Bed of Roses

CHAPTER THIRTEEN BED OF ROSES

It had taken a full year of dreaming and dating and erasing and resketching before Sam and Noah had the blueprints for the house of their dreams completed and were finally ready to break ground.

Noah bought Thurman’s old hunting lodge and the eighty-six acres surrounding it from Kathleen. When the backhoes came on site that morning, he called Kathleen and Sam and asked the crew to take an early lunch break. He handed one of the foreman a wad of cash to buy everyone’s food. Then he grabbed three hard hats from the back of his truck.

When the three women appeared at the cabin, he handed Sam one of the hard hats and motioned toward the backhoe.

“Oh, no!” Sam shook her head. “Kathleen should get to take the first swings at the place. She’s the one who needs to bash this place into smithereens. It’s overdue.”

Sam could sense she was witnessing something special as she held Noah’s hand and watched with a whoop and a holler as Kathleen bashed through the roof of the living room with the giant metal bucket. Her history with the little cabin ran deeper than Sam’s one dark memory of it, and Sam was getting to watch her dismantle her past pain. Loose strands of her hair bounced around under her hard hat as she abolished Thurman’s mark on the property—once and for all.

Most of the rubble was hauled off later that afternoon, and Kathleen and Sam stared at the clearing where the cabin used to be. The place that Sam avoided and Kathleen despised. Sam was pretty sure that Kathleen had experienced a cathartic moment that afternoon just like she did.

With the cabin gone, a trailer brought in a load of rebar to begin the new foundation. Sam and Noah were planting a new seed of a dream with this project. A new dream that would rise like a phoenix soon enough from the past ashes of pain.

With Loretta and Kathleen’s help, Sam planned to plant wildflowers down the new driveway and find a mailbox real soon. She was ready for a life with Noah in their two-story cottage settled back in the woods, she was ready to fill the meadow with the love and memories it deserved.

Noah hadn’t asked Sam to marry him, but as the summer had come to an end, he began asking her more pointed questions about diamonds and ring sizes during casual conversation. She had been focused on the house designs, deriving incredible amounts of joy from deciding where they’d put the fridge and how many rooms they felt they may need over time.

She had forgotten they had almost skipped a whole step. He was talking about carats, and her thoughts were more concerned with where the nursery should be. Noah was the love of her life, and he was wholly and completely hers. She felt that in every cell of her body. No ring, no matter how big, no matter what kind or cut or color, would change that. But one evening after they’d been out to check on the progress of the house, he had that look on his face again.

“What kind of ring would you like to have?”

She stopped thinking about nurseries and looked up into his warm brown eyes. “Anything you pick will be exactly what I’ve wanted. Size eight. That is, if you’re asking about what I think you are.”

When his face flushed, the freckles across his nose darkened. He drew her into his arms and hugged her tightly. “So, size eight?”

“That’s right.” She snuggled down close to his chest.

Her phone buzzed, and she knew without even pulling it from her pocket that it was her mama. “Hey, I’m gonna answer this real quick. I want to ask Mama’s advice on the tile for the powder room and see if she had a suggestion on what type of siding we should use. I think she’ll agree with us on the dark green tile for the powder room, but I don’t know what color to go with for the appliances, and I wanna think it through before we order any tile.”

“Of course,” Noah agreed. “Go ahead and answer and get her opinion, I like the green tile idea. I’m just gonna go mark off some areas I want to build around your garden. I think raised garden beds would be nice around the edges of the main plot and your herb garden.” This man knew exactly how to talk to a woman.

“I love you, Noah Carter,” she murmured.

“I love you more,” he teased and kissed her on the forehead. “Now talk to your mama and get her opinion on tile and paint.”

She pulled her phone from the pocket of her jeans, answered, and spared no time going into talk of paint swatches and tile design.

Finally, Wanette got a word in edgewise. “Baby, however you decorate this house, that’s how it should be. Your love is what will make this house a home. Not paint colors or fancy tile. Right now, I gotta let you go. I’m expecting company tomorrow afternoon, and I gotta get a cheesecake made up.”

“Cheesecake? Without me? That’s cruel, Mama.” Sam sighed.

“Well, come home, and I’ll make you one,” Wanette said cheekily.

“Okay, then. We’ll visit soon, I promise!” Sam said. “I think I’m going to go with the dark green tile. I love you, call me after your company leaves tomorrow.”

Her mama ended the call, and Sam tucked her phone back in her pocket. She stood in the middle of where she supposed the tiny, unfinished powder room would be and let her mind wander. Noah had thought of everything up to and including putting a satellite out behind Kathleen’s house to give them all better service on the hill. She sent another little prayer of thanks up to God for sending her the right man when she was ready for him.

