Ivy of Our Hearts

Twenty

Fate, like always, had already made her plans. Every moment we spent in that field was euphoric, a true waking dream. I lay beside Phillip on a pillow of lady's bed-straw, that's what Phillip had called it. Comfortable despite its name, it did smell a little of hay or sometimes honey, depending on how deep a breath I took.

"Tell me if there's a bee nearby. I'm afraid of them," I said, turning away from Manderley making orbits in the sky, to him. My other half.

The clouds had hidden most of the sun, but he had his arm over his eyes, which might have meant Nora had slipped into his thoughts. I watched his mouth say, "Are you allergic? To their bites I mean."

I shook my head, realized he hadn't seen me shake my head, and said, "I don't think I am."

"Well," he said. He said "well" in a drawn-out sort of way, like it took all his might to say it. "Don't bother them and they won't bother you."

To be sure, I scanned the flowers around us for them. "Ivy," Phillip said, as if he'd caught me doing it. I gasped. Raising his head, he lifted his arm enough for me to see his eyes. "If I'd known you were afraid of bees, I wouldn't have brought you here."

I let go of the flower's petal I'd taken between my fingers. "I love it here."

"You love it here," he said, but he said it in that same drawn out way, as if he'd repeated my words as a question back to me. He sat up. "Do you think Margaret does?"

I watched her. Phillip told us we'd be collecting flowers to bring back to the house and she took it upon herself to do the task. The basket he'd found her overflowed with a various array of flowers, some I recognized, like daisies, poppies, and marigolds. Near a small pond, she reached over to pick another, as she did a handful of flowers fell from the basket, some into the pond. Since Margaret didn't care to curse most days, she said, "What the..." Her voice drifted off before the expletive.

I shifted my gaze to Phillip. He'd been watching her through squinted eyes. He had a petal stuck in his hair. In his raven colored mane, the yellow leaf stood out like the yellow on a bee's belly. I leaned over and picked it out, which brought his attention back to me.

"She hasn't seen Nora's grave," I said, bringing the petal up to my nose. It smelled like honey or hay. I smoothed it between my fingers.

Phillip scratched the spot on his head where the petal had been. "I know," he said. His hand fell and he made a fist in the grass. "I guess I should have mentioned that," he said, his fist going limp. He let his hand rest there, near my right one. His nails were clean, while mine were caked with dirt. I curled my fingers to hide them.

He took my hand, uncurling my fingers, and held it in his lap. "I'm sorry," he said. "But the dead can't hear us in their graves. They don't know to be cautious or gentle or tolerant. They have no boundaries." As he said this, he tapped each one of my fingers, as if he were counting them. "I don't want her to haunt you like she haunts me."

"Tell me what you plan to do with my heart," I said. I needed him to say it out loud.

"I plan to love you, Ivy," he said without hesitation. He didn't mention Margaret but he'd meant to all the same. He should be the one to tell her about Nora's grave, that single rose, its petals as soft as the one I'd plucked from his hair, as red as Margaret's pout.

He let go of my hand and I brought it to my side, fingers uncurled in my lap. With her basket filled once more, Margaret hurried over. She sat on the other side of Phillip. Bending her head back, she asked him, "What is she doing up there?"