Root, Petal, Thorn

by Ella Joy Olsen

Genres: Family Life; Historical Fiction; Women's Fiction

Synopsis

"Provocative in the way it explodes and expands the category of historical fiction." -- Salt Lake Tribun e In this beautifully written and powerful debut novel, Ella Joy Olsen traces the stories of five fascinating women who inhabit the same  historic home over the course of a century—braided stories of love, heartbreak and courage connect the women, even across generations. Ivy Baygren has two great loves in her life: her husband, Adam, and the bungalow they buy together in one of the oldest neighborhoods in Salt Lake City, Utah. From the moment she and Adam lay eyes on the  home, Ivy is captivated by its quaint details—the old porch swing, ornate tiles, and especially  an heirloom rose bush bursting with snowy white blossoms.  Called the Emmeline Rose for the home’s original owner, it seems yet another sign that this place will be Ivy’s happily-ever-after…Until her dreams are shattered by Adam’s unexpected death. Striving to be strong for her two children, Ivy decides to tackle the home-improvement projects she and Adam once planned. Day by day, as she attempts to rebuild her house and her resolve, she uncovers clues about previous inhabitants, from a half-embroidered sampler to buried wine bottles. And as Ivy learns about the women who came before her—the young Mormon torn between her heart and anti-polygamist beliefs, the Greek immigrant during World War II, a troubled single mother in the 1960s—she begins to uncover the lessons of her own journey. For every story has its sadness, but there is also the possibility of blooming again, even stronger and more resilient than before…

Release date: August 30, 2016

Publisher: Kensington Books

Print pages: 306

Sample

Downington Avenue

The sound was only mildly alarming, a persistent non-menacing scratch like bare branches against thin glass on a blustery December night. But it wasn’t winter, the covers had been kicked to my ankles, and the house was July-muggy.

I reached over and tapped the mattress near my husband’s head to wake him, knowing without opening my eyes our raccoon was back and nesting in the attic. Typically, it took both of us to triangulate her stealthy movements among the rafters, then come morning, we could easily locate her cozy mound of shredded cloth and insulation. We had a routine. With elbow-length gloves and face protection, Adam would catch the hissing female and lock her in our old puppy crate. If there were babies, I would hand him a towel I’d heated in the dryer, and he’d bundle her masked kits for transport. Together we’d drive them back into the foothills of the Wasatch Mountains near our home. There we’d shake the mama out of the cage (again), run for cover, and admonish her through the open windows of the minivan to stay in the woods where she belonged, or the next time we’d be forced to take more drastic measures.

I leaned closer to his sleeping form and whispered so my voice wouldn’t muffle the sounds of the creature in the attic. “Adam, she’s back. Listen.”

The response was a lolling lick, wetting me from finger to forearm. Recoiling, I gasped, “Oh, God, Chloe. What are you doing on the bed?”

Wiping dog slobber onto the quilt, I foggily tried to recall Adam’s whereabouts. Was this the bar convention in Sun Valley? Or that deposition he’d scheduled in Denver? And then with a nauseating punch I sat up in bed, hand to my mouth. Knowing. I glared at Chloe, willing her night-blurry canine silhouette to be my husband. But it wasn’t. Her fringed tail thumped once against the mattress in response to my flinty stare. She sighed, perhaps in sympathy, and laid her head back on the pillow.

Sliding from the bed to the floor, moaning lightly with each breath, I reached under the skirt for the box I knew was there, all the while pleading it into nonexistence. But the tips of my fingers found the cardboard container my brother Stephen used to bury the items I couldn’t look at, not even for a second. He was certain I’d want them someday. But I didn’t. I didn’t ever want them to be there, because if they were under the bed it meant—

“No, no, no, no, no,” I whispered softly, my voice quivering as I tugged at the lid. “Please be empty, please be empty.” I willed it with my words even as I recognized the intimately familiar contents. Lifting the red T-shirt, threadbare at neck and hem, I breathed in the lingering smell of laundry detergent and sweat, swiping at my cheeks with my shoulder so tears wouldn’t tarnish the precious item. My heart was pounding behind my forehead, blurring the remaining contents as I groped inside the box with shaking hands. His gym shoes had been placed at the bottom, as free from impact as the morning he last tied them to his feet, and his socks, still crunchy from his run, were tucked inside. Holding the crumpled pair to my nose, they smelled antiseptic, like the floor of a hospital, but I inhaled until my lungs groaned with the effort.

