I showed up to his garden at 10:00 a.m. sharp, right on time but still tired. I’m not used to being this tired. If I’m in love, shouldn’t I have boundless energy?
He commented on how tired I looked, and I made a comment about my girlfriend being a black hole. I said it in an affectionate way. He looked at me and nodded, handed me a pair of shears, and told me to deadhead the spent flowers. He showed me what to do and proceeded to leave me to it while he pruned shrubs nearby. It was the simplest thing, but I was acutely aware that there were exactly no times when I was growing up that my father did that—showed me how to do something and then trusted me to do it.
“You know what kills most plants in vertical farms?” Merrick asked, his attention seemingly focused on pruning.
“Energy costs,” I answered quite seriously.
“Aside from that,” he said. I could hear him smiling, and I was so proud. “It’s a lack of light. Even when they have everything else—water, nutrients, perfect temperature—without light, they don’t grow. They exist. But they don’t grow.” He paused to toss a handful of stems into his wheelbarrow. “You’ve optimized everything, but you’ve been growing in the dark.”
Ah. This is about me,I realized. “And Olivia is the light?”
“You must let her in, dear boy.”
“It’s not that simple.”
“No. But it’s fundamental. You can’t optimize your way around fundamentals.”
I don’t know that to be true, but I didn’t say anything.
“I see who you are, John Brandt,” he continued. “I know you because Iwasyou. You think the girl is the black hole, pulling everything in, warping everything. But you’ve got it backwards. The real void is within you. You have an emotional void that you’ve been filling with work and optimization and achievement. What youthinkis your life’s work. But your real life’s work is to fill that void with love.”
I heard the sound of, well, of this brilliant man breaking wind. He waited for all the gas to pass, and neither of us acknowledged it, and then he continued, as if nothing had happened.
“Yes, I was you. Root-bound. In the same optimized, small pot. Circling the same patterns, trapped in my own perfect system. Until my wife disrupted everything.” He yanked something up by the roots, startling me. “Forced me to transplant. To break out of my self-made constraints. It was uncomfortable. Terrifying, even, because it felt like I was dying. But it was the only way I could grow into something bigger and better than what I had been.”
I understand exactly what he was saying, although it’s…a lot. Of metaphors. To describe how scary it is to fall in love.
Still. What am I supposed to do—notkeep the plane in the air? I’m not the only person on this plane. I have employees. My employees have families. I’ve invested in people and companies who also have employees and families.
How do people have ongoing relationships like this without losing everything they’ve worked for? It’s entirely possible theydon’t. It’s quite possible that I’ll have to choose. Solve the problem of world hunger and limit my interactions with Olivia? Or lower my standards and goals for making the world a better place in order to incorporate loving and fucking Olivia into my daily schedule? Thinking about it makes me uneasy. Thinking about anything besides Olivia is impossible when she’s around.
Is it really this black and white?
Perhaps not.
Perhaps I just need to let the light in and get a bigger pot.
She’s still ignoring me, but I can tell she’s not asleep. We’re in the center of the plane, in first class. I made sure Sanjay booked this airline to JFK so we would only be separated by armrests, a narrow side table, and a divider that can be raised or lowered. I’ve kept the divider lowered, even though Olivia’s emotional divider is still up.
It has been a quiet flight. No noisy kids. There’s a sweet young couple sitting in front of us and a cute elderly couple who have been split up on either side of us. I put my phone away ten minutes before boarding, gave Olivia my full attention. I didn’t say anything to her beyond asking her which side of the plane she wanted to be on and asking if she was sure she wanted to drink champagne during the flight.It’s dehydrating,I reminded her. But I didn’t stop her from drinking it. I wasn’t being judgmental. She slipped her earbuds in as she sipped her champagne. She played her music so loud that I could hear that it was Nine Inch Nails. Respect. I did tell her she was free to scowl when we aren’t in public, but I can’t stand seeing her the slightest bit unhappy. This is more than annoyance. There’s some kind of pain lurking beneath her beautiful surface.
Before I can talk myself out of it, I pull a pen and notebook out of my bag and tear out a piece of paper. In my least messy handwriting, I scribble:
Hi. P.S. I like you. P.P.S. I like you a lot. P.P.P.S. How can I make you happier?
After folding it up into something vaguely resembling a heart, I drop it onto her side of the divider, along with the pen, making sure they land on the side table.
I watch her stare at it. My chest warms at the sight of the hint of a smile on her pretty face. But now that she’s unfolded the note and read it, she looks sad again. She picks up the pen and writes something, refolds the paper, and holds the pen and paper over the divider so I can take them from her.
It is not cool how nervous I am.
And it is really not cool how excited I am to read what she wrote:
Hello. P.S. I like you a lot too. P.P.S. I’m sure I’m just dehydrated. P.P.P.S. I didn’t expect to like you this much. It’s weird and scary. That’s all.
I’m going to have this framed and give it to her as an anniversary gift.
That’s my initial thought, before I remember that we aren’t married or engaged yet.
