Page 10 of Only One Bed: Anthology Vol. 1
Only One Flower Bed
Rebel Carter
Grant Sinclair squatted down and squinted at the leafy vines growing happily in their loamy home. He reached out and pulled back a few leaves to examine the new fruit. It had been over a month now since he’d tilled this patch of land and seeded it with cantaloupes. The fruit was well suited to the Georgia climate, the warm weather and soil ensured it would thrive. It was far tamer than some of the plants, trees, and fruits Grant had taken to growing lately for his small but upscale clientele.
Plenty, Georgia, was a small town, with deep roots; founded in the mid-eighteenth century, Plenty’s citizens were a proud, stubborn but welcoming group that liked to stay put. When you came to Plenty you were accepted wholly and that meant few were of a mind to leave. Many of the current families went generations deep, Grant’s family was one such example of deep roots and little movement.
At least until Grant.
Although his leaving hadn’t been for long. He’d graduated along with his friends and spent a year or two living and working, thinking a little on the future and realized he wanted something slightly different than what Plenty had to offer. Or rather he wanted what it offered but just more and different.
If Grant had stayed in Plenty, he would have probably been working on the nearby docks helping maintain the boats his family owned for their shrimping business, hell, he might have even become a cop, a familiar face to those he’d grown up alongside of.
But Grant hadn’t wanted that. He looked down at the green leaves under his fingers and twisted one curling it back before he buried his other in the dark soil. He scooped a handful of it in his palm and squeezed it tightly making a fist, a sigh escaping the big man with a shudder.
Grant had wanted this. Plants in front of him and dirt in his hands. He wanted to know what made green things thrive and he wanted to give that to people, but it was a skill and a knowledge he’d had to leave home for. He’d gone to school in Athens for four years, got his bachelors in horticulture, and then set off taking jobs wherever he could, saving and learning as he went until he would be able to do the thing he wanted most--open his own business.
He glanced behind his back at the greenhouse, the large structure imposing and standing in sharp relief to the green woods that seemed to be pushing forward, ever reaching into the land he had cleared for his business.
Sinclair & Co. Horticulture. He was the ‘Sinclair’, his family the ‘& Co.’
They hadn’t been thrilled in his choice to leave but damned if they hadn’t tried to support him at every turn. The land he was building on had once been his grandaddy’s, deeded to him at the start of last year so that he could “Get rollin’ already,” as his grandaddy had explained in his will. Sitting in rumpled clothing from the red-eye he’d caught from Los Angeles, Grant had hardly been able to stop the laugh in the lawyer’s office, Mr. Oliveres, a family friend and a man that had known Grant since he could crawl. His grandaddy had chosen the man for a reason, he wouldn’t have wanted a stranger with his family. Not after he was gone and Grant was thankful for it. They could hear the old man in the lawyer’s dictation and they shared a smile of knowing.
“Guess you’ll have to come home,” Mr. Oliveres had observed looking at Grant over the rim of his reading glasses.
“Guess I will,” Grant conceded leaning back in the leather chair with a sigh and a nod. “Guess so.”
City life didn’t agree with him, never had, but it’d been a means to an end---that end being a life and business in Plenty. The move home had been relatively easy. Grant had been welcomed back with open arms and slaps on the back and more than one too many invitations for a cold one at the pool hall. It had been like he’d never left and to be honest, he’d been ready for the move back and most folks had been excited to see him.
The rumble of thunder overhead reminded him that it was due to rain today and he stood from his crouch, wiping his hands on his worn jeans. He had a good deal more to do today before the rain came and taking a journey down memory lane wasn’t one of them. The thunder grew louder and he stopped looking up at the sky to see that it remained the same overcast gray it had been all morning and afternoon. Still the sound grew louder and Grant turned, searching the sky for the source of the noise. He sighed, hands going to his hips and stared off into the horizon. The storm shouldn’t be here until the evening so what was that deafening---
A beat-up blue truck came into sight and Grant went still. He knew that truck, the familiar chrome of the hubcaps, the curve of the hood Grant knew was sturdier than it looked, the almost sky blue paint job that should have been repainted years ago.