“Where are you?” I whispered into the dark, imploring him to respond. Silence answered me. After shedding my pajama top I slipped into the worn red cotton, the last shirt he’d worn. We’d purchased it together, more than fifteen years earlier, high from cheap beer and victory after one of the best football games in all our years at the University of Utah. Late-season golden leaves swirled under our feet as we walked across campus to our apartment, swinging through the bookstore to buy it. Warmed from exhilaration, he’d stripped from the sweatshirt he’d worn that day and, boldly bare-chested, switched into the new shirt, his boyish abs turning to chicken skin with a rush of October air. Later that afternoon, he’d abandoned it in the corner of our newlywed bedroom, his skin smooth and warm against mine, pressed together under the down comforter.

I crossed my arms at the thought of him and crushed my hands into the sinew of my shoulders until my fingers ached. Embraced once again against the chest of my husband, I curled onto the floor and slept.

Porter was close to my face, his nose nearly touching mine, and his breath was tinged with his regular breakfast of Cheerios and chocolate milk. He jumped back as I opened my eyes, and I noticed the snail trail of slick tears across his cheeks. “Mom? Are you getting up? It’s after lunchtime and . . .”

I willed myself to look at him, to answer, to stand. But his eyes, the almond shape of them, the arc of his brow, though he was only eleven, they were Adam’s. I pressed my lids together, shutting him out.

“I’m calling Uncle Stephen.” Naomi’s voice came from the kitchen, shrill and worried.

“She moved a second ago,” Porter said. “Let me shake her again.” He touched my arm, fingers cold and tentative.

Naomi’s voice found me, speaking loudly from the kitchen. “She’s on the floor in his shirt and she hasn’t moved all morning. Yes, she’s breathing, but . . .” Her voice hitched the way it always did before she cried, and I could picture her bottom lip curling up in the center, like a bow, looking like it did when she was a toddler and crying was a daily occurrence.

Go to her! I screamed silently. Every impulse pushed me toward my daughter, arms surrounding her with familiar comfort before she could feel pain, but I couldn’t move.

Her sobbing was real now. She hadn’t cried openly since she entered the teen years, but this morning she was sniffing like a child between words, her voice clogged with tears. “There’s a pot of oatmeal on the stove. It’s rotten, there’s mold all over the inside. I think it’s from that day!” My daughter was coming unraveled, but heaviness bound me to the carpet as surely as stones. My heart raced like it did when I was seven and my brother, Stephen, buried me in the sand at the beach, my legs and arms paralyzed, fighting against a brain begging me to Move!

“He says he’s on his way,” Naomi said to Porter, hanging up the phone. Relief swept over me at her muffled words. Stephen could fix me if I couldn’t fix myself.

“Ivy.” Stephen pushed stiff threads of hair from my face and, using gentle hands, he pulled me into a sitting positon. “I wondered if this might happen.” My brother crouched next to me still in his scrubs. “It’s been a month, and until now, I haven’t seen a single tear.”

“If I cried, it would mean he was really gone.” I spoke quietly, telling my brother what I’d realized only hours earlier. “But Stephen, I don’t think he’s coming back.”

