with it. Anise, for example, uses it.”
“Anise is always baking us stuff.”
“Is she now?”
“Uh-huh. She even labels the treats. Puts our names on them.”
Reseda nodded, a little pensive. “She just arrived.”
“You mean here at Mrs. Messner’s?”
“That’s right.” Garnet decided Reseda must have amazing hearing, because she herself hadn’t heard a car pull into the driveway.
“So, this greenhouse isn’t just for Mrs. Messner?” Hallie asked.
Garnet was glad her sister had asked this. It was beginning to dawn on her, too, that this was a sort of communal nursery. She had a feeling that Mrs. Messner wasn’t the only one who grew plants here.
“That’s right,” Reseda said. “Some of us have our own greenhouses, but not everyone. Holly, for instance, keeps her plants here. And none of us has a greenhouse quite this large. So, yes, this one is a sort of shared space. We all help tend the plants here. And you must call Mrs. Messner Sage. I know she’d prefer that.” She brought the girls slowly up and down the long rows of tables, and occasionally Garnet recognized the name of an herb or a flower, but more often it was a plant that she had never heard of before. Some looked a little frightening, even when their names were rather comforting, such as the hoja santa: The leaves were the size of her face, and she imagined being smothered by one. Her favorite names, she decided? Elderberry. Fenugreek. False unicorn. One corner of the greenhouse had a series of raised dirt beds instead of tables, and the magic here, according to Reseda, was beneath the soil. Eventually someone would pull up many of the roots that mattered, but in some cases-such as the dangerously poisonous mandrake-only select, very experienced gardeners would be allowed to handle the harvest.
“Did the woman who lived in this house before Sage share the greenhouse, too?” Garnet asked.
“She did. And she actually bred some of these plants. Some she brought from other parts of the world, but others she created herself-like this rather potent despairium.”
Just then the greenhouse door opened, and Sage entered with a plate of small tea sandwiches in her hands, and Anise and Clary beside her. Garnet decided she was right about Reseda’s hearing: She had never heard Anise’s pickup pull in or the truck doors slam shut. The sandwiches were made with watercress and chives and cream cheese, and some also had cucumber. The white bread was almost as thin as a cracker, and Garnet thought they were absolutely delicious.
“Is the watercress from this greenhouse?” Hallie asked, after Sage had listed for them the ingredients.
“It is, absolutely,” Sage told her, and she surprised Garnet by putting the tray of sandwiches on one of the long tables with plants and sitting down on the dirt floor of the greenhouse. Anise and Clary, despite their ages, sat on the ground, too, and Clary patted the earth, signaling Hallie and her to join them. Garnet looked at her sister and saw that the girl was already sitting down, so she did as well.
“Reseda?” Sage asked, when the younger woman remained on her feet. “Going to join us for our… our picnic?”
“I’m fine,” Reseda answered simply, but Garnet detected a slight sharpness to her tone. She noticed that Anise was staring intently at her, the woman’s face curious and probing.
“What have you shown the girls so far?” Anise asked.
Reseda motioned vaguely at the long columns of tables behind her.
“The rosemary and the calandrinia?”
“No. That felt rather premature to me. Remember, all we discussed was showing the girls some plants. We did not discuss a naming ceremony.”
“Not a ceremony. Just a…”
“A chance to eat finger sandwiches and learn our new nicknames,” Sage chirped agreeably, cutting Anise off, clearly desirous of easing the tension that seemed to exist between the two women. “All right then, Anise, do you want to begin?”
The women who had sat down only a moment ago all rose up to their full heights, Clary rubbing the small of her back but still grinning expectantly. Her eyes sparkled, and she and Sage held out their hands, and Garnet realized that she and Hallie were each supposed to take one. And so they did, Hallie taking Clary’s and Garnet grasping Sage’s slightly gnarled but soft fingers. Then Anise led them down an aisle between the tables from one end of the long greenhouse to the other. Reseda followed, but Garnet sensed it was only grudgingly. Finally they stopped almost at the farthest wall of glass, and Anise motioned toward a pair of pots beneath grow lights at the edge of the table. One held an herb and one a flower with a great fan of red petals. “Do you recognize either of them?” she asked.
Garnet looked at her sister. Hallie shrugged, as unsure of what the plants were as she was. “No,” Garnet answered simply.
“Well, we have a lot to learn then, don’t we?” Anise said, and there was a waft of judgment in the remark. “This is rosemary. Smell it. Inhale the aroma. Lovely, isn’t it? It looks like a little evergreen. And this is calandrinia. Feel the dirt it’s in: sand, peat moss, and loam. And the flower-this one in particular-has a coloring that reminds me a little of your hair, Garnet. Clary here was the first person in this area to grow it. She brought the seeds back from Chile.”
Anise used her thumbs to push her own untamed hair back behind her ears. “Hallie,” she said, bending over with her hands on her knees so she was face-to-face with the girl, “I appreciate the idea that you are named for your grandmother. It was such a lovely gesture on your mother and father’s part. I like genealogical legacies. And Garnet, I love the idea that you are named for that magnificent hair of yours. That was so creative of your parents and, at the time, so perfect.”
Garnet nodded and waited for more, well aware that this was a preamble to… something.
“But,” Anise went on, “when we’re together, I think we would all like to call you Cali-short for calandrinia- instead of Garnet. You are, like this flower, a little mysterious, and you clearly have a depth that is both grand and uncommon. And Hallie, how would you like to be Rosemary? You are fragrant and proud and make the world a little more savory.”
“But why?” Hallie asked. “Why these new names?”
“See what I mean? Already you are living up to the name. And the answer is simple: They’re terms of endearment. Of affection. That’s all. Many of us here in Bethel have taken names of interesting herbs and remarkable plants. It shows we’re… friends. You may have noticed. And we want you two girls to be our friends.”
Garnet didn’t mind having a nickname, though a part of her wished that she had been given Rosemary and her sister Cali. She had to hope it would grow on her. And it sounded like only her mom’s women friends were going to be using it anyway. She’d still be Garnet at school. Nevertheless, she wondered what Mom would think of this. Would her feelings be hurt? Would she feel it was some sort of intrusion into the family? Almost as if Reseda could read her mind, the woman knelt before her and said, “In time, your mother will be very happy with your names. Your father, too. And here is something that might make you feel a little more comfortable with this change. When your mother is with us, she is going to be called Verbena. Verbena is all about courage and friendship. Loyalty. It suits your mother.” She brushed a strand of her own lustrous hair off her forehead.
“Thank you, Reseda,” Anise said, but her voice was strangely curt. “I wasn’t planning on going into that much detail today.”
“And I wasn’t anticipating a naming ceremony.”
“Not a ceremony-just a preview. But I can’t tell you how much it pleases me that even around you I can be a little unpredictable,” she said. Then she reached for the leather shoulder bag that she had placed on the ground where they had been sitting and announced, “Girls, I have a present for each of you.”
“More jewelry?” Hallie asked.
Anise glanced at their wrists, noticing the bracelets for the first time.
“I can be unpredictable, too,” Reseda said, a wisp of a smile on her face.
But Anise only nodded agreeably and reached into the bag. “Do you two like to read?” she asked, and Garnet knew instantly that, instead of presents, they were both about to get homework.
