Marion traversed the dark hall her fingertips lightly brushing the velvety tulips on the wallpaper. One by one she touched them, counting as she went. Ten between her room and the door to the kitchen. She could see them as clear as day in her mind. A dark, nearly black purple regimented on a field of succulent green. She had helped her mother hang the paper near thirty years ago and been so enamored with it she had recreated its charm in the yard surrounding this house.

Acres of grass kept more perfectly groomed than putting greens framed a dozen flower beds where a prize purple tulip stood at attention for one month of every year. The only thing to spoil the effect was her neighbor Clay Quincy�s insistence on growing a variety of flowering vines on the fence between their properties. All spring, summer and fall there was an effusion of vibrant color cascading over her fence. She was sure he took a perverse delight in spoiling her creation. He had once referred to it as evidence that even psychiatrists were not proof against neurosis.

Marion left the narrow confines of the hallway, keeping a hand on the doorjamb to get her bearings before stepping into the wilderness of her house. Use a cane? In the house I grew up in? I know it like I know myself. but she often turned back to her room and waited for Ernestine to see to her. Her daughter--raising a daughter of her own, while nurturing a radio talk-show--saw to her mother�s needs with barely a hitch in her lockstep.

Light inhabited the cavernous kitchen like a dragon its lair, slashing at Marion�s eyes. She blinked rapidly behind splayed fingers until her eyes adjusted to brightness, listening to Ernestine fix breakfast--the tinkle of metal against glass (a fork stirring eggs in a bowl?) the clang of metals (a pan being lidded?) the percussion of cupboard and fridge doors, the jangle of utensil drawers. Across the room, Verna croons counterpoints of contentment to her dolls.

Marion was emerging from a winters mourning for dimming eyes and withering womb--a double whammy. Though her resolve to contribute no more defective genes was twenty years old--the age of her widowhood--menopause at forty-eight seemed as much a failure as failing eyes. No matter what Clay said. Clay Quincey, an EMT, spent off duty days making pottery and courting Marion with patient perseverance. She held him off with scrupulous decorum.

Except her scruples went the way of her eyes and ovaries last fall, during a week spent hiking on the coast. they began in separate sleeping bags but confronted with the depth of their friendship, Marion found her grounds for naming their relationship inappropriate, shaky as the sand at sea�s edge. With Clay�s whispers in her ears relentless as the surf, their bags were zipped together. Then Clay proposed again.

�What objections are left?� He brushed her bangs back to plant a kiss. �Time dissolved most of them. Your mother�s been gone five years. And I never thought she�d object.�

Marion hid her face against his shoulder. �She never saw you as a suitor. You saw how she treated them.�

�Because she feared they�d take you away, which I wouldn�t have. Since age fourteen I did chores and errands for her, and escorted her about. She treated me like a surrogate son.�

�Your eighteen to my twenty-eight made it impossible for her to see you as more than surrogate kid brother for me.

�Two decades has lessened the shock-value of that if not proved my commitment.� He tightened his arm about her.

�I never doubted your commitment. Just the wisdom of it. Age difference aside, I wouldn�t deny you the delight of having your own children and they couldn�t be mine.�

�I don�t want to father children who can�t have you for a mother. I�d have been content as step-father. I felt like father enough the night Neal was born. Almost delivered him myself! If the paramedics had been five minutes longer��

�The night you found your vocation.� Marion remembered the gray-faced boy kneeling beside her in as much awe of the life-savers as the life giver.

And my heart. His hands cupped her cheeks. �Two callings which I never repented.�

�I know.� She caressed his lips with her thumb.

He caught his breath. �So how can you still object?�

�How can I subject you to the burden of an old blind lady?

�The same way you do Ernestine.�

�That�s different. I cared for my mother as she did hers. She needs to be home anyway. Her Drew flew the coop.�

He gripped her shoulders. �So let her and the kid have the house and move in with me. With your career you needn�t follow tradition and be so dependent. Doesn�t take good eyes to be a good listener. If maneuvering clinic and hospital mazes is too much, I got room for you to set up at home.�

�You make it sound fated.� She laid her cheek on his chest to feel his heartbeat.