“No, honey, he’s not.” My brother held me until I could lift my face from his shoulder. He looked older than he had moments earlier. He loved Adam too. “So what happened? The kids found the oatmeal, and you’re in his shirt—”

“The oatmeal?” What was he talking about? And then I remembered pulling it from the back of the cupboard, where I’d stashed it weeks earlier. Last night, the midnight kitchen was inky black, the yellow Post-it reading “oatmeal for you” left from that morning still stuck to the lid of my red ceramic pot. “Where are the kids now?” I asked, suddenly alarmed. They shouldn’t see me this way. I pulled my hands through my hair, embarrassed at the snarled mess.

“Porter has a couple of buddies over. They’re in the basement playing Call of Duty, and I had Naomi walk over to Amber’s for the evening.”

“They’ve been so strong,” I said. “But you know, I hear Naomi crying most nights after I close her door. I’ve tried to get her to talk with me, but she hides her sorrow because she’s being strong for me. Stephen, I’m the mom. If I don’t pull myself together I’m going to scare her. I’ll scare them both.”

Stephen stood from the balls of his feet and extended me a hand. “I think you should take a shower. Nothing like the thump of hot water to give you a little clarity. However, you’re right, when you get out we need to come up with a plan. You know, I wasn’t sure you’d need it, but there are medications that might help smooth this transition. I could even prescribe—”

I shook my head. “I don’t want my memories dulled. I just need to—I don’t even know what I need to do.” Finally standing, my legs felt like I’d run a marathon. I leaned into Stephen’s shoulder, a safe haven where I’d sought shelter more than once.

When we were children, my brother was usually the one to tuck in my shirt, point out Oreo stuck in my teeth, hand me a tissue and dry my tears—because Stephen was more than a regular big brother, he’d been my solid my whole life. More handsome than the best-looking doctor on a television hospital drama, face lined with compassion, sandy blond hair graying with gravitas at the temples—that was Stephen. Swoon-worthy, my girlfriends called him. When he came out after college, I swear there was a cry heard round the dating world. But secretly I loved that my big brother was gay because, no matter what I did, I would always be Stephen’s best girl.

After the shower I put on a long cardigan and leggings. Though it was July, I was shivering. Lingering on each aspect I could recall of my husband, and torturing myself with the timeline of events on the day he died, took every drop of hot water plus at least ten minutes of ice pouring from the pipes to drive me from the bathroom. Stephen had changed into shorts and a shirt from Adam’s closet and was sitting at the dining room table when I emerged.

“I thought you’d drowned in there. I beat Porter and his friends in a round of Call of Duty and had time for a cup of tea before I heard the water shut off.”

“I think I have a fever.” I pressed my thumbs into my eyelids.

Stephen put his hand to my forehead. “I wouldn’t doubt it. It’s amazing what the brain can do to the body.” He removed his hand. “But you feel fine to me. Now sit.” He slid his lukewarm tea toward me. “And let’s talk about Adam.”

“I can’t talk about him like he’s gone. Not yet.” In quiet moments since my husband died, when I hadn’t pasted on an I’m-doing-fine face, I’d catch myself staring out the window at the quiet street in front of my house, incredulous the ash trees canopying our front walk still held the same leaves, alive and verdant, the same ones that graced the branches the day he died. With something as momentous as his death, it seemed unfair the neighbors could drop by with lasagna and go on with their lives, backing down their drives and leaving for work like the world hadn’t shifted. In every corner of our fixer-upper bungalow, abandoned tools were idle without his able hands. And the oatmeal I’d made that morning waited for him to return for breakfast.

“Stephen, help me.” I slid my chin into my hands, pushing back the tears. “Tell me it’s going to be fine, like you did when we were kids and I’d come crying into your room after a fight with so-and-so. Tease me, rationalize with me. Say something funny. I feel like I’m crumbling.”

He was quiet for several minutes, then he spoke with a self-assured tone he’d assume when he was sure he was going to beat me at Monopoly, or he’d diagnosed the symptoms in a mystifying medical case. “Today, before I leave, we’re going to make you a plan—a list to help you when you can’t figure out the next step. Like the study chart you used for calculus, remember?”

