The Plant Whisperer

Clark killed the fern on a Monday. He was house-sitting at Annette's apartment while she was away at depositions in Hartford. Five days, tops. She had one plant. A big Hammond fern in a ceramic pot by the window, the kind of plant that cost forty dollars at a garden center and looked like it cost more.

She had named it. That was the part that got him. Wesley.

"Water Wesley on Friday," she'd said before she left. "Half a cup. Half. He sulks if you drown him."

Clark watered Wesley on Friday. Then he watered him again on Saturday because he forgot he'd already done it. Then once more Sunday morning because the topsoil looked dry and he panicked. By Sunday night the fronds were browning. By Monday the whole thing sagged over the pot rim like wet laundry.

He stood there holding a watering can and looked at it. Twenty-eight years old, in good shape, could deadlift three hundred pounds, and he'd murdered a houseplant in four days. Friday to Monday.

He texted her. Okay so funny story about Wesley.

She replied an hour later. What did you do.

Nothing. Small accident. I'll fix it before you're back.

Clark. What did you do to Wesley.

He didn't answer that one. He googled "fern dead can it come back" and the internet said no. So Wednesday morning he took the spare key off the hook and went down to the parking spot where Annette's car sat, two days after Wesley's death. A little silver sedan she'd borrowed from her firm for the week and left with him. She had come back on the early train that morning and gone straight to the office. "Just for errands," she'd said. "Don't joyride it."

He was going to buy a replacement fern that looked exactly like Wesley and put it in the same pot. Perfect crime. He'd done worse things with less planning.

He was three blocks from the garden center when the car coughed. Then it coughed again, louder, and lost power in the middle of the street. He coasted to the curb right in front of city hall, hazard lights on, engine ticking like it was mad at him.

He turned the key. Nothing. Turned it again. A sad click.

"Oh, come on," he said out loud.

He called her. She picked up on the second ring, background noise behind her, copy machines, some guy talking about invoices.

"Hey. So. Two things," he said.

"Clark."

"Your car died. In front of city hall. And before you ask, yes, that's where I am, and no, I wasn't joyriding, I was buying a new Wesley."

There was a pause. Then she laughed. Not a little laugh. A real one, the kind she tried to hide in court.

"You killed Wesley and stole my car in the same week."

"I didn't steal it. I borrowed it. With permission. For penance ferns."

"Are you at the front entrance?"

"I'm at the curb. Blinking at people."

"Stay there. I'm coming down. I have to pull files from the basement for the Whitman case anyway, so you can keep me company and then call the roadside number in the glovebox, which is where it is, because you would not have found it."

She hung up. Clark sat in the dead car and rehearsed his apology. He got about four minutes of it ready. Then she came out the doors in her work clothes, gray suit, sleeves rolled, badge on a lanyard, and she was grinning before she even reached him.

"Oh my god, your face," she said, leaning on the car roof. "You look like someone who got caught breaking a window."

"I'm a professional. I deadlift."

"You look so guilty right now!"

"I killed a plant. It was overwatering. Very common. Very fixable."

"It's not fixable. Wesley is dead." She popped the hood anyway, looked in, waved the smoke away with a folder. "Yeah, that's dead too."

"So we match."

"Get out. Come with me." She shut the hood. "Basement. Files. Then you call the tow thing."

The elevator down to the basement was old and slow and smelled like radiator dust. He didn't mention the smell. Annette badge-swiped a gray door at the end of a hallway and flicked on a light. Storage room. Filing cabinets in rows, boxes on shelves, everything the same shade of tired beige.

"Charming," he said.

"Shut up and hold this." She handed him a box lid. She started down a row of cabinets, running her finger along the labels. "B, B, B... here. Whitman, 2019 to 2021. I need the March boxes."

He followed her and held boxes while she pulled folders. It was quiet down there. Just the vent and her humming something he didn't recognize.

Then she stopped. Closed the drawer. Turned around and looked at him.

"So," she said. "The car."

"The car, yes. That was not my fault."

"The car I borrowed for you. And the plant."

"The plant was a misunderstanding between me and the watering can."

"Mm-hm." She leaned back against the cabinets, arms crossed. "You know what I keep thinking about? You've been telling me for a year that you'd do anything for me. Anything. Your words."

"That's... true."

"So here's your chance to prove it." She nodded at the floor in front of her. "Kneel."

He blinked. The vent hummed. A pipe somewhere ticked.

"Here?"

"Locked room. Door's locked. Nobody comes down here." Her voice was even, but her eyes were bright, watching him. "You can say no. It's a joke if you want it to be a joke. The plant and the car are forgiven either way, none of that has anything to do with this."

He looked at the floor. Concrete, dusty, a little cold looking. Then he got down on his knees in front of her, hands on his thighs, and grinned up at her like an idiot.

"Like this?"

"Okay, that was fast," she said, and laughed. "You didn't even negotiate."

"What's the deal? How long do I kneel?"

"However long I say. But hey. Important thing first." She crouched down so they were eye level. "We've played light before, at home, nothing like this. Pick a word. A real one. If you say it, everything stops, no questions, no arguing about it after."

"Fern," he said.

She snorted. "Of course."

"It's on my mind."

"Fern it is. It works for everything, any time, even if it seems random. Deal?"

"Deal."

"Stand up." He did. She stayed crouched a second, looking at him, then stood too, smoothing her jacket like she was resetting a chess board. "Shirt off. Under it too. All the way up."

He pulled his gym shirt over his head, then the gray undershirt under it, and dropped them both on a box. The basement was cool on his skin. She walked a slow half circle around him.

"Three hundred pound deadlift," she said. "And you fold like a lawn chair when I ask."

"Only for you."

"God, you're easy." She stopped behind him.