�It always was.� He kissed her with long-denied urgency.

Today she blushed to think that she and seriously considered his proposal for several weeks after their return home. Until symptoms of menopause consumed her thoughts and nibbled away her courage. His call this morning had penetrated her self-absorption. �You a trauma shrink hiding from life?� a vulnerability in his voice had twisted the knife in her guilt. Time to end his agony. Better to ruin a friendship than the rest of his life. Today she was off to Clay�s for a long-postponed pottery lesson. Where she would firmly put their relationship back into the safe zone of friendship.

Marion eased one foot forward, reaching for the table, its mahogany surface a splash of shadow against pale linoleum and cerulean walls. Her fingers followed the edge to the south window-wall, where plants of a variety of shape and hue sat on shelves and hung from the ceiling. She took a mister among them, bestowing halos of mist, fingers brushing lightly the vines and laves, hovering over blossoms as she inhales an ecstasy of life.

She knelt beside a fern growing vigorously from a glazed pot, hands halting over a cluster of wilted fronds. �Feeling poorly today?� She probed its soil and sniffed her fingers. �OD�d on water, poor thing.�

Is Fern sick today Mare-Mare? Verna asked in a sick-room whisper.

�Might say so. Sometimes too much of a good thing is worse than too little. Its got a little root rot. Best leave it be for a bit.� she set the mister down and stood, wiping gritty fingers on her denim skirt and adjusting her black T-shirt�s seams. It fit snugger this spring than last. The winter had laid more than heavy thoughts on her.

�Hmmmm.� Ernestine approached, �Your grunge-work get-up.� Silver letters across the chest read: Down and Dirty. �I see you�re up and about.�

�So you do and so I am. Up to no good and about to be caught. She winked at Verna.

�Go wash up you two. I�m about to set the table.�

�I�m about washed-up already.� Marion mimed a morose look in an imaginary mirror and giving herself a finger facelift made a face at Verna, who squealed and ran for the hall.

�Verna Ruth! Walk!� Ernestine commanded. �Better yet, come help Mare-Mare.�

�No need. I may be washed-up but I�m not laid up.� To prove it she stepped forwards without reaching for support. With the second confident step she grinned but the next instant her grin was plastered to the wall as one foot surged forward, surfing the waxed floor.

�Mother!� Ernestine lunged for her.

Marion watched the red slime slide past her eyes as her face floated down the sky-blue wall and the bright white floor drifted up, a fathomless cloud offering endless embrace�..Slugtrail slugabed snuginbed snugasa bugaboo bugout slugitout knockout knockabout knocked�

��.up to your room, and leave it. I warned you what could happen.� The sound of ice-cubes breaking accompanied Ernestine�s words.

A sobbing Verna freed her blanket from Marion�s foot. �Is Mare-mare dead like Daddy?�

�Your Daddy isn�t dead, baby. He�s a deadbeat. Whole different thing.� Ernestine�s voice harbored a smile. �Mare-Mare�s just knocked out. She�ll be sassy as ever in a few minutes I�m sure.�

The tinkle and splash of ice-cubes in a bowl of water and the squish and splatter of a cloth immersed and wrung out, the shock of the cold compress applied to her nose, all served to focus Marion�s attention on the heart of the matter. She reached out Raggedy Ann hand�s. �Don�t� she whispered.

�Lie still, Mama.� With tender strokes she wiped away gummy blood, looking for its sources.

�Not Verna�s fault. Own foolishness!� Words molded by rapidly swelling lips.

�She must learn to accommodate your eyes.�

�That�s no chore for a child not yet five.�

�Adjusting to the exigencies of her environment is every child�s chore. Three Psych degrees and you don�t know that?�

Marion squeezed her eyes shut against the pain--not of her wounds but her inexorable guilt. By giving her children life she gave them and theirs eyes likely to fail by middle-age, bequeathing on their youth dependent elders and foreknowledge of their relentless fate.

