Mia's Garden

What does this mean?

The flash fiction piece below says something. What I do no exactly know. I wrote it. It speaks to me in a familiar way, and perhaps an unfamiliar way. I’m older and know less about life. My certainties have waned. But what I am certain about is writing somehow allows me to explore the various caves inside of what, and somethings I am surprised when I find out what was inside that whole.

Enjoy, and by all means share your thoughts.Writers we are vessels, so perhaps you know something about this piece I do not.

Photo: Bolton Hills (Baltimore City). One of Baltimore’s historic neighborhoods.

They argue again. This time in the kitchen, Mia stands in front of the sink washing dishes. She is fixated on the roses she planted when they moved into Bolton Hills twenty years ago. A restored rowhouse, a hidden gem that they got in a foreclosure. It’s just the two of them. Bernard sat on the stool at the gourmet counter.

It’s the same argument they have had since she lost the last baby five years ago.

“Let’s just adopt!” Bernard says.

“No!” Mia’s no is concrete.

There is no abstraction in it, no hues, no gradients in it. Her no is as firm as the prickles sticking out of the roses’ stem. It is the same “no” she has given every time he asks or even hints at an adoption. They are in their fifties now. Gray strands peppered through his beard, and half of her afro is gray spikes.

“I don’t know if I will be able to last in this marriage without us being parents. Mia, we can adopt. We can afford to adopt.” Bernard says.

“Bernard, you know I can’t do it. I’ve thought about it. I’ve thought about it for years now. Hell, it’s been a decade at this point. I cannot raise a baby that is not my own, not ours. To look in its face and not see my nose, my hands or my eyes or your toes, or your smile. I couldn’t bare it. To not be able to hear my mother’s voice or see my father’s walnut skin spread on the baby’s body. What about your father’s artistic abilities or your sister’s critical thinking skills? That baby would be a stranger. Always a stranger to me and I can’t bare it.” She said with her voice trembling pointed toward the ceiling keeping the tears from falling down her face.

Bernard stands and walks to the sink. He too stares at the backyard they curated. The cobblestone walkway that sets a path to a fire pit and lounge chairs just for the two of them hidden behind the privacy fence with stained wood, six-feet high planks they installed together. He kisses Mia and exits the kitchen. He leaves behind the sigh of his breath filling the air with a weight that rest on her shoulders.

Bernard returns to the kitchen. She turns to meet his footsteps; she glimpses the well-kept heirloom luggage. Not the luggage he uses when he travels for work, or a weekend away with his frat. This is his heirloom luggage—his grandfather’s luggage.

He says, “you’ll always have the roses.”

He walks to the front door, turns the knob and the door quietly closes behind him. The click of the doorknob signals her heart. She exhales deeply, assuredly. She suddenly feels free. The weight floats off her shoulders and she notices the roses open to receive her. She is alone now, and it brings an unexpected relief.