Page 19 of The Legend Next Door
It’s his ritual. His habit. His way of making magic.
My eyelids slide to half-mast, and I tighten my grip on the cushion on my lap.
“OhGod,” I murmur prayerfully.
“Ugh,” says Marcus. “I’m beat. Think I’ll head home.”
Ben’s ritual doesn’t appear to affect Marcus the way it affects me. It seems he’s as immune to it as Ben is to Luca’s pout. Me on the other hand, well, I had to have a little lie down the first time I saw it.
The second time too.
Come to think of it, I might have another one now.
14
Jeremiah Blake
Alongshadowstretchesout from the side gate, morphing and moving, as a big man and a small boy make their way toward me. Ben’s strides are long and purposeful. He takes up an inordinate amount of space. It’s his height. And the width of his shoulders. And the thickness of his thighs. There’s a lot of him. He can’t help it.
It’s been three weeks since he and Luca moved in, so I should be used to what happens in my ribcage when I see him, but I’m not. This sighting is unexpected, which makes it worse.
Ben is holding Luca’s hand as they walk. Ben’s arm is straight, hanging at his side, swinging gently as he moves. Luca’s arm is upstretched, clutching Ben like he’s a climbing gym. Luca gives a little hop, skip, and jump every few paces, kicking his legs into the air on the up-swing of Ben’s arm. He does it partly to keep up with Ben and partly because he’s so excited he can’t keep his feet on the ground.
“Surprise flowers!” he yells every time his feet touch down.
When they reach me, Ben shrugs and says, “I can’t get a lick of sense out of him, but I’ve been led to believe it’s a matter of urgency that we come over to do something with flowers.”
“Surprise flowers!” Luca says again.
I hold up a bag of seeds and shake it in Luca’s line of sight. “I have some wildflowers to plant,” I explain to Ben. “I don’t know which ones are in the bag or which ones will come up, so I plant them and water them and wait for a happy surprise when they bloom.”
“Ah,” says Ben. “Surprise flowers.”
“I told Luca he should check with you if he could come over to help me plant them. I hope that’s okay.”
“Of course. Thanks for inviting him. You’ve made his entire week. Possibly his month.”
I crouch at the edge of the flower bed I’ve prepared, and Luca and Ben do the same.
“Have you planted flowers before, Luca?” I ask.
“No, but I planted a bean at school last year. I put it in cotton wool and watered it a lot. It grew these little curly strings, and then it went black and started to stink.”
“Oh dear,” I say. “Well, don’t worry, I remember the same thing happening to me when I planted a bean at school, but I’ve never had any stinky trouble with surprise flowers.”
“Maybe plants prefer growing in dirt to cotton wool,” says Luca.
“Maybe,” I agree. “Now, would you like to help me?” He nods his head rapidly and clenches his hands tightly together in glee. “Okay, I’m going to need you to snip the bag here… Good. That’s perfect… Now pour them all out in my hand so we can pick out the bigger seeds and plant them first because they need to go a little deeper into the ground than the others.”
Luca and Ben take turns picking out a big seed. When they each have one, Ben uses his free hand to rake through the soil with his fingers. His hand is huge, nails short and blunt, and there’s a languidness to his movement that makes it look more like he’s petting an animal than digging through dirt. When he’s happy with the state of the soil, he presses his forefinger into the earth. Gently. Tentatively. Like he’s trying not to hurt or disturb it.
There’s something infinitely seductive about the way he does it, though God only knows there shouldn’t be.
Once the holes have been made, he and Luca take turns dropping seeds in and covering them. Ben speaks softly to Luca the whole time. His words are encouraging and attentive but laced with humor. Under the praise and playful teasing, one thing is constant. Ever present.
Kindness.
Ben is kind to Luca all the time. Every time I’ve seen them interact, an undertone of kindness flows freely from Ben to Luca. He’s gentle all the time too. Gentle and nurturing in a slightly too big, overtly masculine way.
