“Let me go get my purse, and I’ll give you some money for my order.”
“Absolutely not. It hardly makes up for all the food you’ve brought me over the months.”
The sprinkler hissed, and an errant stream of water lashed Micah’s jeans. He jumped back and so did Ximena.
She wiped at the skirt of her dress. “Twenty minutes late.”
Behind them, water bubbled from ground tubing beneath the rose plants. Micah glanced at the frilly petals. “I, uh, want to pay my respects to someone later. Can I take a few flowers?”
“Take as many as you’d like.”
Which ones? Blush? Mulberry? There were more bushes farther down, with other colors. “Can I ask you a weird question? The tenant who passed away, Cosmo… What color do you think was his favorite?”
Ximena’s gaze drifted from Micah to the roses. “You’ve been thinking about him a lot, huh? Maybe I shouldn’t have said anything. I don’t want you getting depressed and morbid.”
“I swear I’m not.” He shrugged. “Well, not any more depressed than I have been. Today, less so, actually.”
She folded her arms and tapped her chin. “He wore the most outrageous outfits. Greens and purples together. Cowboy boots with… things that don’t go with cowboy boots. The tiniest shorts you’ve ever seen” – she gestured to her crotch – “that left nothing to the imagination.”
“Wow.” Cosmo liked to make a statement. “I can work with that. Thanks.”
“I can’t say I understood his style or his art, but he was always polite, and I think it’s sweet that you want to visit his grave.”
Micah nodded and continued down the sidewalk. A soft breeze toyed with his hair, and a kaleidoscope of scents – flowers, exhaust, someone’s spicy cooking – filled his lungs. Cars honked in the distance, a chihuahua yapped, and a smoke alarm let out a shrill beep. Lemon Disco was alive. So was Micah. He needed to start acting like it.
When he reached the coffee shop and opened the door, he was inundated with the rich bite of coffee and sparkle of sugar. The last of the tension in his muscles unraveled, and he found himself rocking back on his heels as he waited in line. People sat at tables, typing on their laptops and chatting with friends. There was an incomparable comfort to being at home, safe, amid his art, but right now the studio seemed dismal in comparison to the energy in The Seventh Circle of Java.
Stooping to the pastry case, he surveyed the selection. Though there were no open flame pits, their hot pepper jelly muffins had made him feel like he was tongue-kissing Satan, and he wouldn’t be making that mistake again.
“Micah? God, I haven’t seen you here in forever. I thought you moved away.”
It hadn’t beenthatlong since he’d been here, had it?
He looked up. The cashier’s surprised smile decayed. She stared at his face, blinking rapidly as though if she did it hard enough it would make him less disfigured. Yep, apparently it had been that long.
“Still here.” He focused on the pastry case. “Can I have two medium lattes, please. Also two blueberry muffins, an angel muffin, and a poppyseed. Gotta get fat for hibernation.”
The cashier let out a strange laugh. “Yes, of course.” She filled his order, trying to fit all of the muffins into a tiny paper bag. “I think you might need another bag.”
“For my face?”
A flush flared in her cheeks, and she stammered and dropped the poppyseed muffin on the counter.
“Sorry. Still working on my routine of self-deprecating jokes.” He opened a bag and put the poppyseed muffin inside.
After paying, the cashier thanked him and urged him to come back more often. This had gone awkwardly, but he would try. Baby steps.
Stopping at Ximena’s office, he traded her a latte and muffins for a pair of pruning shears, then clipped the most vibrant roses possible from the complex’s bushes. Cosmo might not see them since it was doubtful any ghost wanted to spend their afterlife beside their own grave, but that wasn’t the point.
Purple at the center, flanked by orange and yellow, fringed at the edges with lavender herbs that had been growing freely beside a fire hydrant. After tying the bouquet together, he set it gently in the car and drove for Cherry Lane.
GPS gave him the fastest route there, but failed to come up with the location of a cemetery. Buildings thinned out, replaced by swaths of alfalfa and corn. Orchards and cow pastures rolled by. Maybe what Cosmo considered his grave wasn’t a proper burial spot, but the place of his death. He’d said there was nothing inside the grave at all.
A decaying church sat at the end of the road. Faded graffiti marked the double doors, and windows that once would have reflected the blue sky gaped as black, broken-paned holes. A strand of something sparkly was caught on the jagged glass, flapping lazily in the breeze.
Micah parked and got out, shielding his left eye from the sun. Weeds and beer cans crunched under his shoes. He stopped at the church and plucked a scrap of Halloween garland from the window. Little sun-bleached jack-o’-lanterns grinned on black tinsel. He peered inside. Shafts of light pierced the gloom fromholes in the roof, illuminating more partiers’ trash, collapsed pews, and candles melted to window sills.
He walked around back, startling a crow. Seedheads quivered, and branches on nearby trees rocked slowly. A wooden cross jutted from amid the weeds and broken bottles. There was only one, leaning against the church as though it didn’t have the will to continue standing on its own.
