Dad tells me that he is going to build a greenhouse for Mom. He calls it a “lean-to” because it will lean against the same wall of the house that my room is on. From my bedroom window, he tells me, I can look down at all the plants. I think that sounds okay. Mom does not say much to me about the greenhouse, but she makes me come with her to the farmer’s market on a day so bright I have to squint. Mom speaks softly in a singsong voice as we walk down paths of tomatoes, eggplants, cucumbers, zucchinis, raspberries. She picks up plant after plant, seed after seed, until we both hug our arms full with potted creatures.
When we get home, dad is setting up shelves in the greenhouse. There are tin barrel trash cans under the shelves. Dad knocks on one and it makes a “Dum” sound. 55 Gallons of water, he says. They will collect heat from the sun. Mom smiles and puts the plants and seeds down near the door. She carries one past Dad, brushes her hand across the back of his wrist and puts the small tomato plant with green marble buds on the top shelf. The lean-to is so new that it isn’t working yet, but it is kind of warm the way your body feels when you wake up from a long nap. Mom and Dad spend the rest of the afternoon inside the greenhouse. Dad builds; Mom arranges, tends, makes lemonade for Dad. I watch them from my room, in and out as the sky grows pink and the air blue. I open my window. The room fills with crickets, and when I look outside again, mom is below my window with a single bulb clamp-light. And she is reading in a beach chair.
When it rains hard, sitting inside the greenhouse feels like being inside of a drum, and the rhythm is so quick that I like to dance in the center of all the plants. Some days, I am a jungle warrior. When it snows the greenhouse is so quiet my breath sounds like the ocean. Those days I sit in mom’s beach chair and make declarations like Elbow, Window, Tub and feel how the words drop the moment they leave my mouth. Then dad appears above me and sweeps the snow from the roof with a broom, and inside I watch the snow fall into mountains on the ground.
Sometimes mom’s sister drives in from the country and stays for a weekend. She brings presents like flower tea, homemade jam, and once for me, an Ar – Cz Encyclopedia with a gold spine that said inside the cover Of a very big world. Aunt Evra has big soft curls that are blonde and white at the same time. She can hear colors. She says that every hue is a different pitch of something between a pipe and a bell. Dad rolls his eyes at this. The first time she visits after the greenhouse is built, she takes me inside and sings the harmony of greens.
I look out my window on a very rainy morning. Below me the glass sparkles and sounds like dad drumming his fingers on the kitchen table. I watch the rain falling over the curve of the lean-to and notice a dark spot under the glass. Downstairs, mom and dad are arguing in hushed voices. Well I don’t know how it could’ve gotten in, unless it came through the house! Isn’t there someone we can call about this sort of thing? I am not looking at them because inside the lean-to there is a crocodile sitting next to a shelf of tomato plants. What’s that? I ask, and at the same time mom says alligator and dad says crocodile. Mom looks at dad. I’m pretty sure it’s a crocodile, he says to her. She stares at him some more and then looks at me. There’s nothing to worry about, sweetie. But please go in the kitchen now.
My encyclopedia says that crocodiles are ancient creatures and probably have not changed much since the time of the dinosaurs. They can live for several days at a time without food because they are cold-blooded and lazy. It also says that they only eat fish and stuff, so mom’s plants are safe. Anyway, I was never worried. When I go back downstairs, mom is on the phone and dad is putting a piece of plywood in front of the greenhouse door with some chairs in front of it. I tell them what my encyclopedia says and tell mom she doesn’t have to worry about the plants and they both look at me and then mom asks me to please go to my room.
If I look out my window, I can see the crocodile like I am a bird. He is definitely lazy because he has not moved since I was downstairs. I want to tell him that sometimes, I feel lazy too, so I wave and think he see me. Then he winks. He sees me. Mom and Dad won’t let me go near him but I know he won’t eat me and I think I will go see him tonight. I read my encyclopedia some more and learn about cicadas, Chrysanthemums and Crohn’s disease, an inflammatory bowel disease, and I wonder why anyone would want a disease named after them. Dad knocks on my door and I say he may come in. He sits on my bed and says that Aunt Evra is on the phone and wants me to come visit her. I say Why? He says it is because she is working on something and needs my help. Where’s the crocodile? Dad says he’s still in the greenhouse. I say that I’d like to name him, so dad suggests Eugene. I don’t like that name, so dad suggests Crocky. I think that’s dumb, so instead we name him Crohn.
