DOGWOOD ✔︎

27 | The Whole Truth

Dad's hand closes around my arm. "You're looking unsteady again, sweetheart. I really think we should get you in the car and—"

"My dogwood tree is more than a just another monument," I blurt.

As soon as the words are out, a blast of wind rustles the leaves over our heads. It has that rain-is-coming-any-moment smell, but it feels like Mother Nature giving me the strength to keep going. "Mom brought it home from the plant store because it was...sort of...magical."

Dad gives me The Face. It's basically the same as when I was nine—after I told him my tree was more alive than the other trees in our yard—except that now I can see like, layers of...emotion, I guess. It's more complicated than disappointment or Dad thinking I'm weird. He knows something.

He looks at the puffy charcoal clouds and holds up an expectant palm like he's checking for rain. "We should go inside," he says, urging me toward the screened porch. "Kyle, you should head on home."

"No Dad, you brought me back here because my tree is suspended in time. You said you weren't jumping to conclusions, but you were—I could tell by the look on your face. You don't really believe this is a glitch of nature, do you?"

The rain starts: pelting down and bone-chilling cold. It drenches us in seconds. Dad tightens his hold on my arm and tugs me to the screened porch. Kyle walks backwards, keeping his eyes on mine like maybe he's waiting for me to say or do...something. I lift my hand, giving him a stupid little wave. He presses his lips in a line, turns around and runs.

I'm shivering now, so hard I can barely climb the brick steps. "I'll get a towel," Dad says, once we're under cover. I wait, dripping on the jute rug, while he goes into the house.

He comes right back, wraps a beach towel around my shoulders and guides me to the closest chair. "I was jumping to conclusions," he says, squatting in front of me. "We had that conversation about the purple flowers yesterday, and when I saw your tree—standing there, defying nature—I let myself get carried away. It's impossible to live with a woman like Evelyn for eight years and not come away a little more open-minded. But I'm sure there's a logical explanation for what's going on with your tree."

"It's perfectly logical if you're from the spirit world," Dogwood says.

Good point. "What if logic is...sort of...something that can be explained in different ways?" I tell Dad. "Like depending on how a person sees the world?"

He braces one knee on the rug so he can turn and look at my tree. The perfect dogwood flowers are in constant motion, a frantic little dance that's in sync with the plump water droplets drumming the porch roof. "Evelyn talked to all of her plants," he says. "She said it was scientifically proven to help them grow."

"Yeah," I agree, because that's written in her journal.

"It was different with your tree. After we planted it, she asked me to move one of the patio chairs into the grass for her. She sat out there almost every day, sometimes for hours, reading poems out loud to you—inside her tummy. But also for the tree."

Dad faces me again, his chin quivery. But then it's like he fortifies himself with a breath. "About a week before you were born, Evelyn told me the tree had a soul. She said she knew it the moment she found it in the plant nursery."

"She told you that—and did you believe her?"

"Your mom didn't need me to believe her," he says, reaching for my hand. "That's one of the things that made our relationship work so well. It was enough that I respected her beliefs and opinions, the same way she respected mine. But maybe I was wrong, Ginna. When I noticed those dogwood flowers, I started thinking about that conversation we had last week—when you reminded me of what I said about Evelyn's heart and soul being in that garden. If there was any way possible for your mom to send us a message, it's only logical that she would use that tree."