A/N:This chapter refers back to my story "Tiptoes in the Garden."
Left alone in the back garden, Patrick looked up at the bright moon. Shelagh's voice drifted from the nursery window, a lullaby to soothe their daughter after she woke in the night. In his mind's eye, Patrick could see his girls swaying to the soft tune, Angela's head buried in the crook of her mother's neck. He smiled and began to clear a bit of Shelagh's makeshift garden retreat. It was nice out here, he had to admit. They had spent a lovely evening under the fairylights in her temporary oasis, talking, dancing, kissing.
A garden would certainly be a better use of the space than before, not that it had ever had much of a purpose. Tim rarely used the empty place, and now that Patrick was putting his smoking days behind him ( he was down to just three or four a week, and those always at the clinic), a new leaf would be a good thing. He smirked at the garden pun, thinking he would save that one for Timothy. The boy did hate his father's puns.
As he gathered items to go back in the house, Patrick thought of all the times he had come out here to wrestle his worries, smoking like a chimney. He recalled that summer and fall nearly two years ago, when he had struggled out here with his feelings of guilt, convinced that he had brought pain to the woman he was learning he loved so well. The devastation he felt at her diagnosis, only able to give vent to his pain in this solitary spot. This place had seen him at his lowest: when he believed his life would never know the richness of her love, then later, when he believed though he once had it, her love would disappear.
His forehead furrowed and his eyes darkened at those remembrances. He wished he could go back and tell his tortured past-self of how wonderful his life was now. Just to say, Hang in there, lad. Happiness is coming. Have faith.
The last candles in his hands, Patrick looked around one more time. A new space would be quite nice, he thought, but it wouldn't hurt to make Shelagh work just a little bit more to convince him. Maybe she needed practice with the liniment. Eagerly, he closed the back door and made his way up the stairs to his wife.