"Here, Coral," I said, patting my raincoat, "please sit."
Coral still didn't sit.
There was a generation--pretty much dead now--who walked about with their hands clasped behind their backs. That's how Coral clasped her hands as she walked her eyes up and down the fat trunk of the cherry tree that grew up over the old tent site.
A good way to get a girl to talk orgasms is to scold her for talking orgasms: "See, Coral, you and I are old souls. Which is to say, you and I are supposed to be going at it soul-to-soul. Not sitting in shacks having orgasms, walking in orchards talking orgasms, eyeing wild cherries while inquiring if one or the other happens to be turned on at the moment."
Coral didn't say anything.
I took a breath. "I mean, jeez, Coral, don't you see how this is leading us into dangerous territory?"
Coral showed me more of her back, took a step towards the fat Cherry trunk. "Really, Anton; it's no big deal."
I poked my hand with my fork. "All I'm saying, Coral, is that old souls like ourselves ought to engage in talk that's a little more elder-like."
"Wow," Coral said, releasing her hands, "don't you like how this old tree has grown up all twisted?"
Tough love, young lady. No talk will you get out of this elder now.
Coral turned to look at me. But I was turning myself. Turning to better see what I'd found on the ground. What had I found? Why, perhaps this half-a filbert shell. I picked it up.
"Anton, I just realized something: One can actually see the life in a tree. No, what I mean is; one can see what a tree experienced growing. Look at this tree, Anton. The struggles are right here in its trunk--in its shape, I mean."
Sorry, schoolgirl; Elder, here, has far deeper things to look into just now. Like this halfshell, here. And, oh, how I peered in--peered in as if whole worlds were unfolding in there. Of course, without my reading glasses I couldn't make out the half, let alone the whole.
Coral scanned the orchard, then got back to her cherry. "I love this tree. I love it because it has struggled harder than any tree in the orchard. And because of its struggle--its winding climb in search of light--it stands here, the most beautiful tree in the orchard."
I, too, found this particular tree noteworthy. That's why I'd placed the bale of hay just so--so one could sit and ponder its mighty undulating trunk. And now I'd come across something else of note: A tree is a visual record, through space, of what the tree had gone through in its search for light. Made a nature boy--and elder to boot--wonder why he hadn't figured that out for himself.
I was raising a workboot as if to kick myself when I noticed some stirrings. I lowered my boot. Damn, Coral, lost in her tree, was stirring her ponytail now.
I dropped my halfshell that I might better drop my jaw over the sexy schoolgirl, here, stirring her ponytail unaware.
I couldn't remember getting up, but there I stood, staring down the stirrings inches from my chest. "See, Coral, that's what I mean by old souls; we see into things. Where others see a weed of a tree, you and I see a sentient being with something to say."
Coral stopped stirring, looked up to me. That's right; up to me and me alone.
"Hear it, Coral?" I cupped my ear with my fork. "Hear what this old tree is saying? This tree is saying--"
"Yes," Coral cut in, "I do hear it. This tree is saying, 'So what if they come tomorrow to cut me down, today I'll stand here strong because every yesterday I gave life my all.'"
Damn, that's what I was going to say. Only the upstart had said it better.
I took a step back. "Sure, Coral, this tree says that. But every tree in the orchard says that." It came to me then, how I could one-up the schoolgirl; recite that killer line I'd laid in my journal years ago. "No, Coral, what I hear this tree saying is more on the order of, 'Power on earth isn't about trampling over fellow life forms; power is finding ones place among fellow life forms. Power on earth isn't an orchard under control; power is an orchard left to go.'"
"It's no big deal," Coral said, backing up, taking a seat on the bale of hay.
"No big deal?" I said, slamming down beside her. "This tree is the--"
"No," Coral cut in. "I mean you, getting turned on. I just thought you incapable of getting turned on."
I turned my head, took in a tree that grew opposite the wild cherry. Huh, a horse chestnut--a tree I'd never taken notice of. See what happens: A noteworthy tree grows in an orchard, and no one takes note of the run-of-the-mill tree growing opposite it. I was staring down the split trunk of this outcast horse chestnut--determined to divine something noteworthy in it--when the sun came out, white-washed strange shapes on one of its trunks.
Omen.
But first I had to get to the bottom of what, exactly, Coral was saying in regards to me getting turned on. Then again, there was some other messaging that needed addressing. Somehow, in the course of sitting, my left thigh had come in contact with Coral's right thigh. Yes, and what exactly was the elder saying by not scooting over? Yes, and what exactly was the younger saying by not scooting over?
"What I'm saying, Anton, is that I've always read you as asexual."
****
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