And then there was the driver.
The dark-haired, most likely scowling sonofabitch at the wheel that was none other than Remington Wilson.
Hands still at his hips, Grant’s fingers squeezed his sides almost painfully when he was offered a clearer view of Remi’s face. He was indeed scowling, and he was just as handsome as ever.
If the move back home had been easy and everyone being glad to see him had made Grant think his decision to return to Plenty fated, then the sight of Remi seemed single-handedly determined to send Grant running. There was nothing easy about Remi. Never had been, but that didn’t mean Grant hadn’t tried.
Didn’t still try.
It was why he had thought of none other than Wilsons’ to fulfill his monthly supplies. Remi’s family ran the hardware store and keeping business local was key to Plenty’s ability to thrive and survive with big box stores and the damned internet slashing prices meant to drive small businesses into the dirt. Everyone in town had done their part to keep Wilsons’ going, just like they did for all the locally owned businesses. Plenty wasn’t about to let their small town vanish under the heel of new development. Grant had made sure every dollar spent had gone right into local pockets and Wilsons’ had been the only choice that made sense for his business---except that somehow that came attached with twice a month visits of scowling Remi Wilson bent on making the encounter as uncomfortable and prickly as it ever had a need to be.
He sighed, watching the truck bounce up the dirt road before it came to a skidding stop in front of the greenhouse. “Fucker,” Grant muttered under his breath and raised a hand in a terse wave. Remi didn’t wave back, just threw open the truck door and leapt from it with a scowl on his face.
He didn’t want to be here. Couldn’t be making it more clear that he didn’t want to be here, but Grant ignored it and ambled forward, working to keep his posture loose. They’d been friends once, or at least sort of--- Grant found it hard to remember with the way that life in Plenty was tangled together until the threads of separate lives tangled and knotted, creating a mess you couldn’t even begin to sort. He swallowed hard and took in the sight of Remi’s familiar body, the man’s broad shoulders and muscled arms drawing his attention for a beat before he forced his eyes back to his face.
He’d give anything for their once upon a time sort of friendship, the kind born of playing on the same sports teams, sitting in the same church pews and running around the same streets. Anything was better than what they had now which was open hostility. It’d been that way ever since Grant had announced he was leaving. It should have been an exciting night; they’d been out for Grant’s 22nd birthday and it had been somewhere between the third shot of tequila and the beer he’d just been handed, that he realized what he had to do.
He had to leave town otherwise this would be all he knew. It wouldn’t be a bad life. Just not the one he craved. It would be the one he fell into, not created and that would not stand. He’d already applied to UGA, received the acceptance letter and had just been sitting on the news, but there in the dim pool hall with his friends Grant had shared the good news with them all. Everyone had been stunned into silence but they’d recovered quick enough with congratulations and shouts for another round for “the college boy!”
All of them except for Remi.
He hadn’t missed the dark look that had passed over his face, or the way his normally warm gray gaze had gone hard all over in front of Grant’s very eyes. It was like looking at an enemy, or worse a stranger. He’d tried to head it off, catch up with the other man when they’d both stepped out for some air---Remi to smoke and Grant, to well, talk because the two of them had struck up something that year. Something Grant had always felt inside but never really acted on, but it had felt so good and natural with Remi that he hadn’t questioned it. Not when they’d first kissed, on a night much like this, hands and mouths exploring the other tentatively in the dark and then again with more confidence the longer the minutes stretched on.
The men hadn’t labeled what they had. It was easy that way. The days and night shared between them in town. A few of their friends knew and no one was really surprised by it, which made Grant wonder what they’d known before even he had, though he felt like it would only ever be like this with Remi. It had only taken a handful of years away from home to know he’d been right.
