Felicity – A Philosophical Fable [Chapter 17]
Sitting still did not come easily to Fae. While Sunny sat blithely eating tiny round cakes from her bowl, Fae just swirled her spoon in her custard without eating.
“Do you think she’ll wake up soon?” she asked.
Sunny shrugged her shoulders.
Fae set her bowl down and stood up. She twirled on her heels a few times and then rearranged the sofa pillows. “What do you think she does out there?”
Sunny shrugged her shoulders again. “I don’t know,” she said between bites. She was curious, but not quite as curious as Fae.
By the time Mimi came out of her room, Fae had become so eager to pose her question that she couldn’t even wait for Mimi to sit down on the sofa.
Mimi was not at all troubled by Fae’s impatience. She immediately went to the inner wall and opened a door to the courtyard. Fae and Sunny followed. What they saw when they passed through the doorway was dazzling. The bright blue sky. The sunshine. The clouds agleam with light. And in the center of it all, the garden, green with life.
Mimi tended to a tomato plant that needed pruning. Fae watched her work. Sunny gazed at the sky.
The plants were strong and healthy, for Mimi tended them well.
As Fae bent over a tomato plant to take a closer look, she smelled the pungent aroma of the foliage. It was a sharp smell, crisp and peppery. She walked carefully between the rows of sprouting vegetables. The tomato plants already had small green fruit. So did the pepper plants. The lettuce and spinach plants were full of leaves. And the tops of radishes and carrots rose out of the soil. Fae ran the fine fronds of a carrot lightly through her fingers.
Sunny was still gazing at the sky when Fae called her over to see the plants. Sunny looked closely at the leaves and stems and unripe fruit. Each with its own shade of green.
As Sunny and Fae admired the garden, the first drop fell. It landed on a spinach leaf and glittered in the sunshine. Fae didn’t see it, but Sunny did. She saw it and she sighed, awed by the beauty of it. She crouched beside the spinach, rapt in contemplation of the glittering raindrop. And more drops fell. They fell lightly at first, splashing on the soil, the plants, the patio tiles.
When the scattered drops became a shower, Sunny, Fae, and Mimi took cover under an awning that Mimi had never noticed before. Still the sun shone in the bright blue sky.
They stood only a moment under the awning. Then Fae cast a playful glance at Mimi and Sunny before dashing into the sun shower. Mimi and Sunny were right behind her, dancing and laughing in the rain. The picture of grace.
They danced in a circle around the garden, water dripping from their hair, from their clothes. They tossed their heads back and raised their arms to the sky and the rain streamed down their faces. And around they danced. Round and round on the wet grass. In the shimmering sunshine. In the rain. The rain that watered Mimi’s garden.