“Calculus was my worst subject.” I rested my head on my folded arms.

“But you passed.”

“Only because you kept bugging me to study.”

“Using the chart.” He was smiling now, and I couldn’t help but smile back. “Get some paper and a nice pen. We’re making you a chart, or an action plan, or a list, or whatever you want to call it.”

“If that’s what the doctor orders,” I said with false stubbornness, but I was actually fizzing. My list-making skills had always been my inflatable water wings in choppy waters, and at this point my head was above water. But just barely. I could really use a plan.

I handed him several sheets of my nicest stationery, a pale green with intertwined leaves. I bought it in bulk, because it was my name paper—Ivy. I put the pen next to the paper in front of him.

“No, you hold the pen,” Stephen said. “These are your words and your commitment. I can’t do this for you. I can only help you with the tools.”

I uncapped the pen and held it over the paper. “What’s first?”

“You tell me. Don’t you have some articles on grieving, some self-help books? I swear I saw a stack someone brought over after the funeral.”

Suddenly inspired, and wanting to show Stephen I still had a wobbling sense of humor, I wrote: #1: If one glass of wine isn’t enough, pour another. Stephen slid the paper over so he could see it.

“Yes, drinking is a coping skill,” he said seriously. “But maybe not the healthiest. However, you should list anything you think of.” Stephen stood. “I’m making more tea, do you want some? And maybe I’ll figure out dinner for the kids since you’re currently occupied.” He cocked his head toward the task before me.

I put pen to paper as Stephen clunked about in the kitchen. The tea was taking an eternity, and I figured he had the gas on low to give me time to think. Stephen called his partner, Drew, and speaking in a hushed voice, told him he wouldn’t be home for dinner. I immediately thought of all the times Adam would call me from the office, telling me he’d be late. But he always came home.

I wrote my second step, half listening as Stephen asked Porter and his buddies what they’d like on their pizza. Porter came upstairs, and I knew from their whispers my son had been deflected from looking for me by his uncle. Stephen ordered the pizza and called Naomi, who, after a few minutes of chatting, appeared to decide to have dinner with Amber.

By the time he returned with a National Geographic, half read, and my cup of tea, I had five steps:


Stephen read the list slowly. “This is a good start,” he finally said. “But I have at least one more suggestion.”

“Okay,” I agreed. Writing this list felt like reaching my arm out of the deep end of the pool and finding a ladder. Knowing I could use the rungs to hoist myself out of the water—still a little ungainly, but possible. I would write anything he suggested.

“One question first. Is ‘get the dog to sleep on his side of the bed’ even a skill?”

“If you’ve ever awakened from a dream, only to realize your perfectly alive dream-husband is actually dead, you’d understand. It comforts me to bury my hands in Chloe’s fur. It’s silly, I know.”

“Not silly. It stays,” he said. “Now, don’t get offended, but I’m going to add number six, ‘Get your house in order.’ I can see, like always, you and Adam were in the middle of several fix-it-up projects.” He swept his arm around him, palm up, indicating the dining room was a perfect case in point. “But you can’t leave them half done forever. It might help you through the denial part of grief to admit he won’t be finishing them.”

“But I don’t know how—” I protested logistics.

“Come on. You’re capable,” Stephen said, as he added Step #6 in pen. “I’ve seen you work a power drill with as much proficiency as most construction workers. You just don’t want to finish them. And if you need actual help, call a professional.”

“But if I change things . . .”

“Ivy, you know I’m not the one who will sell you a bunch of bullshit. Adam’s death is one of the truest tragedies I’ve seen. And I’ve seen a few, but . . .” Stephen gazed at the hardwood under the table as he spoke, his own eyes brimming. “He’s not coming home and you can’t live in a shrine. First, it’s unhealthy; second, with kids, it’s impossible. Start by putting away the tools.” He pointed to the jigsaw, a stack of sandpaper, and a level sitting in a dusty pile in the corner of the dining room. “If you clean up your house, you’ll be able to see your way to the deeper issues. By the way, I like number three, ‘Find a deeper meaning.’ Let me know what you discover.”

