The Unfinished Garden

by Barbara Claypole White

  “Goodness. What’s going on out here? I was on the phone when I heard a scream.” Tilly swiveled toward her mother’s voice, but too quickly. Multicolored lights swam before her eyes. She clutched at her head, trying to keep the world steady.

  “Hmm. Something smells good.” Mrs. Haddington hopped through the French doors and beamed at Sebastian, unruffled by the desire in his eyes as Rowena wiped dirt from his chin. Tilly frowned at her mother. She had known, her mother had known all along. “Hello, Rowena dear. Have you been cooking that delicious pheasant lasagna again? That was Sari, by the way. On the phone.”

  What phone? Tilly hadn’t heard the phone. She hadn’t heard anything beyond her body expelling the truth, along with the dregs of her duty-free gin.

  “Darling? Are you all right?”

  Tilly laughed. “Too much reality and too much gin. Sebastian and—” She watched as Rowena’s arm found Sebastian’s waist, and he mirrored her movement. Sebastian and Rowena: two halves of a whole. “Sebastian and Rowena are leaving,” Tilly said. “And I’m going to lie down. I feel a migraine coming on.”

  “Poor you. I’ll make this quick, then. Sari says not to worry,” her mother continued. “She’s taken down the porch swing, put the garden art and outside furniture in the garage—” Mrs. Haddington checked off items on her fingers as if running through a shopping list “—dragged all your pots under the deck. And boarded up the basement window. If the phone lines go down, she’ll contact you when she can. And she’s sorry she didn’t call earlier, but they didn’t discover the storm had shifted until they turned on the morning news and then the excrement, I believe, hit the fan.” Mrs. Haddington wrinkled her upper lip.

  “What are you blathering on about?” Tilly mumbled, holding her head.

  “Hurricane Evelyn,” her mother replied. “The eye is projected to pass over the Triangle.”

  “Hurricane Evelyn? But it pounded the coast of Florida and then petered out across the Atlantic. They were talking about it yesterday on Radio 4.”

  “Evidently things changed during the night. It picked up strength over the ocean and veered northwest. Made landfall at Wilmington as a category three. But Sari said it’s been downgraded to a category two.” Her mother gave her best-foot-forward smile, when her lips disappeared into a thin line and the dimples on either side of her mouth became so pronounced she looked ridiculously girlish. “Not too bad, then.”

  No, not to someone who remembered rationing, but then her mother hadn’t cowered in the basement listening to apocalyptic cracks and booms as Hurricane Fran had toppled sixty-foot oaks like giant bowling skittles. And that was before Tilly had the greenhouse. Bugger. How did you protect a structure made entirely of plastic sheeting?

  Inside the house, Monty barked. That ruddy dog. Would he never shut up?

  “What did she say about the greenhouse? Has she—” Tilly gave a halfhearted laugh and forced the pads of her fingers into her temples. Clearly, she was the one having the breakdown after all. An episode of delirium, no doubt, generated by stress and blue gin. Had to be, because the tall, scowling man striding around the side of the house with matching luggage was, at this precise moment, disembarking from a plane in North Carolina.

  “Either this is a really bad migraine, or I’m ready for the cuckoo shack.” Her voice sounded scratched, like a worn-out record. “You here for the floor show?” she asked the James doppelganger. “’Cos I’ve got to tell you, we’re putting on one helluva performance tonight.”

  He dropped his duffel, swung his suit carrier off his shoulder and unhooked his backpack. “They kept us in the departure lounge for hours delaying the flight in thirty-minute increments until they could confirm the path of the hurricane it was hell Tilly.” Normally James spoke slowly, but he sounded breathless, as if he were dashing to force out his words before speech failed him. “It was hell. Then they canceled the flight and told us to come back tomorrow but I can’t, Tilly, I can’t get on a plane.” He glanced at her mother. “I’m a nervous traveler,” he said, and began twisting his hair.

