The Wicked Garden (11 page)

Eli cupped Gretchel’s taut, deliciously round backside in his hands and nuzzled her midsection. He let his warm breath pour over her skin. She reacted with a quiver. Eli was trying to reassure Gretchel, trying to let her know that she was safe with him, but he felt like he was also honoring a goddess. Her body was more than a temple—it was nirvana materialized. He could have stayed in that spot eternally.

He reluctantly pulled himself away from the rapture and returned his gaze to her freckled profile. His lips grazed hers. “I’ve seen your scars now. Are you still afraid?”

She wiped away a few stray tears, and then she kissed him, not holding back this time. Soon they were consuming each other.

He moved her to the bed, easing her softly against the paisley pillows. His tongue found a breast and lapped at the stiffness as he tickled her with his mop of curls. His hands slid down her side to find her center, where a hot wetness beckoned him.

He could feel her panting, and then she spoke. “I’ve been waiting a long time for you, Eli.”

CHAPTER TWELVE

Carbondale, 1990s

Summer in Carbondale was turning out to be a blessing—and Eli couldn’t help wondering if his father had had some cosmic presentiment when he asked him to look after the house on Pringle Street. Regardless, Eli owed his old man some serious gratitude. He hadn’t given sailing a single thought since he first laid eyes on Gretchel.

His days revolved around her. He would watch her get ready for her morning run. He would see her off to work. He was there when she got home. They would fall asleep in each other’s arms.

When Gretchel was gone, Eli spent his time writing and taking photographs. When she was around, he was happy to just be near her. Lying on her bed and watching her paint was his idea of paradise.

And she was an amazing lover. Eli was honored that she trusted him, and grateful—boundlessly grateful—for her invention and enthusiasm. He was a lucky, lucky man, and he was smart enough to know it.

They didn’t spend
all
their time in bed—not quite, anyway.

Gretchel started introducing Eli to her favorite wild places. Their second weekend together, they hiked through Giant City and
Garden of the Gods. They both carefully maneuvered their way through Fat Man’s Squeeze, a tiny crevice in the rock formations, Eli—who wasn’t crazy about small spaces—distracted himself by giving Gretchel an impromptu lecture about rites of passage in traditional societies and shamanic journeys to the Underworld. Gretchel, trying hard not to be
too
amused by Eli’s nervousness, told him how Aphrodite went down to Hades to bring Adonis back from the realm of the dead.

The beauty of Southern Illinois surprised Eli. His father had been right to call this god’s country, although Peter would have been much more persuasive if he had also mentioned a certain redheaded goddess residing there. In fact, Gretchel’s presence left Eli feeling content to venture no further than the garden on Pringle Street. As for Gretchel herself, she was restless by nature, but, with Eli, she was learning to slow down. It didn’t take them long to find a pace that pleased them both.

They lay in the backyard hammock one summer twilight, her fingers entwined in his. “I’m not big on wasting time like this, but with you, I don’t mind. With you, even wasting time is magical,” she told him as they swayed back and forth.

“Gretchel, look at that!” Eli lifted his head and pointed toward the woods behind the house. There was a deer gently nibbling at the roses.

Her eyes lit up as they watched it graze. “I love deer. They’re so graceful and majestic. They’re all over our place in Irvine. You know, when I was a kid my daddy taught me how to bow hunt,” she said. Eli was not surprised. He was under the impression that she could do anything. “I shot a buck when I was only twelve. It’s hanging at the cottage where I used to live when I was in high school. My daddy, my brother, and Devon, one of our farmhands—they were all so proud of me. I remember feeling bad at first. Guilty. But then I honored the animal’s spirit, like I had been taught. I thanked it for the nourishment it would give my family, and somehow the death seemed okay. It seemed right, part of the natural cycle. That’s the only time I can remember being at peace with death.”

“That’s a pretty profound thought for a child,” Eli said.

“I grew up in a weird family.”

“It can’t be as weird as mine,” Eli asserted.

Gretchel snorted. “You have no idea. I was raised on a farm and homeschooled until junior high. My mama and grand mama taught us all the normal stuff a kid might learn in public school, but we learned more—so much more. My grand mama has a thing about education. I don’t think she had much of one herself–not formal education, anyway.

“We studied history and philosophy, but also mythology and botany. We learned survival skills. I know more about gardening than any girl you’ve ever met, Eli.”

Eli grinned. “I have no doubt in my mind.”

“Especially strawberries. God, I love strawberries. I’ve nearly broken my back cleaning out that strawberry patch of ours. This is the first year I’ve missed picking season. I’m almost sorry.”