From the outside, Aunt Evra’s house is a yellow shed with a tiny little porch. It has white shutters and lots of plants all around. Behind the house are the stables, and in the front lawn are her old golden retriever and a new black lab. Wind-chimes hang all over the porch, and when Aunt Evra comes outside they all chime at the same time. The house is very big inside, with two floors. The bottom floor has the kitchen, living room and what Aunt Evra calls “the drawing room” and upstairs is her bedroom with a big canopy bed. The living room smells like muffins and she has tapestries, old instruments, a mirror bigger than me with a fancy gold frame, a china horse collection, a grandfather clock and a big birdcage. And sometimes when I come she has new things. Today, she goes over to a big rusty trunk and pulls out all kinds of purple, red, gold, green fabrics and drapes them over her furniture. She tells me that they are for a play and that she needs me to help her decide who should wear what. She turns on her record player and all day we try on costumes and pretend to be queens.
When the rain stops, Aunt Evra and I sit on her little porch and eat muffins with butter. The air smells like dirt and grass and the sky is metal. I tell Aunt Evra about Crohn. He is purplish green and looks rough and like Dad’s hands. I tell her that he winked at me. She says we must have a connection. Aunt Evra stands on the edge of the porch and looks all around. She goes out into the yard and keeps looking at the sky. What are you looking for? I ask. The rainbow. I can hear it. We walk around to the back near the stables and see a rainbow stretching all the way over the sky and Aunt Evra closes her eyes. And hums.
Mom asks me if I had a fun day. Where is Crohn? I ask and she says, Who? We go inside where she is making grilled cheese sandwiches. Dad pats me on the head. Where is Crohn? I go through the kitchen to the dining room door where the greenhouse is. The plywood is gone and inside the plants are quiet and still. It smells sweet but also like tomatoes. Dad comes up behind me. He doesn’t belong here. I wonder why Crohn doesn’t belong here if I do. A vine of cucumbers is climbing up the wall of the greenhouse and looks like it is going to tangle up in everything. But where is he? Dad says they let him go, but he won’t tell me who they are or where they put him and then I get really angry and go up to my room.
“Belong” is not in my encyclopedia so I look it up in dad’s dictionary. It says, “to be in the relation of a member, adherent, inhabitant, etc. (usually fol. by to)” and I still don’t know what that means.
There is a hibiscus flower in the greenhouse that has not bloomed yet, but it has a big, bulging bud in the middle of its stem. It looks like a snake that swallowed a mouse. Every day the bud slides a little closer to the end of the stem and mom says it should bloom any day now. Aunt Evra comes to stay with me one night while mom and dad are on a date. We sit in the kitchen and wait for the cookies to bake. I am coloring and drawing and Aunt Evra is doing a crossword puzzle. A five letter word for an abundance of water, she says. I say flood, and she smiles at me, then she looks across the kitchen with a funny face. Would you listen to that. Then she stands up, so I follow her, and we go to the greenhouse. The hibiscus flower has exploded into a million flowers and they are everywhere. Red, orange, pink and yellow ones and some multicolored ones are all over the floor and the shelves, and the plant that came from the pot has burst into a bush of tons of flowers. I go into the middle of the greenhouse and try hard not to step on any of the flowers. Aunt Evra laughs and tells me that it sounds like an orchestra.
Aunt Evra gives me a crystal ball for Valentine’s Day and I wish on it for Crohn to come back even though I don’t think you are supposed to wish on crystal balls. Mom is in the kitchen and I know she is baking brownies because I can smell it. I can see my liquidy reflection in the black refrigerator. I ask mom if everyone dies at the same time. Then I hold on to the handles on the refrigerator and hang loose. Mom says “Mmhmmm.” and I think that’s nice because we will all do it at the same time. Mom rinses an eggshell and throws it in the trash.
This story is part of a collection of short fiction entitled,
Things That Lose You. I wrote, designed, illustrated and
bound this collection into a book for my thesis.
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