“Oh,” Corinthia said, releasing a breath she had held without thinking.Oh.A sweet happiness rose in her soul, like waking up and realizing a book you’ve been waiting to read for years has finally been released.
“Doyoulike to read about women in love?”Rosemary asked.
Corinthia nodded vigorously.Oh,yes, she did.
“Someday,” Rosemary continued, airily, “I shall meet a wonderful, beautiful, bookish woman, and I shall promptly fall for her.Especially if she is slightly grumpy and has trouble expressing her feelings.”
This was such a wonderful thing to hear that Corinthia could have heated a mug of cocoa simply by pressing it to her own cheeks, and it took her a full minute of recovery to notice that there was something missing in the green cottage.
The green cottage had no kitchen.
Even as new to the Refuge as Corinthia was, she had learned quite quickly that there was little to nothing in it that could sustain a person.Pine needles to nibble, certainly; and wild blueberries here and there for a few months; but nofood, not in the quantity needed to survive.
If there was no kitchen then how did Rosemary eat?Where was the food?How would she not waste away to nothing?
“Rosemary,” she said, taking the direct route, as it was the one she knew best, “what do you eat out here?”
“I had some of your chocolate,” Rosemary said, not meeting Corinthia’s gaze.
“Rosemary,” Corinthia repeated, affectionately severe, “you can’t survive on the occasional chocolate.”
Rosemary looked up from her shelf-straightening.“You care!”she said.
“Of course I care,” Corithia replied, trying to sound gruff but, by the amusement on Rosemary’s face, failing entirely.This was the third time, by Corinthia’s count, that Rosemary had left a question unanswered, or changed the subject, but Corinthia could be patient.
Once, she had gone out to walk in the Refuge and got caught at the picnic pavilion by a sudden downpour before she could enter the trails.Distant lightning snapped across the sky and thunder rumbled in its wake.She sat in the shelter and watched the rain fall on two slow-moving box turtles for a good twenty minutes.Then, all at once, the clouds flew apart and revealed the blue sky.
“I’m being a terrible host,” Rosemary said, hurrying over to the chair crafted of living woven branches and vines, and tufted with fresh-growing green grass.She gave it a pat.“Would you like to sit down?”
“I can’t take your only chair.”
“I’ll make another.We’ll sit together—won’t that be nice?”
Corinthia took in the sturdy, beautiful shelves; the hand-made, herbed, and flowered bed; and fully believed that Rosemary could grow a chair on command.
Even if she seemed to be doing it in part to avoid answering questions.
How long had Rosemary lived here?How did she eat?And wherewasthat bird, anyway?
Corinthia carefully lowered herself into the chair, as if it might not hold her weight, but it cradled her like the most finely engineered ergonomic chair, and she relaxed into its support.She did not have to be quick with words, now.Rosemary had a whole chair to grow, and Corinthia had time to think.Overthinking could be her greatest weakness, it was true.But its more sensible cousin, plain oldthinking, was her greatest strength.
Rosemary stood by the pine stump side table next to Corinthia’s chair.She closed her eyes, breathed deeply, fidgeted slightly as if getting out a small case of the wiggles, then held her hands in the air, palm-down, as if she might play an invisible piano.
A moonlight glow surrounded Rosemary’s hands.It slowly enveloped her arms, then her entire body, until she was haloed with soft silver light.Corinthia’s exposed skin warmed from the gentle radiance.
Rosemary breathed again, seeming to draw upon something Corinthia could not see but could, in a distant way,feel—like the far-off thunder outside.
And then there were little plants growing out of the pine straw floor, reaching upward; twisting and turning and coming together and splitting apart; bursting out in bright green leaves all over; reaching and climbing as if they competed in a joyful race to grow taller, all while spinning the scent of spring into the air.They wove together and settled at last into the familiar shape of a chair, all-over puffy with fresh green grass.
Rosemary opened her eyes and smiled.Corinthia clapped appreciatively.Rosemary curtsied, then sat, with a sigh of relief, in the new-grown chair.
“Was that tiring?”Corinthia asked.
“A little,” Rosemary admitted.“But it’s good for practice.”She settled more comfortably, and appeared to be thinking.
Corinthia sat quietly.It was something a librarian knew how to do.
“I must seem secretive to you,” Rosemary said.