That’s why she always smells like strawberries. It’s become her essence
, Eli mused.

“Herbal sciences, spell-casting, and magical correspondences. We worked closely with the elements. And there was dancing—so much dancing. We followed the cycles of the moon, and during major rituals, we would dance like wild things.”

“That sounds amazing,” Eli replied, and he meant it. His own upbringing had been strange, no doubt about it, but slightly sterile by comparison. Sure, his mother studied transpersonal psychology and was obsessed with an acid-fueled prophecy, and his father…. Well, his father would probably love the
idea
of dancing under a full moon…. Eli couldn’t quite picture it actually happening, but he couldn’t quite rule it out, either. His parents lived in their own little worlds. They certainly didn’t share any intense family traditions like Gretchel was describing.

“It
was
amazing,” Gretchel agreed.

Her voice pulled him from his reverie, and he tried to imagine being from a family of witches in a rural, Midwestern community. “But I suppose it wasn’t easy. Did everybody know that your family was pagan? What did they think?”

“Well, my grand mama has a good reputation in Irvine. She gets respect for running a successful farm for so long. She’s doctored plenty of people—usually for free—and the old-timers like her because they know she doesn’t put up with any bullshit.

“Sometimes I wonder, though, if it’s not so much respect as fear….” Gretchel’s voice trailed off. She watched the deer as it gently decimated the rosebushes Eli’s grandmother had once tended.

“What are they afraid of?” Eli asked.

Gretchel shook her head. “The people in town, they think that Snyder Farms is haunted.”

Eli smiled, intrigued. “Is it?” he asked.

“Of course,” Gretchel laughed. “I think that people in Irvine—especially the older people—suspect that my grand mama is somehow to blame for those hauntings.”

“Is she?” Gretchel was usually so reluctant to talk about her past. Eli wanted to know more.

“I don’t know. I can tell you that she’s a bitchy old thing, but she’s never harmed a hair on my head.”

Gretchel was quiet again. Eli gave the ground a gentle push to keep the hammock swinging. He wanted to know everything that there was to know about Gretchel, and she had never been more forthcoming.

“I’ve seen the ghosts, Eli. I’ve seen them myself. And I’ve heard them, too.”

The deer looked at them for a heart-stopping second, and then it bounded away.

The spell was broken.

“Eli, I’d rather not talk about this anymore. I feel charmed here, in this house, and I don’t want to ask for trouble.” She paused for a moment. “I kind of have a history of asking for trouble.” Eli tightened his arm around Gretchel’s shoulder, and he laid a kiss on her forehead. He would never push her to talk about anything. He trusted that she would eventually tell him everything.

The hammock moved back and forth, putting them both into a mellow trance.

She loves me
, he thought.

“It’s true. I do,” she murmured.

Eli was shaken. She had read his mind. He was totally unfazed and completely stunned, intensely gratified and chilled to the bone.

“I love you, too, Gretchel, infinitely.”

“I know,” she whispered. “And I’ll never forget it.”

∞

“Hey, Dad, I think I’m going to stay for the rest of the summer.”

“Hmmm,” Peter replied.

“The house has kind of gone to shit. Little things need fixing, and the roof…. I think the house needs a new roof, maybe?”

The line was quiet for a moment, “Is she pretty?”

“What?”

“I had a new roof put on last year, son.” Eli’s father laughed.

Busted
. Eli gave himself a moment before he responded.

“Pretty doesn’t even come close, Dad. I can’t explain her. She’s everything. Everything I always thought I wanted. Everything I never knew I needed. She’s my muse, too. You wouldn’t believe what I’m writing, the photos I’m taking…”

“How’s the sex?”

Eli sighed and rolled his eyes. There were times when he wished that he had been raised by conservative, suburban types.

“She’s a Kegel queen, Dad. A nymph. She does this bouncy thing with her ass that sends me into orbit.” Eli knew that his deadpan tone would be completely lost on Peter. A sense of irony was not—gods bless him—one of his strengths.

Eli strained not to hear his father’s response to this information, and tuned in again when it seemed safe to listen. “Your mother’s in London right now. I’ll see what she thinks about you staying in Carbondale.”

“Why would she care? This is what she, wanted, right, for me to meet the girl from the prophecy? This is the girl! She’s got red hair and horrible, pitiful scars. Gretchel’s the one.”

There was an awkward pause. “Just stay there and I’ll deal with your mother when she returns.” Peter was quiet again. “New love is magical, Eli. Cultivate it well.”