  Adverse weather and travel delays were triggers for his OCD; Tilly knew that. It was all about control, he had explained once. But surely life was a big ol’ crapshoot no matter who you were.

  James fastened his gaze on Tilly and blinked through a constant rhythm of anxiety; Rowena and Sebastian stared at her, waiting for absolution; swallows searched for insects with a soft collective whistle that seemed to say, We need, we need. Everyone needed, and everyone would have to wait. She’d reached the end, hit her wall of concrete.

  Tilly tented her fingers and stared inside. The shape she’d created was a tepee, a place to hide from the demands of others, a place from which to watch the amber sunshine leak through the clouds.

  A thought lambasted her, and she let out an exclamation. Her mind had gone straight to the greenhouse, but what about the two-hundred-year-old oak that dangled over David’s studio, the tree that was dying? If it fell, what would happen to the shelves behind David’s desk, his high altar stacked with journals and books filled with his words, his theories, his passion? Why hadn’t she called the tree surgeon before the hurricane season started? Because of some ridiculous ideal about the sanctity of the tree’s life. And now she would pay.

  * * *

  Her face confirmed what he knew. He shouldn’t have come back. Why, why had he come back? Because, like a homing fucking pigeon, he could think only of returning to Tilly. Either way, he was screwed. Couldn’t leave, couldn’t stay.

  Had to do this alone; couldn’t do it without Tilly.

  Don’t hate me, please, don’t hate me.

  His head jerked like a short-circuiting robot, and his arms shook. He had to stop trembling. But he couldn’t; he couldn’t control the anxiety.

  Rowena smiled at him, and he tried to smile back. She was—arm in arm with Sebastian? She’d told him? Good for her, good for her. But that meant…Sebastian wasn’t in love with Tilly? How could that be? Sebastian had loved Tilly his whole life. Rowena had said that was why his marriage failed, why his wife had the affair. Sebastian wasn’t in love with Tilly? God Almighty, poor Tilly. He should go to her, try and help, try and be…what? The consolation prize? How could he help anyone? He couldn’t even help himself. He was shaking; he couldn’t stop shaking.

  Get a grip, James, get a grip. Virginia was staring at him, must think he was an escaped lunatic. As good as, Virginia, as good as. He had to twist his hair, had to twist his hair because tomorrow he had to get on a plane. He had to force himself to get back to Heathrow tomorrow and get. On. A. Plane. And if he didn’t twist his hair, the plane would crash and he would die. He would die, without telling Tilly how much he loved her. How he had messed up. How he should never have walked away. How he could never walk away from Tilly.

  “That’s it. Shoo.” Tilly flicked her hand. But she didn’t mean him, right?

  Of course she does. You’re a troll; she hates you.

  “I’m serious, here.” Tilly raised her voice. “Leave. I need to call Sari while she still has phone service. All of you, scram, before I get nasty.”

  “Even me?” Isaac appeared and bobbed under Tilly’s arm. He squealed, “James!” and tried to break free, but Tilly secured him in place. She wasn’t even going to let Isaac near him? He needed a hug so bad, and Isaac gave the best. Please, Tilly.

  “No, Angel Bug. You’re the only one who belongs. Sorry, Mum. Other than you.”

 
“But—” James said, his fist still buried in his hair.

  Sebastian picked up James’s duffel. “Come on, mate. I think she means it.”

  Chapter 28

  Empty windows framed the night and gable ends pointed into the sky like the rigging on the Marie Celeste. The stone hull of the Dower House was a roofless shell of history, nothing more. Tilly tugged on Monty’s lead and headed away from the ruin. There was no pain in her head now that she had doped herself with Imitrex, just the residue of a weak migraine and the fog of mental white noise. She could almost believe she was numb. Almost.

  Halfway around the world a hurricane was tearing up her life, the one she had finally decided to keep, but in the fields surrounding Bramwell Chase, the air was still with a slight nip that promised dew. The moon glowed the color of goldenrod and the starless sky was turquoise, an opaque tone that reminded Tilly of sunlight absorbed into her neighbor’s artificial pond. Alongside her, The Chase reached forward and backward like a never-ending tear.

