Repotting:

Sprout likes the greenhouses best when it rains. She strides between the rows of plants, eluding the more playful ones, confident, rooting out the occasional pair of students, rumpled and hot from giggling exertions. This is her territory, her domain, her refuge; she is protective and shares it rarely.

Her faded cap slips forward as she repots Sedum telephium, woolen itch mingling with beads of moisture at her hairline. She pushes it back with dusty fingers; small interruptions make her restless. But her work is vital, important, soothing with its rhythms and repetitions, constant as water sliding down the glass panes, varying in intensity, never ceasing.

She closes her eyes and listens, feels, smells the earth and the greenery. For a moment the world is whole, spinning complete beneath her hands, dirt lining her fingernails, nestling in the narrow crevices of her knuckles. She imagines she can feel the purity of the flow, the energy within the soil, the water, the air that binds all life together cleanly. Perfectly. Simply. There is no loss, no pain; birth and death are part of a great, magnificent whole: life, death and renewal. It is beautiful and she is dizzy from it.

When she is finished, she washes her hands at the wide, deep sinks, scrubbing red and rough with a nailbrush. The water is cold, swirling away in a muddy spiral; she doesn't stop until it runs clear.