“Thank you, for making my car break down when you did,” she whispered.

That night, Samantha was almost asleep when a gentle knock at her bedroom door brought her into a sitting position and Kathleen popped her head inside. “I hope I didn’t wake you, but Noah left something for you on the kitchen counter. You should come on downstairs and see it.”

Sam came out of her room in her pajama bottoms and a faded, oversized T-shirt.

“Put some damn pants on, not in your pajamas, girl!” Loretta shouted.

“Yes, ma’am,” Sam shot back.

She went back to her room, threw on jeans, and slipped her feet into tennis shoes. Then she buttoned one of Noah’s long-sleeved thinner flannel shirts up. She made her way down the stairs and to the kitchen. Her flashlight, well, his flashlight was sitting on the counter, acting as a paperweight for a note underneath.

Come see what our love has been building. Don’t forget your flashlight this time. —Noah

Sam stuffed the note in her front pocket and took off toward the old cabin site with the flashlight in hand. She called out her goodbyes over her shoulder with Nibbler following fast behind her. She knew what Noah had meant by what their love had been building. He had said the day before that the concrete would probably be cured by today. The foundation for their new home was almost done. That meant they were one step closer to their forever.

She stopped and gasped when she came into the clearing. Noah had strung lights up over every corner of the fresh cement, now standing solid. A blanket lay in the middle of the foundation of their future home, and wine and bread popped out of the top of a picnic basket nearby.

“What are you doing?”

“I’m building a life with you, Sam.” Noah held his arms out wide. “Damn, that feels good to say. Our cornerstone is ready, the cement has finally cured, and I wanted to celebrate this first step with you.”

She clicked off the flashlight and ran across the concrete pad, wrapped her arms around him, and rose onto her tiptoes to kiss him—long, lingering, and passionately. He picked her up and spun her around as they continued kissing until Noah set her back on her feet.

“This is everything I could’ve ever wanted, Noah. I can’t wait to make a house into a home with you.”

“Me too, Sam,” he said. “I put the house in your name. And the land.”

“You did what?” Had she heard him right? Surely not.

“And May too. She should be yours now.”

“You’re giving me the house? And May?” Sam gasped.

“Yeah, I am. You deserve a piece of Homestead that is truly yours to call home. The house was always going to be in your name. I’ll just get to live here with you if you’ll have me.” Noah locked eyes with her. “But as far as May goes, think of her as an early wedding gift.”

“A wedding gift?”

“Marry me, Sam. You’d make me the happiest man in the world if you’d marry me.”

“Yes,” she answered. “Forever, yes!”

Loretta eyed the ring on Sam’s left hand over coffee the next morning. “I’m surprised you didn’t have to resize it.”

“Isn’t it beautiful?” Sam said with a sigh. “I can’t believe he gave me his mother’s engagement ring.”

Kathleen picked up Sam’s finger and touched the ring. “Mrs. Carter’s old ring fitting your finger like Cinderella’s glass slipper. Now that’s the Lord’s work.”

“I still can’t believe he planned all this,” Sam said and blushed at what had happened after he put the ring on her finger.

They started making out on the blanket, but then after a few minutes, he stood up and pretended to close a door. “What goes on in our bedroom is our business and not the rest of the world’s.”

They had made sweet, sweet love right there where their bedroom would be—smack dab on the cement slab. Afterward, they went to the trailer and made love again before falling asleep in each other’s arms. That morning, Sam was still a bit loopy from equal parts of low sleep as well as the high around a new engagement when Noah dropped her off at the B&B.

“There’s another surprise,” Kathleen said.

“What?” Sam asked.

“Loretta packed a go bag for you,” Kathleen said. “And I whipped up a go bag of breakfast and snacks for you. Noah will be here soon with May. He called your mama and daddy yesterday to plan a trip to Rosepine to see your family and tell them about your engagement. Your sisters will be there. Noah thought of everything.”

“Vivian is able to step back in at the florist shop while you’re gone, honey.” Loretta squeezed her arm, and the old gals walked her to the car. “Go enjoy yourself, then y’all can get back and be all in love! Go have your time in the sun. We got the Nibble Monster.”

Noah opened her door as the two women hugged her again.

“We’ll throw you two a little bash here in Homestead when you get back. How does that sound?” Kathleen asked.

“If it’s not too much of a hassle, that would be really special, Kathleen, and thank you,” Noah answered for both of them.