�Looks like just a split lip and bloody nose. But maybe you should see a doctor.

�No doctor. Clay.�

Ernestine put Marion�s hand on the compress. �Hold this then.�

When Ernestine returned Marion was sitting at the table. �He�s on his way.� She paused. �He was expecting your call.� Longer pause. �Pottery lesson was it?�

Marion stemmed the smile stinging her lip. �I still haven�t the knack of the wheel. I fear he�ll give up on me.�

�If Clay were going to give up on you, he would have fifteen years ago.�

Marion blushed. �I made it clear long ago there�s no hope there.� Must be firm with him today.

�If he truly lost hope, it�d destroy him.�

�How long have you known?�

�At thirteen I had a crush on him. He made it clear his heart was already vowed. He said it was his destiny to kiss awake a sleeping beauty but he had to wait for her to finish dreaming her dreams. And no, he didn�t tell me it was you but that wasn�t hard to figure out. Shh now, he�s here.� Ernestine turned calling out, �Come on in Clay.�

The patio door slid open and Clay set down a terra cotta planter. �Join us for breakfast.� Ernestine said. �Can you manage scrambled eggs, Mother, or would you rather have a milkshake?�

�Eggs are fine.�

VERRRRRNA. Ernestine called.

�She�s out front.� Clay said.

�I best get her.� She stopped him closing the door.

Clay sat beside Marion. �Let�s see.� His breath on her cheek made her shiver. �Going to be some nasty bruising.�

�What�s that?� She pointed to the planter.

�I noticed the quince in your room is root-bound. Better repot soon or risk having to break the pot getting it out.�

Marion was alarmed. �That�s one of your finest pieces.� He�d given her the quince when they�d graduated from college. The night he�d first proposed. �But this won�t fit in there.�

�Make room in here. Better yet, bring it to my house.�

�Oh, Clay.�

His hand behind her neck drew her face to his until their foreheads touched. �You�re breaking my heart, Marion.� His earthen-brown eyes searched hers until she closed them to resist the urge to plant her soul there.

�I�m aging by the minute.�

�I know what�s eating you. I had my own theory. Here.� He slipped a slender object in her hand. Some kind of pen? �The other day, when I was over fixing your toilet�and you used a bucket?�I took the liberty�� His voice sank to a whisper. �You�re pregnant.�

Laughter welled to overflowing within Marion, but just then Ernestine drug in a wailing Verna. �Go sit on the stairs.�

�They�re for Mare-Mare!� The child�s feet plodded past Marion and the door to the stairway creaked open and the shut on her heartbroken wails.

Ernestine rolled a doll buggy chock-full of tulips to Marion�s knees. �She got them all, Mama, I�m so sorry.�

Marion lifted a velvety bloom, cradling it in both hands as sobs echoed in the stairwell like memories.

�Remember the day you dusted Grandma�s desk?�

Ernestine inhaled sharply. �Yes! I moved everything and she panicked that she�d never find anything.�

�She sent you..�

�To the stairs!�

�While we named and placed every last thing.�

�I could�ve put everything back exactly but she wouldn�t listen.�

�That�s when I swore to stop the cycle. If I ever led you to believe that my things or comfort were more important than a child�s heart, I�m sorry.�

Ernestine ran for the stairs and returned carrying Verna. �Mama�s sorry. Mare-Mare�s not mad. We�ll put them in water.

Marion lifted the stem-less tulip to her nose, visualizing the acres of manicured lawn and loamy soil designed to frame a few prized blooms--now gone--and suddenly understood Clay�s preference for a yard growing with the abandon of a woodland meadow and bursting with varieties of blooms every season. �I�ve been so contrary.� She moaned against his neck.

�Quite.�

�Take me home?�

He gathered her into his lap. �You are my home.� He whispered against her earlobe as she let her body relax against his, surrendering finally to the firmness of his resolve.