Beautiful Graveyards

“The cemeteries up here are beautiful, wow,” he awed as his eyes spanned the landscape on our four-hour drive home from my wedding on this county road. We must have passed four of them already on our way back from the wedding. He wasn’t wrong. The cemeteries weren’t barricaded by tall iron fences like they are back home. Here, the landscape was open, a patchwork of weathered gray headstones collected in pockets between the mountaintops and the road. Maybe they were just particularly picturesque today. The dense gray mist that hung in the sky dripped into blurry blue mountaintops that blended into brightening shades of green as it wept down the mountainside toward the grasses that nestled the headstones. The grave markers were not adorned with sprays of plastic flowers, either. Here, they were surrounded by clusters of wildflowers, the magenta pinks and pale orange colors popping against the gray mist. Pear trees were planted to protect some of those who lie beneath its cover, the petals of its white flowers dusting the emerald grass cover of their graves.

This wedding was Desmond's introduction to a snippet of my life. We had been together for some time now, but we were slow to let our respective lives and our relationship meet each other. At this point in our lives we found it less important to share everything, to let all the things that matter to each of us separately to blend into somethings that matter to us both. Or perhaps we both were all too aware of what it took to un-blend, to withdraw your life from someone else’s, and were careful to guard against that. Caution, or cowardice, I’m not sure which governed, but there was an unspoken respect for it between us. Despite having been together for two years now, when I asked him to accompany me to the wedding his impulse was to tell me he had to think about it. And mine was to tell him that was fine.

On our first date we talked about how we had no interest in marriage. How we were on the cusp of being too old for children, which meant we already were. How neither of us have done well in the past living with anyone, feeling too intensely that need for more isolation than most other people seem to feel. How we don’t favor saying “I love you,” the words having proved meaningless too many times. We were uniquely alike in our expectations, like twin souls that spent their 40-something years slowly being taught there was no such thing.

Even though he said he needed to think about it, I knew that he wanted to come with me to the wedding. He knew he wanted it too. We had committed ourselves to never being committed, but oddly enough that left us more resolved to not let go of each other.

Our conversation on the ride home was mostly about the wedding, peppered with moments of exhausted silence, both of us feeling the aftermath of last night’s indulgences. During those moments I thought about what he said last night. After the bride and groom made their ceremonious exit from the reception, we slipped away to our cabin before anyone noticed our absence as the party slid over to the bar. I took him by the hand and led the way down the sandy gravel path, he perhaps having indulged more than I. We walked into our room and clumsily undressed ourselves, collapsing into bed from the day, too tired for anything other than sleep. As we lay there, he kissed me on the head and said “I love you” just as he was falling asleep.

He had never said that before. And I never needed him to say it before. But my god, how it felt to hear him say that. To me. And now here I am, wanting to hear it again… I knew he didn’t remember saying those words to me. He was practically asleep when he uttered them, fatigue having overcome what otherwise contained him. I could’ve reminded him, prodded him, even teased him about it. But I didn’t. I would keep that moment with me, the memory of that feeling unmarred.

“Let’s remember to be buried up here,” he said casually, still lazily gazing out the window. “And have one of those pear trees planted over us too. I like those.”

I couldn’t help the light smile, my heart warming. “I won’t forget.”