“Danny is fifteen, gentle as a calf. Smart as a stock horse. He could memorize the Latin names and all the properties of all these plants within a day. Keep you talking about what you love for weeks.”
This idea stirred the ashes of Garner’s heart like the breath of God on embers. No one but Cat had ever taken such interest in his work—no, not even she, now that he saw through the lenses of hindsight. Dotti more than Cat, in fact. A smart boy. The son of Rose couldn’t be otherwise.
Beth had come around the table and now stood beside him without touching him, standing in the gap between their hearts without forcing him to look at her.
“Families go on, don’t they?” she said. “You pass along the good and the bad even if you don’t mean to. But mostly good, I think. You grow all these plants because you want to help people feel better, don’t you? You learn their secrets, you use that knowledge for good. I was going to be a vet, an animal healer. Maybe I got that from you.”
“You were going to be?”
“My father had that in him too—not the veterinary skills, but the goodness. I think you would have liked him if you hadn’t misjudged him so badly. All he ever wanted to do was help people get through life with their heads up. He gave them everything he had—kindness, trust, and this beautiful place to live, good food, the chance to do hard work so they can sleep on their satisfaction at night. I don’t really understand why you objected to it. Isn’t it the same thing that you’re trying to do with all this?” She indicated all the healthy greens and colorful blooms.
“It isn’t safe or smart to surround a woman and her children with maniacs.” The argument lacked his usual passion.
“These ‘maniacs’ have never caused a fraction of the trouble you and I have caused to the people we love most.”
“I’m not to blame for anything!” Garner objected.
Beth’s momentary silence caused him to feel childish and stupid.
“You offer a type of mercy to people who need it,” Beth said. “That’s all my parents and I ever wanted to do. And Danny too. Levi . . . well, I don’t know. Maybe he needs someone like you to help him figure that out. But now we’re the ones who need mercy, I need it. And I don’t have the resources. God gave me this . . . gift, but it can’t pay the bills. Would you please do it for my mom, if not for me? For the sake of everything that is good about that ranch—I’ll agree to anything. Name your terms.”
“I can’t,” he said, and he saw Beth’s confidence falter.
“Levi has already made plans to sell the property to a developer. These men who need the ranch most will lose their home, their livelihood. What I’m asking for isn’t entirely for us, do you see? It’s for them too.”
Garner cleared the knot out of his throat. “They won’t be the first to face that kind of hardship.”
“Mom will lose everything.”
“I’m sorry.” His heart filled with sincerity and his eyes brimmed with disappointment. Any ending but this one, God. It would have been better if you’d let me die.
“I’m begging you. Please.”
“I can’t.”
“You can, but you won’t! You stubborn bull!”
“Careful, girl, I don’t owe you anything.”
“And God didn’t owe you a second life either! But he gave it to you—what are you going to do with it?”
Garner slammed his pruning shears down on the table and took off his gloves. “Is that how this works? You go around giving people gifts they don’t want and then expect something in return? No, I won’t be used that way. But even if I would, it doesn’t matter. There is no money, Beth! Get it? I don’t have squat, and I don’t know who told you I did!”
“You’re lying!”
“I’m telling you the truth like it has never been told in this family. I gave it away! There is—no—money!”
Grandfather and granddaughter faced each other underneath the harsh fluorescent lights. Back when he’d allowed his imagination to dream up grandchildren, he had never envisioned a woman who seemed so worn out, her eyes sinking into black bowls of skin, her lips thin and dragged downward by the weight of the world. She was too young to be so old. Her need and his inability to meet it sucked all the