  At Creeping Cedars there was no bright twilight such as this, but nothing could compare to the wonder of a clear Piedmont night, when the sky became a magician’s cape embroidered with stars of white gold thread, stretched across the stratosphere. How she loved to sit on the porch swing and search for shooting stars in her private planetarium above the treetops. If one treasured object survived the storm, something on which to hang her hope, let it be the porch swing.

  Tilly turned left at the estate road, leaving the lights of the village and the sporadic drone of traffic behind. Her Doc Martens squelching on the tarmac, she made for the gamekeeper’s cottage and the shooting lodge. Once she had passed both, she would be out in the open, exposed on the estate road to Manor Farm. On a clear day, you could see across two counties from up there.

  The sky lost its luster, but Tilly strode on, finding calm in the descending darkness. Nighttime had a way of stripping life to its essentials, of lending perspective as it swept away distractions, including the apology she owed her mother.

  Good one, Tilly.

  To start an argument with Mrs. Haddington was to finish an argument with Mrs. Haddington, which meant she would wait up for Tilly, even if Tilly stayed out until dawn. Dumping on her mother had been stupid and self-defeating, but the throwaway comment—I suppose I should find an estate agent. After all, they won’t want two homes, will they?—had shoved Tilly over the edge. Along with the let’s-make-the-best-of-it smile that had landed in Tilly’s stomach like a right hook. They. Already Sebastian and Rowena had become they. Suspecting they were a couple when Tilly hadn’t talked to Sebastian in ten years had barely left a bruise. But witnessing his declaration of love for her best friend after weeks of sifting through her own feelings for him, with said best friend, felt like an emotional gutting. Okay, so despite her best intentions, not numb. But come on. How many years had she and Rowena loved the same boy, the same man? And in all that time Rowena hadn’t found one opportunity to sneak in a quick “I have a crush on your ex”? Not even after Tilly married and skipped the country?

  Why did she feel cheated? Rejection, hurt, even anger, Tilly could understand, but she sure as hell didn’t want to own this childish feeling that insisted she had lost when she should have won. After all, she and Rowena were hardly ten years old, competing against each other for blue ribbons in horse shows.

  Of course, she could start finger-pointing to explain away these eddies of emotions. Maybe Sebastian had encouraged hope; maybe Rowena had tricked him into a secret tryst. Her relationship with Rowena had been the cornerstone of Tilly’s life, had guided her through death not once, but twice. And it had flourished on secrets. Had it also been built on lies? Where did you run to when the past was pitted with more sinkholes than the future?

  Duped, that was how she felt. Clearly, she was the only person not to realize Rowena and Sebastian had the hots for each other. She could have scraped the lust off the patio with a trowel, not that it seemed to bother anyone else. Isaac didn’t blink when he saw them draped around each other; James showed no surprise whatsoever. Had he known? Had Rowena trusted him and not Tilly?

  A muntjac barked, an eerie call that frightened Tilly even though she’d grown used to the cry of coyotes. She shivered, grateful for the snuffling noises as Monty shoved his muzzle into a rabbit hole, oblivious to the hedgehog lumbering across the road. Lucky hedgehog. Two minutes earlier and Monty would’ve pounced. See, even spines couldn’t protect you from the inevitability of death. When your number was up, you could only pray to go quickly, unlike David. No, she didn’t want to think about this, not now. Her best friend had punched her to the floor; her childhood sweetheart had kicked her; a hurricane had stomped on her; she was going to leap up and ask for more?

  Evidently, she was.

  As a child, Tilly loved the comfort of repetition, loved using the same Spirograph cog to create an identical pattern over and over, always going inward, always getting smaller. And yet she was still shrinking, still circling back to the living will, to the five days David hung on, to her broken promise. How could anyone punch through so many layers of guilt? Or was this darker than guilt? Had this become obsession?

