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She didn’t feel well.
Again.
Things were starting to pile up. One cup on her nightstand became two, three, four, till they covered every inch. They started to spill elsewhere in her room, strewn about any available surface until her kitchen cabinet only had a sole cup available at a time if she lingered down there. Things festered; fuzzy and off colored as neglected houseplants began to visibly suffer as much as its’ caretaker. They shivered, soil thirsting for a drop of water, leaves staining with splotches of sickly yellow.
And the disease jumped to Leafy.
Was it a disease? She just felt a little sad, she insists, a little under the weather. Smiles were a lot of work. Happiness too. Not every day during the year was pure sunshine and blue skies. It was those times when it was cloudy all day. That was it. It was only a cloud day.
(It’s been stretching far too long. An endless cloudy day with no sign of lifting.)
A small horse sat in her chest. Perhaps it was a pony. It sat squarely, suffocating what little breath could get in her. Her body shivered; it ached and pained as something ate away at its precious energy reserves. It was incessant as a newborn. Crying, demanding, agitating at Leafy for more food. More attention. More care. More more more and Leafy couldn’t give. For once, she couldn’t give and a switch flipped; stop demanding for more and keep the complaints silent. Her body still ached and shivered, needing more more more. More food to keep stock of energy stores; stores being sucked up by something.
Illness: the cloudy day.
It was invisible. She didn’t feel wrong because there’s nothing wrong. Isn’t that funny? She was mimicking what Pin did, but Leafy was earnest; there was nothing to worry about. No cuts bleeding, no runny nose, no broken limbs. Only the pony that sat in her chest and the strain behind her eyes.
Plants took up some nutrients from the soil. Leafy forgot to give them their monthly fertilizer. Their pots, still full of dirt, was ultimately barren. Empty. They took up nothing and they shivered.
Leafy couldn’t bear cooking right now. She didn’t want the smell of food no matter how good to even touch her. The pit of her stomach remained in a strange paradox, between hungry and satiated. Grumbling yet nauseous. Empty yet full. And she shivered.
She kept away from the sun too.
At least her houseplants still got that mercy.
She didn’t.
Because there’s nothing wrong with her even though she knew that she needed her time in the sun. She didn’t need it. “I’ll be fine,” she mentally insists. She demands that she’s fine yet her body shivers, aching. In pain. In its need to have the sun, pale yellow splotches begin to mar her too.
She’s fine. She’s fine. She’s the happy one so it’s just a cloudy day.
The cloudy day illness was very dangerous. It starts quiet, hushed, soft and sweet.
Then it shows its hands, supple and reassuring. Do not do that, it insists, as Leafy tries to do knitting or wash the dishes. Lay in my hands, you’re exhausted.
Then it shows its maw after long enough. The illness was hungry, growing inside the dark parts of a mind like a fetus. Always demanding and for some reason, Leafy couldn’t resist its demands. It was company and it was good to feed company even if she barely mustered the energy to feed herself. The illness started with a little bit of blood, a little bit of her body’s hard earned energy. Then it grows and it needs more. More energy, just a little more as an offering. It takes its pay every morning and Leafy felt like she worked an entire overnight shift. It continues to feed more and the lemon leaf was none the wiser.
Then it speaks. Quiet. Slow. Compassionate. ‘You’re in pain and I see it,’ it rumbles, ‘I have a solution.’
A single solution. Leafy ignores it until the demands become too much. Till the needs start to pile up. There’s too many dishes scattered around her house, festering disease and pestilence. Her houseplants remain neglected and some perish in their battle. They’re all in a battle and they’re all losing. Too many things scattered. Too many things lost. And her body keeps demanding for attention, for basic care.
And she is fine. Till it isn’t.
‘You’re in pain and I see it,’ it repeats, ‘I have a solution.’
‘Don’t go into the sun,’ it says even though the sun was her kind’s best friend, and the sun missed her. ‘I have a solution.’
‘Don’t tell Pin,’ it muses once Leafy picks up the phone, contemplating. She didn’t have much to say except for the urge to simply tell her “I miss you.” “I love you.” “Can you come over?” But the cloudy day tells her that it’s not so bad. ‘I have a solution.’
It’s morning. ‘I have a solution,’ it greets her with. ‘If it’s too much, I can take over. I can take the helm.’
A single solution and suddenly it becomes a good idea.
Leafy was a lady of passion, of passionate whims, little thought and all feeling. This single solution did best when one thought very little of it, at least this version of it within Leafy.
Don’t think. She didn’t have to think. Something else took the helm, gentle and careful with her burdened self. Like an old friend leading her to somewhere warm and peaceful, recounting all their old adventures with a strange veil of melancholy staining it all. Whoever this old friend was remained patient with her, slowing down whenever needed. It was extra careful with her and took into account how wobbly and uncoordinated her legs became.
It took her gently into the basement. Down there was the single solution.
She just felt unwanted or something. Not needed. Pointless. What reason was there to allow her to exist burdened like this? Why did she have to be in this sort of pain? She knew she did some things, but it shouldn’t warrant this. She wanted to go home; a home beyond her own house. She didn’t know where that is and yet the need claws within her, wishing to curl up into a room that didn’t exist.
But it knows where that home is. ‘I’ll take you there,’ it speaks and like an inviting host, pours out a cup of clear liquid, the same kind she pours on the unwanted weeds in her garden to get rid of them for good. ‘Have a glass. You’ll be there in no time.’
Drinking it. The single solution.
The only solution she can think of.
Leafy stares blankly into the dead, dark air of her basement.
The TV played a show about bakers competing by making themed cakes. The dialogue hummed quietly; the right volume for Pin.
“Do you want more sauce in your rice?” asked the thumbtack.
Leafy nods.
Pin carefully carves out a bite-sized portion of rice from the main mound of it on her plate. She did the same to the leftover sauce that she made for her creamy garlic chicken. In the emptier part of her plate, she mixes the two together to create a perfectly balanced bite-sized portion of creamy rice.
“Here.” A forkful of warm, aromatic rice lifts temptingly close to Leafy.
The Plant eats from it without complaint.
She cuddles against Pin; snugging into her side and the couple of blankets that enveloped them as they sat on the couch, watching TV and eating dinner. Well, Pin was the one eating dinner. Leafy found herself too easily overwhelmed with a plate and rejected it, but Pin fed her little by little, as much as she wanted to take.
There was a large lamp near them. A purple light emitted from its bulb, warming Leafy’s body and making it begin to recover again. For a Plant unwilling to see the sun, a grow light was a merciful invention. Pin had plenty of spares and she happily cleared out her stocks for Leafy’s sake. While heaviness still lingered, Leafy felt lighter than before.
She puts herself on Pin’s lap face down. A throaty, satisfied rumble comes from her as her girlfriend rubs her back.
Not even rubs it.
Just gently touching her, fingers spreading to feel how weak Leafy had gotten like her recovering houseplants. Some of their leaves grew brittle and so did Leafy, but a few days of tenderness was enough to start bringing back some life into them again. Unlike them, Leafy needed more time and more care, but she was slowly making it there. Bit by bit.
She felt loved and cared for. Pin was right here, feeding her bits and setting her out under a grow lamp because she felt too embarrassed to go outside in her current state. Her girlfriend cuddled her and kissed her and helped her tackle the long list of chores and obligations she let fall to the wayside. Pin didn’t go if she didn’t want her too and every hour, she whimpered for Pin to stay.
Pin did.
When she shivered, Pin tucked the blanket closer to her. Still rubbing her, still feeding bites to her if she looked up at the thumbtack with watery doe eyes.
‘I have a solution,’ it still speaks.
It has a solution, but not the only solution.