“Maybe I should move,” I said, hoping for a reaction.

“Not a bad idea,” he said slowly. “You and Adam put so much of yourselves into this place, it would be hard to leave, but maybe it would help.” Stephen studied the corners of the room as he said it, likely remembering the days he spent helping Adam rewire the dining room and kitchen. He had memories here as well.

The doorbell rang. Stephen jumped up and grabbed his wallet from the pocket of his scrubs, which he had folded near the door. “I’ve got this. And now, grab a bottle of wine. I think we’ve made good progress, and it’s time to work on step number one.”

As I opened a bottle of no-name cabernet and collected plates and paper napkins from the kitchen, Porter and his two friends sat at the dining room table eagerly opening the cardboard box. The rich smell of tomato sauce and the abundance of voices in the room made me forget, if only for a second, Adam was missing. I took a sip of wine and felt it settle into my stomach. I could definitely master Step #1.

“I love it when Uncle Stephen comes over,” Porter said, his mouth full of food. “Pizza from The Pie is so much better than Little Caesars, especially since we’ve had Little Caesars, like, every day.” Porter swallowed and grinned sheepishly after divulging our main source of sustenance these past few weeks. My son. He still looked rumpled with worry from the day, but his shoulders were relaxed and thank goodness he wasn’t biting his left thumbnail, a little obsessive behavior he’d picked up when things got especially emotional around our house.

The three young boys resumed their conversation about the video game, discussing the weapons they’d accumulated. They finished their pizza and left the dining room fully engrossed in each other. A minute later Porter returned and touched my shoulder lightly, almost as if he was confirming my physical presence. It was an “I’m here” touch, like Adam would give the kids when they were sad. The tiniest sob rose from his throat, and I knew my baby boy was aching too. I leaned my cheek against his fingers, pressing them between my face and my shoulder. He held perfectly still for several beats, then left without saying a word, his steps light through the kitchen and down the stairs. The maelstrom of eleven-year-olds away from the table and one glass of wine consumed, I reached for a piece of pizza.

Stephen and I ate wordlessly, peacefully, because really what else was there to say? After we’d both pushed away from our plates, Stephen stood and picked up the nearly empty pizza box. “Do you mind if I take this extra piece back to Drew?”

“Take it, of course.” I stood next to him.

He put the box back on the table and put his warm hand on my shoulder. “You can do this, Ivy. Day by day—all right? What will you work on tomorrow?”

I rested my finger lightly on Step #6, Get your house in order. Stephen’s physician scrawl was much less legible than mine on the first several steps. “I have to work the Saturday shift at the bank, just until two o’clock, but I’ll stop on my way home and get some paint for Naomi’s room. It’s almost done and it’s about time we—or I, finish up. I also think there are raccoons in the attic, which I’ll have to deal with. Good?”

“Let’s call it a good start.”

I was doing my best to get my house in order, because Stephen was right, a day filled with work was a day I wouldn’t spiral. It was a sleepy Saturday morning a week later, the fingers of a hot July day slowly stretching into my empty rooms. Naomi and Porter had spent the night with the neighbor-friends, intent on getting an early start at the water park, and I’d intended to capture mother and kits, but frankly I was a little frightened at the prospect. Besides, the raccoons had been quiet the last couple days. For a week, I’d acted like a crotchety old lady pounding the ceiling with a broomstick to send them an audible warning, but if it worked and I didn’t have to crawl into the attic (because it was Adam’s job, after all), it would be worth it.

This morning, however, with the kids out of the house I felt a little out of sorts, the desire to curl up like a pill bug and burrow into the quilts overriding my sense of purpose. Having painted Naomi’s room, I figured there was nothing like crossing things off a list for inspiration. If not the raccoons, then I must do something.

