Chapter 11 Don’t Let Go #3
The sky is clear when I start walking, late afternoon sun slanting golden through the trees.
The north grove is the oldest part of the estate, the trees my grandfather planted decades ago.
I know these paths the way I know the rooms of my parents' house, every turn familiar, every landmark memorized since childhood.
I find a good tree near the middle of the grove and start collecting blossoms, dropping them into the cloth bag I brought. The work is soothing, repetitive, the kind of thing that lets my mind wander without getting lost.
For a while, I think only about the blossoms. I choose the freshest ones, leaving the bruised petals on the branch, and hold one flower close enough to smell without touching my nose. This much I still trust myself to do.
Then a child laughs somewhere beyond the trees, near the lane, and my hand stops halfway to the bag. I have been so busy being afraid of Rafael's reaction that I haven't let myself wonder about anything else. Would our child laugh like that? Would I hear Rafael in it?
I lower the blossom into the bag. I need a quiet conversation with him soon, one with time for us both to be surprised. Whatever happens to our marriage, he should hear this from me.
A rumble of thunder makes me look up.
The sky has changed. The clear blue has darkened to gray on the western horizon, clouds building faster than the forecast predicted. When did that happen? I've been out here maybe forty minutes. The storm wasn't supposed to arrive until well after dark.
I should head back. I've collected enough blossoms, and I don't want to get caught in the rain.
I draw the cloth bag closed and start walking, following the familiar path back toward the house. The thunder sounds again, closer. The wind is picking up, rustling through the leaves overhead and carrying the smell of approaching rain.
I move faster, my shoes crunching on the packed earth. The path curves around a stand of older trees, and I follow it automatically, my feet knowing the way even as my mind tracks the darkening sky.
Then I stop.
A fallen limb blocks the return side of the loop, smaller branches tangled across the path. The split wood is pale and fresh. It wasn't here the last time I walked this way.
I could climb over it, but the tangle of smaller branches makes that difficult. Instead, I turn to take the alternate route, the one that cuts between the rows and comes out near the irrigation channel.
The trees here look the same in every direction.
Row after row of identical trunks, their branches heavy with fruit and flowers.
I've walked through groves like this my whole life, but usually with the sun as a reference point.
Now the sky is gray and flat, the light diffused, and the rows blur together in a way they never have before.
I keep walking, sure I'll recognize something soon. The channel should be ahead, the landmark I need to find my way back. I just have to keep moving in the right direction.
The first drops of rain hit my face.
Within seconds, it's a downpour. Water soaks through my jacket and plasters my hair to my head, running down my face and blurring my vision.
I pull out my phone and try to call my father, but the signal is barely there, one bar flickering.
The call fails. I try a text instead: Got turned around by fallen branch.
Heading back. It spins, trying to send, the circle turning endlessly without completing.
I keep walking, but the visibility is terrible now. I can barely see two trees ahead through the sheets of rain. Every row looks the same. Every direction could be right or wrong.
A flash of lightning, then thunder almost immediately after. The storm is right on top of me.
I stop before I go any farther downhill. Water is running that way, toward the channel. There should be a narrow track along the upper side of it. If I reach that without going down to the water, I can work out where I am.
The rain drums on the leaves, a roar of sound that drowns out everything else. My bag of blossoms is soaked, the petals beaten flat. My clothes cling to my skin. My phone shows no signal at all now, the message still unsent.
I'm lost in a grove I've walked since childhood, and no one knows exactly where I am.
No. That's not quite true. I told my father which path I was taking. I said the north grove, past the old irrigation channel. If I don't come back, he'll know where to start looking.
I take a few careful steps along the slope until I find packed earth beneath the mud. A track, at last. I stay on it, calling out whenever the wind drops enough for me to hear an answer.
Minutes pass. The thunder moves slightly further away, but the rain doesn't let up. I'm shivering now, my hands numb, my shoes squelching with every step. The sky is getting darker, dusk arriving early under the storm clouds.
Then I hear something through the rain. A voice, distant but distinct. Calling my name.
I stop walking and strain to listen. There it is again, closer. My name, shouted into the storm.
"Here!" My voice comes out hoarse. I try again, louder. "I'm here!"
The voice calls back, and I recognize it.
Rafael.
I start moving toward the sound, my feet slipping in the mud. I call out again, and he answers, and we keep calling to each other through the rain until I finally see him, a dark shape emerging between the rows of trees.
He's soaked through, rain dripping from his hair, his shirt plastered to his chest. He stops a few feet away, breathing hard, his eyes scanning my face and body like he's checking for damage.
"Your father told me which path you took." He holds out a hand, stopping short of catching my arm. "I was dropping off your things when the storm hit. He's checking the lane. I came through the grove."
He came through the grove. Of course he did. We explored it together as children, and he knows the shortcuts I would try.
"A branch blocked the path." My teeth are chattering, making the words come out broken. "I tried to cut through and got turned around."
"I know the spot." He moves closer, close enough that I can see the worry in his eyes. "I saw the fallen branch. Figured you'd try the alternate route."
The rain lashes the side of his face. He doesn't wipe it away; he is waiting for me to answer the question in his outstretched hand.
When we were children, he found me crying beside the irrigation channel after I'd taken a shortcut without him. I'd been furious when he told everyone I was lost. I insisted I was only trying a different way home.
I could keep my hands to myself and be miserable on principle. I don't want to. I reach for him, and his hand closes around mine.
"I've got you." He steps close enough to shield me from the wind, his other hand firm against my back.
I catch the front of his wet shirt before I can stop myself.
"Don't let go."
The words leave me against his chest, and for once I don't take them back.