Blue Dahlia

on her breast. “There. That’s better, isn’t it? I put her in that baby sling I got at the shower, and we took a nice walk.”
    “It’s good for both of you. What did you want to watch?”
    “Nothing, really. I just wanted the voices.”
    “How about one more?” Roz slipped in, walked over to Lily to smile. “I wanted to take a peek at her. Look at her go!”
    “Nothing wrong with her appetite,” Hayley confirmed. “She smiled at me today. I know they say it’s just gas, but—”
    “What do they know?” Roz sprawled in a chair. “They inside that baby’s head?”
    “Logan asked me to marry him.”
    She didn’t know why she blurted it out—hadn’t known it was pushing from her brain to her tongue.
    “Holy cow!” Hayley exploded, then immediately soothed Lily and lowered her voice. “When? How? Where? This is just awesome. This is the biggest of the big news. Tell us everything.”
    “There’s not a lot of every anything. He asked me yesterday.”
    “After I went inside to put the baby down? I just knew something was up.”
    “I don’t think he meant to. I think it just sort of happened, then he was irritated when I tried to point out the very rational reasons we shouldn’t rush into anything.”
    “What are they?” Hayley wondered.
    “You’ve only known each other since January,” Roz began, watching Stella. “You have two children. You’ve each been married before and bring a certain amount of baggage from those marriages.”
    “Yes.” Stella let out a long sigh. “Exactly.”
    “When you know you know, don’t you?” Hayley argued. “Whether it’s five months or five years. And he’s great with your kids. They’re nuts about him. Being married before ought to make both of you understand the pitfalls or whatever. I don’t get it. You love him, don’t you?”
    “Yes. And yes to the rest, to a point, but ... it’s different when you’re young and unencumbered. You can take more chances. Well, if you’re not me you can take more chances. And what if he wants children and I don’t? I have to think about that. I have to know if I’m going to be able to consider having another child at this stage, or if the children I do have would be happy and secure with him in the long term. Kevin and I had a game plan.”
    “And your game was called,” Roz said. “It isn’t an easy thing to walk into another marriage. I waited a long time to do it, then it was the wrong decision. But I think, if I could have fallen, just tumbled into love with a man at your age, one who made me happy, who cheerfully spent his Saturday with my children, and who excited me in bed, I’d have walked into it, and gladly.”
    “But you just said, before, you gave the exact reasons why it’s too soon.”
    “No, I gave the reasons you’d give—and ones I understand, Stella. But there’s something else you and I understand, or should. And that is that love is precious, and too often stolen away. You’ve got a chance to grab hold of it again. And I say lucky you.”
     
    SHE DREAMED AGAIN OF THE GARDEN, AND THE BLUE dahlia. It was ladened with buds, fat and ripe and ready to burst into bloom. At the top, a single stunning flower swayed electric in the quiet breeze. Her garden, though no longer tidy and ordered, spread out from its feet in waves and flows and charming bumps of color and shape.
    Then Logan was beside her, and his hands were warm and rough as he drew her close. His mouth was strong and exciting as it feasted on hers. In the distance she could hear her children’s laughter, and the cheerful bark of the dog.
    She lay on the green grass at the garden’s edge, her senses full of the color and scent, full of the man.
    There was such heat, such pleasure as they loved in the sunlight. She felt the shape of his face with her hands. Not fairy-tale handsome, not perfect, but beloved. Her skin shivered as their bodies moved, flesh against flesh, hard against soft, curve against angle.
    How could they fit, how could they make such a glorious whole, when there were so many differences?
    But her body merged with his, joined, and thrived.
    She lay in the sunlight with him, on the green grass at the edge of her garden, and hearing the thunder of her own heartbeat, knew bliss.
    The buds on the dahlia burst open. There were so many of them. Too many. Other plants were being shaded, crowded. The garden was a jumble now, anyone could see it. The blue dahlia was too aggressive and prolific.
    It’s