Grampy Fernside's Arc

Chapter 9 of 16

Grampy woke before dawn on planting day and knew he was in trouble. His back had been stiff for a week, and last night's leveling had wrung the last strength out of it. He sat up in slow pieces. He walked to the window and looked out at the covered bed with its nineteen waiting holes. Nineteen holes meant nineteen kneels, nineteen bends, nineteen careful drops. He put his hand on the small of his back and pressed. The muscle jumped like a rope pulled tight. He drank his tea standing. His wife tucked a pink flower and a yellow one into his beard and asked if the seeds went in tonight. He said they did. He did not tell her his back. She watched him a moment, then let him go. He made it to the shed by mid-morning. Togg sat on the doorsill. "You're walking like an old fence," Togg said. "I can't kneel nineteen times," Grampy said. "Not tonight. Maybe not five times." "Then don't," Togg said. "Get help." Grampy stared at the shelf where the wicker basket sat with the seeds spread on their flat stone. Nineteen seeds. One chance. He had planned every step alone because the gift was meant to be a surprise. But a surprise that never went into the ground was no gift at all. He walked out to the path and put two fingers in his mouth and whistled the short call his granddaughter knew. Delphine came through the gate within the hour, barefoot, red cap crooked, a beetle riding the point of it. She looked at his hand on his back and did not ask. "Show me," she said. He led her to the covered bed and lifted the moss. He set the pegged board across the soil and pressed. Nineteen clean holes. He handed her the little tray of seeds from the shed. "One in each," he said. "Middle of the hole. Don't press down. I'll cover." She knelt at the head of the bed and set a woven straw tile under her knees so the soil stayed smooth. "Which flower?" she asked. He shook his head. "Grans's flower. That's all I know." She nodded once, like that settled it. She worked down the rows. He walked behind her on his feet, bending only from the hips, brushing soil over each seed with the side of his hand. The watering pipe dripped its slow beads at the far end. When the last seed was covered, Delphine sat back on her heels and looked at the smooth dark bed. "Nineteen," she said. "Done." Grampy eased himself onto the mossy picnic table and let his back unclench. The seeds were in. He had not done it alone, and it did not matter. Now the soil had them, and the waiting began.