Sam nodded vigorously and hugged the woman again before finally settling into the passenger seat. “I don’t know when we’ll be back since he’s keeping everything a secret right now, so I guess I’ll just see you when I see you.”

Loretta looked at Kathleen and remarked, “He didn’t tell her what else he has planned yet?” To which Kathleen responded with a solid thwack to Loretta’s shoulder.

“Should I be worried?” Sam asked as she looked into his eyes.

“Nope, just happy.” He brought her hand to his lips and kissed her knuckles and then pulled out of the Rose Garden lane.

Sam couldn’t seem to wipe the aggravating sweaty piece of hair from her face without rubbing dirt all over herself, and she finally sat back on her heels to yank off her gloves and scrub at her face with both hands. She’d asked Kathleen to help her graft some of the roses so she could grow them along the lane to her new home that had been finished a week before they had married in a simple ceremony in her folks’ backyard.

Kathleen had seemed hesitant at first, but Sam had begged and pleaded.

“They remind me of you, and that’s what first drew me here. Please, Kathleen. I’ll do the work if you just show me how.”

So, on a spring morning as the sun crested over the white pines and the dew had dried, Sam and Kathleen collected large cuttings off most of the roses around the Rose Garden. They had lined up most of them, all now soaking in buckets of water when they took their first break on the back porch. They sipped cold ice water in silence as the midday sun on the shady grove around the house peeked in and out from behind big, fluffy white clouds.

Sam gazed out at the dense tree line in the far back of the clearing. “When did you plant these gorgeous red roses?”

“I didn’t plant these roses.”

“What do you mean?”

“I planted Ducher roses, Sam.”

“But, aren’t they …”

“Yes, they are.” Kathleen’s eyes dropped to the wooden step below her booted toes. When she looked back up at Sam, her expression had aged her twenty years. “I should have told you a long time ago, but I worried about what you would think of me, but I-I do regret what I did, at least some of the time.”

“Ooookay …” Sam said slowly and set her glass over near the water pitcher. “Is this something juicy?”

“I’ve made it right with God, at least as much as I could on this matter. He knows I would’ve taken it back once it was over if I could have, but I couldn’t by then. I may burn in hell one day for my actions, but I just couldn’t handle Thurman’s abuse any longer. I had to get out, Sam. And at that point, I saw no other way to stop the torment than just ending it.”

“Did you try to hurt yourself?” Sam asked.

“It was either me or him,” Kathleen answered. “Life is a bed, Sam. You decide when you wake up each morning. You decide who you let in it. You decide if you get drunk and piss on it. I was just too young and didn’t know no better. I picked the wrong bed to lie down on. So, when Thurman was running around and I knew I couldn’t leave him, I just went outside. Not outside the marriage, mind you, but to gardening. Mama helped me plant the first few rows, then I went overboard. I planted roses in all corners of the fence around the property, and while my husband was tending to women around town and in other cities, I tended them roses. His mama had told him that real southern ladies always have a rose garden, and something in me kept whispering that if I could be just how he would like me, he wouldn’t run away anymore. If I was a better woman, he wouldn’t hurt me. He would be happy and stay at home. I clung to that idea and treated this garden like it was my full-time job once the boys were in high school and driving themselves. I needed to love something, to tend to something. And Thurman had started pulling the boys away from me when they were old enough to go hunting with him.”

“That must have been hell to get through,” Sam muttered.

“We didn’t always have awful times. He liked that I kept the yard neat and tidy and seemed appreciative when he’d throw one of his parties. He could be the life of the party during those times. But every time, at some point in a long night, something would go amiss. A button would be missing from one of his shirts. A rose bush would dare to lose its blooms the day before guests arrived, hell, I’d track dirt in through the back door on a Sunday. Anything he didn’t like was treated as a direct blow against him.”

She paused.

Sam gave her time, and after a while she went on. “He yanked me around so bad that I thought he broke my shoulder after the barbecue we threw the weekend before Independence Day one year. Loretta came in that night, popped my shoulder back into place, and wrapped it up for me. I begged her not to tell anyone, and she didn’t. Instead, she put me to bed and slipped back outside before Thurman came in. The next morning, she was standing by my bed nudging my shoulder until I woke up. She had her hand over my mouth to keep me from squealing. We left Thurman sleeping, and I followed her into the woods. Since we were kids, Loretta’s granddaddy had been known as a medicine man. Sounds funny if you’d never seen it, but he could blow a burn right off someone’s fingers, and he could pray thrush from a child. He could heal folks. But he also knew how to kill folks. He had taught Loretta as a little girl how to gather in the woods for his tinctures and such. He had taught her what helped and what hurt.”