  Panic tasered her with memories she didn’t want to own. She was going under…no air…only pain. And James’s voice, deep and soothing: Concentrate on your breath, Tilly. Breathe in through your nose. Fill your abdomen, then your chest—

  Not helping! She clawed at her scalp, trying to tear out the image of David’s body violated by the breathing tube. What had James said about fighting intrusive thoughts? Think, Tilly, think. Aha! Cultivate detachment, that was one trick. Been there, done that—sort of—for three years. Monumental failure. Okay, what else? Logic! Right, now she was getting somewhere. Why was she convinced that David had changed his mind about the living will? Simple, because he’d hung on. But why? Simple again, because he couldn’t leave her. But what if she flipped that thought. What if he had hung on because she was the one who couldn’t leave? Suppose, oh God, suppose her presence had tethered David to the nothingness he had dreaded?

  Tilly cried out and Monty whirled around, taut with guard dog instincts. Panic swelled, and her eyes burned with tears. And again, she thought of James. If he could confront his fear, so could she. She must stay in that hospital room, she must comb through the memory, because buried in it, somewhere, there had to be forgiveness.

  Use the gifts James gave you, Tilly. Use logic. She breathed slowly. First, she would focus on David’s personality, on his love of grand gestures. No one ever accused David of thinking small. And just suppose that had led him to the ultimate sacrifice—a desire to save her from the moment of his death. That was as honorable as giving up the last life vest, and so utterly David.

  Good, now she was getting somewhere. Her fear thermometer was dropping. But there was a problem with this scenario. David would never choose to die alone. He hated being alone, needed people in attendance always. Hell, he couldn’t even stay at the house by himself. Although, that was due to his fear of nature. When he was holed up in the studio with hypotheses, he drowned out the forest with R.E.M. or Law & Order reruns. Tilly smacked her head. Of course! That was it. The panic disappeared as abruptly as a twister pulling back into the clouds and left behind a nugget of fact: When David needed focus he isolated himself. He would laugh and say her presence distracted him, and then he would seek out seclusion.

  For five days she had been so determined to guide him through
the final seconds of his life, so determined to be with him as he took his last breath, that she had never considered how death, like grief, was a journey you took alone. And if that were true, then maybe the person she needed forgiveness from was not David, but herself.

  * * *

  Tilly spread her arms and spun until she was dizzy. “Whoa.” She stopped and opened her eyes. Dawn was coming, she could feel it. Finally, a daybreak she welcomed.

  The ancient humps of ridge and furrow in the fields below rose up to greet her. Tilly loved it here, under the beech trees that lined the end of the estate road. Her lost spot, she used to call it—the place she had come to escape her sisters, a live-in best friend, hordes of pets, and later, the demands of Sebastian’s devotion.

  A red fox dashed across one of the fields below, so different from the gray fox that sauntered through her front yard with the attitude, “I’m takin’ ma own sweet time.” She sure was looking forward to seeing that Southern fox again.

  Her body hummed with energy as if she were warming up for a race. No more spinning with flight but not direction. Tomorrow was today, and there was so much to do—pack to go home, plan the future of her business, paint her bedroom red if she so wished. No, sod the paint, she would put down rugs!

  “I love you, David,” she yelled. “And I’m sorry, but the library has to go. The MGB, too. And I’m buying rugs for the bedroom.” The air snatched up her words and carried them toward Manor Farm, where lights blazed on the ground floor. The naked sash window in the kitchen was flung open, and a tall figure was braced against the frame. So, he hadn’t slept, either. Had he been keeping vigil for her?

  Tilly held her breath. James couldn’t see her from there, couldn’t hear her, but could he sense her, sense that connection they had shared from the moment they had met, the feeling that had terrified her? Had that been love? Had she gambled and made the wrong choice, chosen Sebastian when she should have chosen James?