In the Moss Season
by Sara Gogol
(excerpt)
     The tree was old, its branches spreading wide, its trunk thick and knobby. On one side of the trunk, a thick covering of moss grew almost to the ground and up to the lower branches. Today the moss was a rich kelly green, and there were pale orange shoots coming from it.
     I walked by the mossy tree on my way home from work. It had been raining lately, the blustery rains which made a bridge between late winter and early spring, but this afternoon there was a break in the clouds, an elongated triangle of clear sky bordered by a line of cloud. The sky-light shone on the moss, brightening it, heightening the color.
     I let the moss hold my attention for a moment, then continued walking home. It was a Friday afternoon. I’d been used to spending Friday night, almost always Friday night and part of the rest of the weekend with Erica. We’d usually have dinner together, sometimes go out, but more often just stay home together that first night of the weekend.
     I missed holding Erica ... running my fingers through the crisp curliness of her hair ... stroking the softness and warmth of her skin, the strong curve of her back.
     I missed other things too, like Erica’s funny grin as she talked about the day’s events at work and all the “crazies” she’d seen. I missed the sudden vulnerability of her face sometimes, and the way her joking could turn serious as she told me some private piece of her life.
     They were warming, these thoughts. I could wind them around me like a blanket, burrow down into them as I’d snuggled up against Erica. I could snap my mind shut around them and almost forget. Almost but not quite. There was still an ache between my breasts which went on and on, a hollowed-out feeling inside me which remembering couldn’t fill.
     You could have made plans for tonight, I told myself. But I hadn’t wanted to do that. It was paradoxical. I was lonely now - lonely again but I needed time alone. Time to be quiet and let myself remember, or forget, or just let things settle inside me.

     I climbed the flight of stairs to my apartment. Inside, I hung up my coat, filled the tea kettle, and set it on the stove to boil. When the tea was made, Earl Grey, a taste Erica and I had shared, I sat down with it at the kitchen table.
     I inhaled the fragrance of the tea as I poured myself a fresh cup. Plans, I thought. Would I make a plan for the evening, or just let it drift along? Did it matter anyway? I pawed through the spread-out newspaper for the television section. I could watch the news and maybe a M*A*S*H* rerun. Sitting in front of the television might be just what I needed. At eight o’clock, there was an hour program on the wild lions of Africa. I might watch that.
     Rice with tofu and vegetables was easy to fix for dinner, and after awhile I started semi-automatically to make it. I’d taken pleasure in cooking dinner for Erica and me on Friday nights when Erica came to my place and we didn’t go out to a restaurant.

     I made myself a cup of decaffeinated coffee laced with brandy, my favorite evening drink these days. Ten after seven, the clock said, still almost an hour until the program on lions.
     The brandy relaxed me, and I leaned back against the cushions on the couch. I was glad the week was over. Nice as the children in my first grade class were, it would be good not to see them again until Monday.      Perhaps I would read for awhile. My eyes moved along the rows of books on the bookshelf, tracing different sizes and colors. They came to rest on my guitar, sitting on the floor next to the bookcase, the music stand beside it, where I’d left them both a few months ago.
     The guitar case was dusty from sitting untouched for so long. Dusty enough to write Erica’s name on it. And perhaps I should have. Or mail the dust to her. I grimaced, picturing Erica’s uncomprehending look when she opened an envelope filled only with dust.
     The strings cut into my fingers. The calluses were gone from my fingertips, and my hands felt clumsy.
     The muscles in my left hand beginning to cramp, I played a piece that Erica had liked: a Peruvian song about a woman of the streets abandoned by her lover. The melody was mournful but beautiful, and although I didn’t understand all of the words, I felt a tightness in my chest as I sang along with the chords.
     I wouldn’t sing that again for Erica, even though Erica spoke of being friends. At our Sunday morning brunch together, the weekend before Erica moved to Seattle, Erica talked about how we could see each other sometimes. I remembered crumpling the cloth napkin in my hands, trying not to cry.      I put away the guitar and made myself another cup of coffee with brandy. It was just about eight o’clock.

     I woke to pale morning light. From my bedroom window I saw rain-dark streets and sidewalks. A light rain was falling and the sky was covered with layers of blue-gray clouds.
     I saw, for an instant, Erica’s head on the pillow beside me. Erica’s arm around me. I could let my mind go further: Erica’s face against my breast, Erica’s hand tracing the curve of my hips and stomach, the softness of Erica’s lips moving along my skin.
     I could go on. On and on. But there was no one to journey with me. No one to lie pressed against me as if a single fire ran between us.
     Erica was gone. I’d been left; abandoned, alone. Tearless, my eyes stung. A dull pain, like an indrawn breath held too long, ran down my breastbone and curled itself into a knot in the pit of my stomach.
     I closed my eyes and turned on my side, pressing my cheek against the softness of the pillow. Erica, I thought, but there was no voice to answer my call. There were letters, like the one I’d sent Erica and her reply. In another, I asked Erica not to end things; to think of how much we’d shared and could still be together.
     And there was Erica’s letter, friendly but cool: we needed a clean break, she needed to be alone on her own in Seattle. She didn’t feel as I did and it wasn’t any use her pretending otherwise. It was better to be honest, so we could still be friends, and I should come up and visit her in Seattle when I had a chance.
     That was almost three months ago. I hadn’t written or called Erica in all that time, but I’d gotten a postcard from her once. There was the Space Needle on the front and a few lines on the back; the new job in graphic design was working out well. And her cats liked the new apartment overlooking Puget Sound.
     I would have moved up to Seattle with her, subbing for a while if necessary until I could find another teaching job. After over a year together, I’d hoped we could live with each other.
     But Erica hadn’t wanted that. That had been clear. How could Erica have given so much and then shut off suddenly? Perhaps a cold steel gate lay beneath her warm surface; a gate which shut tightly when anyone approached too near.

     After breakfast, I took a walk. I walked across a field, stopping for a moment beside a fenced-in community garden where Erica and I had talked about getting a garden plot. There were plots of earth grassed over now, dried corn stalks, and a few bedraggled cabbage and parsley plants growing through the winter.
     I might be able to get a space in the garden. Even by myself, it might be nice to plant one. I walked on again, striding along quickly, enjoying the feeling of my muscles working, of warmth flowing through me.
     A few blocks from home, I stopped once again at the moss-covered tree. The moss was lusher still this morning. Here and there tiny raindrops, jewel-like in their clarity, were suspended on the moss.
     I reached out my hand and touched the moss. It was faintly moist and as I expected, a velvety softness. I stroked gently with my fingertips and then laid my whole hand against the moss. With my hand, and with all of me, I felt the aliveness of the moss. There was a gladness to it, a joyful flourishing in the soft, warm rain.
     I stood there for a long moment, not wanting to move away. The moss, and the strong old tree it grew upon, were opening to spring. And I would too, I suddenly thought. Even as I walked the last few blocks to my apartment, I still felt the sense of a greenness inside me.