The Magnolia League - By Katie Crouch Page 0,38

of O-kee-pa hooks, and some Brazilian smudge pots. Just about every kind of folk art is represented somewhere on Sam’s walls, but after that, I’m lost. There are handwoven blankets and rugs draped across his furniture, crystal skulls lining the shelves, crosses covered with icons snipped from tin hanging from the rafters, beadwork dangling from leather headdresses, bottles and vials stoppered with cork and melted wax. And books. There are bookshelves on every wall, bookshelves hiding his bed, bookshelves framing the kitchen, bookshelves attached to the bathroom door, bookshelves in the bathroom.

It’s such a cool place. Why didn’t my grandmother want me to come?

“Man,” I say, looking at Sam. His urban-chic outfit of linen pants and an expensive silk shirt is utterly incongruous with this house. “It’s not exactly what I pictured. I sort of thought you’d live in some slick, modern McMansion.”

“Never judge a man by his clothes,” Sam says. We stand in silence, taking in the chaotic, overwhelming beauty of this place.

“Is all this stuff from when you studied at Yale?”

“Most of it.”

Suddenly, the enchanted air is pierced by the sound of the phone ringing.

“Excuse me, Alex,” he says. “I need to get that.”

He heads for the kitchen, and I walk to one of the bookshelves, which is jammed with all kinds of titles—medical books, Russian novels, cookbooks. A red leather-bound volume is set slightly apart from the rest. I look at the title: Lady Brown’s Book of Conjure and Spells. Copyright, 1943. An overwhelming fragrance drifts up. It’s not the old-book smell I was expecting, but something different. Some sort of exotic herb. I flip through the pages. The margins are filled with handwritten notes.

“What are you doing?” Sam says sharply as he comes back into the room.

“Oh, sorry. I was just—”

He strides briskly toward me and whips the book out of my hand. “You should not be touching that.”

“Sorry,” I say again, backing away. His eyes, usually so kind, are frighteningly cold. But maybe I’m just imagining it. Because when he turns to me after replacing the book on the shelf, his pleasant expression is back. “Let’s go to the garden, shall we?”

“Sure,” I say, following him outside. He leads me down a path lined with a low fence made from driftwood, old bottles, and parts from bicycles and junk cars. The wind is getting stronger, bending the branches above. In front of us there is a high gate with a large, formidable padlock, which Sam opens with a key. When the gate swings open, I can’t help gasping.

The garden is bigger than it looks from the outside—almost a full acre. And it’s exquisite. The ground is crowded with pots that overflow with rich green plants and neon-colored blossoms. Thick flowering vines climb the walls. The garden is like a jungle, but meticulously ordered and maintained. And at the far end stands the most spectacular feature: a screened-in aviary, teeming with brightly colored, unusually plump birds.

I take it in quietly. At the RC, my mom and I built the Sanctuary with our bare hands, planting every herb, every creeper, every shrub and weed and vine ourselves. We weeded and watered it every day, and it was as unique and private as my mother’s soul. And now, at the opposite side of the country, I’ve walked into the other half of the Sanctuary. It’s as if I’d walked into a Barnes & Noble and found her diary for sale on a shelf. For the second time today, I feel an acute, stabbing pang.

“What’s wrong?” Sam asks.

“It’s just that my mom… really would have loved this place.”

Sam smiles sadly. “Your mom did love this place,” he says quietly.

“She was here?”

“Of course. Your mother and I were close friends.”

I shake my head.

“It’s so crazy,” I say. “She had this whole… life before me.”

“Most people who have children do,” Sam says, smiling. He picks a few leaves from a plant I don’t recognize. “I’m going to mix you a batch of Swamp Brew. To help chill you out when your day-to-day becomes overwhelming.”

“Swamp Brew?” I ask. “The same as my mom—”

“Who do you think taught her?” he says. “I’ll be back.”

He disappears into the vines. While he’s gone, I continue to wander around, fingering the plants, the flowers, the pots. The ones I recognize, I name aloud: “Lemongrass. Verbena. Clove. Valerian.”

Yet there are so many more: in one pot, a sticky fern that smells like cotton candy; in a flower bed, a vine that looks exactly like a snake. When