Shall We Go to Otsu?
Chapter 9: …But Has a Good Idea
In which Tomoe suggests a garden.
He tried not to admit it, but the thought wouldn't leave him alone: That was a mistake!
What had come over him? The gaiety of the marketplace, the fine day, the tantalizing aromas of the food stalls. Her hand, warm and trusting on his shoulder, steadying herself as they'd made their way down the hill. The way her black hair had rippled in the sunlight like a slow brook in a meadow. Her voice, low and gentle as she spoke with the vendors or knelt down to a small child. Her dark lashes and pale cheeks in the breeze-stirred shade of the trees as they'd sat together, pretending to be husband and wife. Each time he remembered, a wave of giddiness washed over him, dizzy like he was falling. He tried not to think these thoughts. They caught at his breath and made his stomach flutter.
In the days since, he had tried to undo it all. He distanced himself from her. He spent more time on patrol. He avoided conversation. He contrived not to look at her. Not more than necessary, at any rate. It wasn't helping.
This evening, as she set before him his meal of grilled pike and rice, she apologized. "I'm sorry." He looked up, puzzled, and she continued, "I don't have daikon, so the fish is bland."
"No, it's fine." And it was. She was a good cook, although he hadn't noticed it before now. And he wondered where she'd learned, if she'd known how before she came to work for Ōkami.
"Do you think we could grow our own? There seems to be space for a garden…" She gestured toward the bare, ragged patch of earth outside the door.
He remembered sunny days in a clearing near an icy waterfall, and a tiny plot of plants he had been given to tend on his own. It had seemed gigantic to his small self, and he'd taken serious responsibility for it. He usually avoided thinking about those days with his master in the cramped, drafty hut beside the freezing river that flowed from that roaring waterfall, about the incessant lessons, the growing excitement, the fulfillment that had been his, for the first time in his life, in learning. About the only father he could remember. "Think of the past only as it gives you pleasure." His master's words seemed to him now more like portent than advice. He would heed them. He turned his mind away from what could never return.
"Perhaps we could. The soil may be good here." He turned his face slightly away. "I used to know something about gardening."
They finished their meal in silence, and while he sat near the fire inspecting and polishing his sword, and not watching her, she busied herself with evening chores: scrubbed their bowls with sand from the firepit, stacked their few utensils and pots in a corner, retrieved a log big enough to last the night and re-laid the fire, banking it so the coals would be ready in the morning.
Once she had put the house in order, she retreated behind the screen. He had moved it and arranged it to create a small space for her personal use. He could hear the silky sounds of her clothing as she removed and folded her kimono and undergarments, and the whisper of her comb through her hair. He didn't think about how it would feel between his rough fingers. He saw her candle go out, and she reappeared in the main room, her arms full with the futon and quilt. She waited while he sheathed and set aside his sword, then he rose and relieved her of her bundle. He was careful to touch only the bedding. He shook it out and laid it out on the floor close to the fire, square with the fire's bed.
"Thank you."
He looked at her, then stepped away to allow her to settle herself under the quilt, and then positioned himself in his corner. But when he turned his face back to the room, he saw she was still standing in the same spot. He raised his eyes to her face. He could feel himself slipping, meeting those dark, intense eyes, and he guarded himself against what she might say.
"Tomorrow, you could begin turning the soil. I would be happy to go into the village and purchase some seeds and starts for the garden."
Oh. It was only that.
He thought about the idea. He knew that women often did a family's food marketing alone, and, since the two of them had already appeared in the village together, he judged that the inhabitants would recognize her as part of "the new couple on the hill." Her solitary trip would not arouse undue curiosity. He nodded his assent and turned back to his corner.
As the fire died down, and the air in the room cooled, he let his mind wander back over other days, in other gardens. Other gardens on other mountainsides, and even older gardens worked alongside family and neighbors, now the mistiest of memories. He hadn't for many years tackled the problem of limited sunlight hours on a plot of land surrounded by trees as tall as ten men and as dense as weeds, nor of how best to orient and shape the rows to retain the most water and prevent erosive run-off. Doing so now felt like retrieving old, faded muscle memory. In the neglected garden, he had seen the ghosts of previous furrows and, recalling the amateur spacing and orientation, he felt a gardener's "itch": He knew he could create something good and strong out of that weak mess.
Clearing the saplings that lined the eastern edge of the plot would give good sun exposure most of the day, and only a few days' work would have the rows in much better shape. He was feeling more himself now, his head filled with furrow depths, planting schedules, and pest control schemes. Already he could feel which muscles would be sore tomorrow evening. Yes, the garden would be a good project. And the extra produce would mean fewer trips into town, decreasing contact with outsiders and reducing hazardous conversations and questions. It would help guard against betrayal.