I smiled at her, and she smiled at me, our hearts too full for words. I kissed her, finally, and she kissed me back like a promise. Like a vow. Together in the wind, in the chill, under a sky full of clouds and sun and the promise of rain. And I looked out at the Wanaka Tree. A fence post, and a willow. Strong and graceful and determined to live.
A tree exactly like Daisy.
Kiwi strong.
59
Same as It Ever Was
Daisy
I woke up on the last day of January, over a year later, looked up at the radiating spokes of the yurt’s roof, the blue of the sky overhead, and remembered. Today was the day I got to see the house. The workmen had departed last night in a final rush of debris-hauling, dusty utes pulling out of the drive and heading up the track. They were a crew Uncle Aaron had put together. Gabriel, Raphael, and the others who’d left the cult since.
Our house had been remodeled by Mount Zion hands that weren’t in Mount Zion anymore, and Gilead was in prison. I can’t tell you how much pleasure those two things gave me.
Oh, not everybody had left. My parents were still there, and so were some of my siblings, and about half of the others. But Prudence was with us, though her name was Priya now. Priya, an Indian name. It meant “beloved,” and she was. She was at Honor’s house, though, with Frankie and Oriana. They’d gone to stay for the long summer holidays, because I was working and studying, and Gray was working, too. In the final stages of his University of Otago projects, and starting on the next ones. Meeting his deadlines.
Honor had told us a few months back, during one of her frequent visits, “I always wanted to be a grandmother. Never thought I’d get the chance. I’ve got a few granddaughters now, though, I reckon.”
Gray had looked at her, amusement in his eyes, and said, “I’m not touching that.”
I couldn’t lie here any longer. I threw back the blanket, got out of bed, and got my clothes on. And then I went out to find Gray.
He was in the front garden with Xena, who was lying beside him as he pruned bushes, and with Iris, who was on the riding mower.
I had flowers now. Lavender and roses, fuchsia and crucifix orchids, and more. Purple and red and pink and orange, the colors of an Otago sunrise. The bushes were small, but they would grow. Everything grew, if you gave it moisture and sunlight and care.
I went to him, smelling fresh-mown grass and sunshine, and he straightened at the sight of me. I wrapped my arms around his waist and said, “It’s barely eight. How long have you been out here?”
“Couldn’t sleep,” he admitted. “Too excited.”
“Mm.” I kissed his chest, sure that Iris was watching us and snorting. Never mind. She could snort. She missed Oriana, that was all.
“Course I do,” she’d said, when I’d asked her about it a few days ago. “Free labor, isn’t she.” After she’d dumped a pasteboard box of vegetables on the front porch and shouted, “Greens,” by way of announcing that she’d brought us a gift.
“Flattering, too,” Gray said. “Having her absorb your gardening wisdom and life lessons and all.”
“Making me take on alpacas,” Iris answered. “As if I don’t have enough to do.”
“Mm,” Gray said. “You may have to move out, things have got so complicated and entangled here. All that dangerous emotion. All that troublesome family.”
She glowered at him. “Did I say I was moving out? Who else is going to look after all this? You? That’s never happening.”
“You’re right,” he said. “You’d better stay. And put up with Oriana.”
Well, she could snort all she wanted, because Gray had wrapped his arm around me and was walking up the track with Xena following after, always his devoted shadow.
Off to see the house. Two months’ worth of labor, of saws going from dawn to dusk and sometimes beyond, of hammering and men’s voices calling to each other and dumpsters filled with debris. I’d chosen colors and materials and discussed the design with Gray, but I hadn’t set foot in the place since the first of December. He hadn’t allowed it.
We stopped outside the door, and I said, “Of course, if I hate it, I’m going to say so, and then you’re going to have to decide between ripping it