Where the Netting Caught

Micah's practical day had involved identifying plants, moving materials and admitting that he did not know the answer to one question about soil.

“I nearly invented something,” he told Leila. “Then I thought it would be a poor beginning to spend the rest of my career defending an imaginary soil type.”

They were at the allotment on Saturday afternoon. Jean had gone to a neighbour's birthday lunch and left instructions long enough to suggest she expected the seasons to change before she returned. Micah had promised to check the watering and secure a loose section of netting. Leila had promised herself she would not spend the whole afternoon checking her phone.

Mum had sent a photograph of the television remote in her left hand, followed by Still competent. Stop worrying at me.

Leila put the phone away.

“Do you think they'll choose you?” she asked.

“I don't know. There were people who knew more than me. There were also people who said things very confidently and then got corrected.”

“Which group were you in?”

“Trying not to join either too visibly.”

He showed her the notes he had made afterwards. There were plant names, a train time and a reminder to email someone about the next stage. His handwriting sloped differently from line to line, as though each sentence had been written on a different moving vehicle.

“I'm glad you went,” she said.

“So am I.”

They worked on the netting. Leila held one edge while Micah untangled the part caught around a cane. A bee moved between the flowers beside her hand. She watched it land, adjust itself and disappear partly into a bloom. At college, she would have tried to sketch the shape immediately. Here she let herself look without collecting it.

Micah glanced up.

“What?”

“Nothing.”

“You look pleased with a piece of string.”

“It's netting. I was listening earlier.”

“Excellent. The terminology has taken.”

The loose corner came free suddenly. Micah stumbled back half a step, and Leila caught the edge before it fell onto the plants. For a moment they were both laughing, holding opposite ends of something neither completely controlled.

Then the work was done. That was the part Leila had been both waiting for and avoiding: the moment when they could no longer use the task as an explanation for staying close.

Micah set the spare cane against the shed. Leila brushed a thread from her sleeve. Somewhere beyond the fence, a dog barked three times and stopped.

“Do you want to sit?” he asked.

“Yes.”

They chose the chair under the plum tree and a low stool beside it. Leila took the stool because the chair looked too much like a thing she had already drawn. Micah moved it so their knees were almost level.

She told him about Mum's wrist. He asked how she was managing and listened to the answer without turning it into a list of solutions. Then he told Leila about the winter Jean had been ill enough to need help with the allotment, and how he had spent weeks assuming every phone call meant something had happened.

“Was she all right?” Leila asked.

“Yes. It took me longer to behave as though she was.”

Leila looked at the rows of plants. “I keep doing that with the room. Thinking if I pay attention hard enough, nothing else can go wrong.”

“Does it work?”

“No. It makes me irritating.”

“Only occasionally.”

She nudged his shoe with hers. He nudged back, gently enough that the movement became a question rather than a joke.

“I like being with you,” he said.

She stared at the toe of his shoe. There was soil along the seam and a loose bit of thread near the heel. Her mind chose these details because the larger thing he had said seemed too bright to look at directly.

“I like being with you too.”

He waited. She lifted her eyes.

“Could I kiss you?” he asked.

“Yes.”

The answer came out quietly, but he heard it. He leaned towards her, stopping close enough that she could move the rest of the way. She did. The kiss was brief and a little awkward because the stool shifted beneath her and she put one hand against the side of the chair to steady herself.

“Sorry,” she whispered.

“For what?”

“Furniture.”

He laughed softly. She laughed too, which made the second kiss easier and not at all like the scenes she had rehearsed without admitting she was rehearsing them.

Afterwards, they stayed close. His hand rested lightly beside hers on the chair, not holding it down. She turned her palm and took his fingers.

For several minutes they said very little. Leila could hear the railway farther away, a bird making a repetitive complaint and the faint click of a loose label against a plant pot. She wanted to remember the afternoon, but the effort of trying to preserve it threatened to pull her out of it. She let the details remain where they were.

When Jean returned, they were still beneath the tree, discussing a television programme neither had finished. She took one look at them, set down a paper bag and began inspecting the netting.

“Passable,” she said.

“The netting?” Micah asked.

“What else would I be evaluating?”

Leila bent to hide her smile.

Jean had brought leftover birthday cake. She cut three pieces with a gardening knife she claimed had been thoroughly washed. Micah washed it again. Jean objected on principle and ate the cake on a saucer balanced on her knee.

“Practical day went well?” she asked him.

“Mostly.”

“Then don't spend a week deciding what mostly means. Wait for them to tell you.”

Leila caught Micah's eye. He looked so like someone trying not to smile at a family habit that she felt a sudden, ordinary tenderness for him. Not because he was going to solve something. Because he was there, embarrassed by his grandmother, pleased about a possibility, holding a piece of cake too large for the plate.

At the gate, he kissed her once more, without needing to ask whether the afternoon had changed its mind. She still checked the time afterwards because she had a bus to catch. He still had chairs to put away. Neither thing made the kiss smaller.

On the journey back, Leila sent Esme a message.

It was definitely a date.

Esme replied before the next stop.

Thank you for confirming my professional assessment.

Then: Tell me everything that isn't private.

Leila smiled at that. She told her about the stool.