Kathleen paused here and put her arm around her knees and rocked a bit on the step she sat on. “Thurman was getting worse and worse. He had pulled a gun out the last time I made him mad. I had told him I was going to leave him, and I’d made up my mind. He went and got his gun out of his truck and held me down. He told me he’d kill the boys if I left him. He said he’d take his shotgun and he’d track both my boys down, shoot them, and then he would come back and kill me. He said he’d take what I loved most before he’d end it. And I believed him.”

“She didn’t want to do anything to him, but I talked her into it. I’m the one who showed her how.” Loretta’s stoic voice came from the doorway behind them.

She walked out and sat on the steps, picking at the chipping paint with one of her long fingernails. “He would’ve killed Kathleen. I’d seen what Thurman could be like when he got in one of his fits. I’d seen him nearly kill a dog for pissing inside. And he loved that dog.”

“How did you do it?” Sam whispered.

“We just celebrated the Fourth of July as usual,” Kathleen answered.

“Yep, all of his favorites,” Loretta said with a nod. “Ham, creamed corn, black-eyed peas, banana pudding, the works.”

“His favorite dessert was a buttermilk almond pound cake I’d make with a heavy almond glaze. That and lime pound cake. He liked a lot of lime and extra almond extract. So that’s what we made for him,” Kathleen said.

“We were as heavy-handed as he normally liked it,” Loretta added. “He ate three slices, two of the almond and a thick one of the lime. He got too full to get drunk and fell asleep in his chair in his room in front of the television. We found him cold the next morning and called the sheriff. A new one that wasn’t kin to him.”

“The coroner didn’t rat y’all out?”

“The coroner was an old friend and just happened to be one of the women who had called the cops on Thurman twenty years before and had been ignored back then. She agreed with Loretta that no autopsy was needed and declared that it was clearly a heart attack. She owned the funeral home and took care of the cremation for us too.”

“What did you do with the ashes?” Sam asked.

“I killed my husband. Samantha, I baked him two cakes, either one of which could make his heart stop, and you’re wondering if I kept his ashes?” Kathleen gasped, but Loretta laughed.

“A mean enough man is cruelest to the ones closest, and some folks ain’t worth all the second chances they get,” Sam simply parroted back the wisdom Loretta had passed on.

Loretta chuckled. “A new employee at the funeral home tried to talk her into a fancy vase and even asked if she wanted one that they called the companion urn. Since she and Thurman had been married so long, he reckoned they might want to be together in death.”

“I’d rather sell ice cream to Eskimos for eternity.” Kathleen’s tone had a sharp edge to it, but then softened. “Loretta and I will be buried in my family’s plot north of town—side by side. Our joint tombstone is already engraved with everything but our death dates.”

Sam let out a deep breath and leaned back on the step behind her. “Well, what did you do with him, then? Is he just tucked back in a closet somewhere in Rose Garden now with last year’s Christmas decorations?”

“No, honey,” Loretta answered. “We took that cheap cardboard box full of his ashes out to the compost pile and chunked him in with the rest of the garbage that we’d throwed out there.”

“Then we tossed in the box too and raked it all up and spit on it for good measure.” Kathleen smiled at the memory. “That winter when the last rose died, I pruned them back clear to the dirt and used the compost to fertilize them. When I finished, I told him that his ghost could keep his roses alive.”

“He liked them more than you did?” Sam asked.

“Not at all, but it was another thing he could bitch at me about. I wanted everything that made me think of him to pass on with him.”

“The roses took us giving them Thurman’s old, poisoned compost very personally and grew back with a vendetta the next year. They all looked dead as doornails until spring and then bam!” Loretta threw her arms back dramatically for emphasis. “Them damn roses came back bigger and bigger than ever before, and we could barely keep a handle on them from then on. Spooky, huh?”

“Maybe his ashes had some wild blood in them.” Sam chuckled.

“I’m sure they did.” Loretta laughed.

“I based the Rose Petal off the sheer demand for the roses that started growing that year. Seems like no one could find a deeper red rose with so big of a bloom anywhere in the Bible Belt. The roses practically keep the flower shop and the Rose Garden open by themselves.”

“I guess that’s a Ducher rose for you,” Sam tossed back at Kathleen with a smile.

“These aren’t Ducher roses. My mama and I planted Duchers on this land. And I know it because it was the only kind she wanted to grow. These roses might look like this now.” Kathleen pulled her pocketknife from the front pocket of her overalls and cut a bloom off the bush beside her, twirling the bloodred petals in between her fingers. “But the only roses I’ve ever planted here were snow white.”

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