Chapter 20
Henry
Marnie’s phone buzzes between the leftover bits of my snack tray and her open Trapper Keeper as we’re finishing our meeting.
She answers it on speaker. “Hi, Dr. Blake. Thanks for returning my call.”
“Yes, of course. I apologize for the shock of my switcheroo. That wasn’t my intention.”
“What was your intention?” I ask, leaning into the phone. “It’s Henry, by the way.”
“Oh, Henry, I was about to ask Marnie for your phone number to apologize to you directly,” he says.
“We’re in our bi-weekly museum meeting,” Marnie explains, “with Dot and Marigold. It’s good that you called. We need to figure out what to do about the garden.”
“Ah, yes. Hello, everyone.”
Dot and Marigold offer muted greetings before Dr. Blake speaks again.
“Might I have a word with you, Henry? In private?”
With Marnie’s permission, I take her phone into the backroom with the obnoxiously frightening encased witch from Hunter, The Return. I turn my back on the creature to focus on our conversation.
“I’m here, Dr. Blake,” I say, taking the phone off speaker and setting it against my ear.
“Henry, I’m sorry for the distress I caused,” he begins. “Venus says you had an asthma attack.”
“You spoke to her?”
“Oh, yes, you’ll be pleased to know that she and her sister have given me a firm talking to about boundaries. But she is my daughter, so I don’t apologize for interfering. Prompting your asthma, though—that is regrettable. I didn’t expect that seeing her would cause such a reaction.”
“Neither would I, but it’s been a long time, and she and I… well, you know us.”
He chuckles. “Yes, I do. She tells me you’ve reached an amicable parting of ways this time.”
“Um, yeah, she came back later, and we talked.”
“Hmm, any sparks left in the ol’ matchbox for each other, then?”
A chuckle sputters out in surprise at the question. So much for his daughters’ talks on interfering. “Sparks were never our problem, sir.”
He laughs. “No, you two were more like a blazing fire, if all that sneaking around was any indication. You still haven’t fixed my trellis.”
“Oh, you knew about that?” I snicker lightly. “Thanks for not telling my mom.”
“You needed each other more than you needed parental lectures on boundaries. You were always a steadying presence for her. She needed your support and friendship then. I only wonder… Hmm.”
“What is it, Dr. Blake?”
“Well, I can’t make this debacle any worse, I suppose,” he says, more to himself than to me. “I love Venus. She’s brilliant, creative, tenacious, and beautifully free-spirited.”
In his pause, I say, “Yes, she’s all those things.”
“Stubborn and independent, too. She’s never needed much.”
He pauses again. “No, sir.”
“But she’s been all over the world, and she has yet to find where she belongs. She’s lost, Henry, and if she is ever to find happiness, I believe she needs you. I only wonder… Do you need her?”
This time, I don’t know how to fill the pause that follows.
He says it kindly enough, but it’s an intrusive question, and what good would it do to admit to him what I’d only concluded a few hours ago, that my heart belongs to her.
Saying that aloud would lift the lid of Pandora’s box and let hope slip out when there isn’t any.
“It’s not that simple,” I say when the pause stretches too long. “We lead very different lives now—that’s what she wanted. She’ll leave again.”
“Hmm, perhaps. Or perhaps she might find a reason to stay, a place where she belongs. Could there be a chance for Henry and Venus, part two?”
Through a frustrated sigh, I chuckle. “Perhaps I should join your daughters in reminding you not to interfere.”
“That’s fair,” he says. “I regret the times I didn’t interfere on her behalf.
Or I interfered incorrectly, based on the advice of those who called her difficult and unteachable.
I tried but failed to stop them from using words like that.
It’s quite startling how one word makes a difference, for good or ill. ”
Certain words followed Venus throughout her education.
Difficult, distracted, and belligerent were common amongst teachers.
But students had their own vocabulary for her, too, one that changed as we grew older.
Dirty, mean, fairy girl eventually morphed into crazy, annoying, know-it-all until high school, when the words took a sharp turn, thanks to me.
“Now, I’m realizing that there were times when she needed my interference and didn’t ask for it…
or couldn’t. I wish I could’ve helped her more,” he says, his voice laced with regret.
“This may be my last chance to interfere, Henry. There’s already talk amongst our circles—a reforestation project in New Zealand is keen to have her on their team.
She doesn’t know that yet, but there she’d be practically cut off from us—”
“If that’s what she wants, Dr. Blake…” I cut in, though my words lack conviction, considering the eight thousand miles and two oceans that would be between us.
“She doesn’t know what she wants, Henry, and I say that with the deepest respect for her and her capabilities. She believes we don’t want her, you see. If my interference quells that faulty belief, then I will barge right in. Wouldn’t you?”
“I don’t know,” I answer honestly, remembering her racing away this morning. “We devastated each other once. We don’t want that to happen again. Besides, neither of us can… change.”
“Change is life’s best-kept promise. Would you be content to lose her forever?”
I stumble over his question, unable to answer.
“Test her, then,” he says after a long pause.
“If there’s any hope, you’ll see it. Try some normal couple things.
She doesn’t think she’s capable of normal things, but we know she is.
Don’t we?” He takes a long breath while I say nothing.
“At the very least, let her install the garden. She’ll do whatever you ask of her, Henry. You know that.”
Would she? Still?
Her sobbing silently against my chest fills my thoughts, but is quickly snuffed out by Dr. Blake clearing his throat. “Thanks for listening, Henry. Whatever happens, you’re a good egg.”
His odd compliment makes me chuckle. “So, are you, Dr. Blake.”
The call soon ends, and I try to put it out of my mind.
I don’t have the time or energy to lose myself in thoughts of Venus.
But, I do anyway.
I can’t stop.
And maybe, I don’t want to.