“Right,” Eli replied, wondering—not for the first time—if there was more to the prophecy than what his mother had told him, “And, Dad... I want to tell her who I really am. I don’t feel right lying to her. It’s making me feel sick.”

“Absolutely not."

“Why? This is the girl I want to spend the rest of my life with.”

“No. If something should happen…. Your mother wouldn’t want her to be able to trace you.”

“What do you mean ‘if something should happen?’ What aren’t you telling me?”

“End of conversation,” Peter said, and he abruptly hung up the phone.

Part Three

Pacific Ocean, 1980s

The sky was a canvas covered in brilliant azure, the moon a glowing circle of zinc white at the center. Eli was captivated by its shimmering reflection in the inky black water. He imagined that he could feel the pull of the moon on the gentle waves that rocked his grandfather’s sailboat—and maybe he could. Even as a boy of ten, trying so hard to become a man, Eli was sensitive to feminine forces and in touch with his own anima.

Of course, the models of manhood in his world were hardly typical. His father, Peter, was intuitive and poetic and more than happy to let Eli’s mother rule their household. And his mother’s father, Charles Stewart, was more interested in mythic archetypes than social convention.

Peter and Charles smiled as Eli tried to capture the moon on the water with his camera. They smiled as he sat beneath the light of a swinging lantern to write a few words in his journal. It was a good night, and Peter felt that time was right for his son to come into his inheritance. Diana had been able to give Eli a nearly bottomless trust fund, but Peter had something to offer his boy that money couldn’t buy.

Peter knelt on the deck and dumped out the contents of his worn leather messenger bag—several notebooks and a bag of weed. Charles watched his son-in-law with interest.

“And what will you be doing with that?” he asked, a Scottish burr coloring his words.

Peter smiled wide. “This,” he said holding the hollow bag before him, “has been with me for many years. Before it was mine, it was my father’s—who I never knew, except within my heart.”

Eli closed his notebook and turned his attention to his father and grandfather.

Charles smiled, too. He was fond of his daft American son-in-law. “And I ask again, what will you be doing with it now?”

Peter’s face assumed what was—for him—a grave expression. “It belongs to the divine messenger. It belongs to the one who is of three worlds.”

“So, you mean to give it to young Eli then.” Charles had grown serious, too. He could hardly remember seeing Peter without this satchel at hand, and, now that he knew that it was a family relic, he understood what it meant to pass it on—even if he could only guess what Peter had meant by the rest of his speech.

“You’re giving it to me?” Eli asked, panicking at the responsibility of caring for something so important.

“Yes, Eli. This is yours now.”

“But Dad, you use it all the time, I couldn’t,” Eli protested.

“You must.”

Eli was quiet. He took the bag from his father’s hand, and set it in his lap. Peter was rarely adamant. He believed in the power of choice and free will. Eli trusted that his father would only insist if it was important. He tried to feel equal to the occasion.

Eli ran his fingers over the fine cracks in the leather. “It’s so old,” he said. He closed his eyes and felt like he was sinking into the past….

His father’s voice pulled him back to the present. “Take good care of it, son. It’s special. Just like
you’re
special.”

Despite the awesomeness of the occasion, Eli couldn’t suppress an eyeroll. He had been hearing about how special he was… forever. Peter saw his son’s sarcastic look, laughed, and tousled Eli’s crazy curls.

“I guess it’s a good place to keep my camera and journals,” Eli acknowledged.

“For now, son. You’ll discover what it means to be the messenger soon enough.”

Eli dozed for a while, but the subtle change in rhythm as they pulled into harbor rocked him awake. He shook off sleep and took up his usual post in the prow, the mooring line in his hand. As Charles guided the boat toward the dock, Peter looked at his son with a mix of love, pride, and wonder. Then he saw all the color drain from Eli’s face, and he watched as the boy drop
ped the rope from his shaking fingers.

“What is it?” Peter gasped, racing toward Eli. His urgency caught Charles’s attention, too.

Eli pointed at the dock. Both men turned to look, but there was nothing there.

“What is it, Eli?” Peter asked again.

“It was a woman. I saw a woman on the dock.”

Peter wrapped an arm around Eli’s shoulders. “Why did that frighten you, son? Why were you scared of this woman?”

“She looked so angry,” Eli whispered. “And hateful. And I knew that she shouldn’t be there. I could tell that she
wasn’t
there—not really.”

“What did she look like?”

“She had red hair and a rotten dress. She was soaking wet. The dress looked so heavy, like it was made out of wool.”