway.

“Why did you leave without telling anyone where you were going, Blue?” Wilson called over his

shoulder as he descended the ramp, juggling an armful of juniper. He proceeded down the stairs

to the basement, and I decided that meant he didn't need an answer or he didn't think he was

going to get one. He loped back up seconds later and resumed talking as if he hadn't left.

“I didn't even know you were gone until yesterday morning. Then I started to worry.”

“I didn't leave without telling anyone. I just didn't tell you,” I replied shortly. “This is

the last piece, but it's heavier than hell. Get on the other end, will ya?” I directed him,

changing the subject. I didn't want to justify my absence. He had been the one ignoring me, not

the other way around.

[page]Wilson grabbed the end of two heavy, tangled branches I was struggling to hoist. Two

separate branches had grown out of two different trees that had been growing side by side, and

the branches had overlapped, wrapping around the other, the smaller branches tangling and

intertwining. The branch from one tree had been damaged and was split at its base. Had it not

been wrapped around the branch from the other tree it would have come down on its own. I had to

climb both trees to cut each branch loose, sawing off the branch that wasn't split, and severing

the few jagged connections of the one that was. It had cost me a hole in my jeans and a long

scratch on my right cheek, but it would be worth it in the end.

The imagery of the fused branches was compelling and suggestive of something innate to every

human heart – the need to touch, the need to connect – and I knew exactly what it would look

like when I finished. When I'd first seen it, I had ached for something I had denied myself

since I walked out of Mason's garage apartment a year ago. But it wasn't the physical release I

yearned for. Not entirely. It was the closeness, the connection. But the thought of going back

to a time when I'd slaked a physical need at the expense of an emotional one didn't appeal any

longer. And so I was left with the ache and no idea how to soothe it.

Wilson and I teetered down the stairs, facing each other through scrubby branches and prickly