The Darling Dahlias and the Silver Dollar Bush

“Yes.” Grady clasped his hands, unclasped them. His face was gray, his mouth pinched. “I’m sorry. Oh, God, Liz, I am so sorry. I didn’t mean to . . . It just happened . . .” He closed his eyes. “Oh, hell.”


She looked away, biting her lip, thinking of those rubber things in his wallet and wondering why the girl . . . why Sandra hadn’t made him use one. Did she want to get pregnant? Had she deliberately trapped him? Or—

She took a deep breath. Still not looking at him, she said, “You’re a hundred percent sure you’re the father, Grady?” The minute the words were out of her mouth, she was sorry. If he hadn’t thought of this himself, she had just planted a seed of suspicion that could doom whatever happiness he might have achieved. But he should have thought of it, shouldn’t he?

He cleared his throat. “How can I . . . I mean, I guess I have to take her word for it. Don’t I?” It sounded like a genuine question, a possibility he hadn’t thought of until Lizzy asked, a possibility that raised an unexpected hope, like a life preserver thrown to a drowning man.

“I didn’t think of that,” he said, his voice lightening. “Is there a way you can tell ahead of—”

Then, realizing the futility, he drew back into himself. “No, I guess not. Anyway, it’s no use. It’s too late. The wedding is all set. It’s on Saturday.”

“Saturday!” She felt as if a big fist had just knocked all the wind out of her. Grady was getting married on Saturday, and she could have prevented it so easily. All she’d had to do was say yes, or not say no, or say nothing at all, and they would have done it. She would have given herself to him there in the hot, sweet dark. And that would have been the end of the story. They would be getting married, she and Grady. There would be no Sandra, no hurry-up wedding.

She raised her eyes to look at him. “Do you love her?”

“Jeez.” His face was tired and drawn, and his eyes brightened with unshed tears. “How could I love her? I love you, damn it, Liz. But you—”

He stopped, biting back the words. He didn’t say, “But you wouldn’t marry me.” He didn’t have to. Unspoken, they hung in the air like smoke, heavy with a sad significance, dark and dense with loss, until he exhaled a long, hopeless sigh and said simply, “I’m sorry.”

Sorry sorry sorry. Such a little word, so frail, so desperately, hopelessly inadequate. Lizzy sat there for a moment, feeling utterly desolate, devastated, as if she were mourning a death. But to her enormous surprise, she suddenly understood that it wasn’t herself she mourned for, or even their relationship. She was mourning for Grady. She knew him, knew him too well. He would marry the girl and he would love her and their baby, because both love and marriage were right, and expected, and honorable.

But somewhere deep down inside the loving and dutiful husband and father would be a dark, unhappy core. Grady would always hate himself for what he had done, and the hate would undermine whatever love had grown, like a river flood undercuts a grassy bank until it gives way and crumbles into the brown rushing water. Or maybe it wouldn’t happen that way. Maybe that dark core would grow cold, like a fire going out, the cinder growing dark and hard, and Grady would become resigned and acquiescent and even, eventually, accept what he had done

But either way, both ways, that was what she mourned.

Lizzy took a breath, and then another, nearly overwhelmed, not by what she had heard but by her new understanding. Did this—feeling sorry for Grady but not for herself—mean that she had not truly loved him?

Or did it mean that she had loved him so much that she wanted only his happiness and well-being above all else, with no thought of her own?

But she couldn’t begin to answer those questions—at least, not now.