Sticking my handwritten recovery list on the refrigerator using a magnet Naomi made me for Mother’s Day, I stared with laser focus at my options while eating a sesame-seed bagel, willing myself to tackle recovery step du jour. I was considering Step #2, Surround yourself with things you love, which, in all practicality, could be called yard work. And there was my plan.

Outside, the air was still kissed with the pink of dawn, an early summer morning fresh with the lingering chill of a starry night. Blossoms blinked in the sun, heavy with dew, their fragrance emerging—surrounding me. Despite the work, this was why I loved my roses. The wrought iron trellis signifying the entrance to the garden was draped heavily in the papery lavender blossoms of a Blue Moon climbing rose. Carefully, I grasped one of the flowers, pulled it toward me, and breathed a heady aroma resonant of lemon and spun sugar. Rows of pastel beauty beckoned me beyond the gate, calling me to a place where time paused. This quiet corner full of sunshine, color, and peace was my sanctuary.

But today the roses were rangy. Roses were a needy plant, and I’d been a neglectful gardener. Many of the flowers had already dropped their petals, exposing the naked center, the round hips swollen like crab apples. Readying my shears, I reached behind a branch of the Sutter’s Gold to deadhead an aging blossom. Several peachy petals scattered on the brown earth and into the palm of my gloved hand. I touched them to my cheek, smooth and cool like the contours of my children’s faces—gently cupping their tiny heads as I put them down to nap. Was it yesterday? Or was it another life?

Deadheading was a necessary but melancholy part of keeping roses, because the belle of the ball only days ago must be abandoned the moment she started to age. She no longer served a purpose. Get rid of the old, allowing the new buds to utilize the nutrients otherwise captured by the fading. A practical yet dreary reality.

And where am I in my rose life span?

Stop it, Ivy, I scolded myself. I could hear Stephen’s voice. “Here’s the problem with ruminating: you don’t accomplish much.”

With determination, I reached for the next bush. Vibrant yellow, tiny withering suns shone from Sun Goddess—a rose with a perfect name. However, it didn’t stop me from trimming her dying blossoms. Next shrub—this one named Timeless. I clipped it without remorse; turns out, timelessness was a myth. Love Potion, Peace and Paradise—sadly none were immune to my blade.

The final bush: the Emmeline, the rose that inspired the garden. It was the only rosebush here, overgrown and strewn with thorns, when we decided to buy our home. Emmeline was an old-fashioned girl, her growth wild and unruly. She’d fill the yard if unattended and she stubbornly bloomed only once a season. Why not rid myself of her? Why plant more roses to accompany her? Two reasons. The fragrance: ephemeral and haunting. It changed from day to day, hour to hour—melting butter, jasmine, sun shimmering on wet pavement, or green. The second reason: She had a story.

The listing agent for this quaint redbrick bungalow on Downington Avenue must have seen in my face the starry-eyed notions I had about living in a historic house, attention skimming past the cracked foundation, overgrown lawn, and peeling paint, and resting instead on tiny perfect details—glass doorknobs, arts and crafts tile on the hearth (chipped but original), a covered porch spanning the width of the home complete with a white-painted wooden porch swing.

“The neighbor across the street told me this is called the Emmeline rose,” the realtor said as we walked into the romantically overgrown backyard for the first time, his hand lingering on one of the snowy blossoms like it was a precious gift. “Apparently, the bare root was carried west across the plains in a handcart, and planted right here in 1913, the year the home was built.”

“Was it 1912 or 1913 when the Titanic sunk?” I asked, mostly to myself, lost in a vision of a youthful Leonardo DiCaprio, standing proud on the deck of an ill-fated ship. The fragrance touched me, and I pictured corseted women with long skirts and feather-plumed hats. Could someone from that sepia time have planted this rose?

In that moment long ago, reflecting upon the lives spent in the house, the innumerable stories held within the walls, I longed to be one of those stories. Mine would be a fairy tale embraced by the little bung. . .