Seasons

Gabrielle sat in the quiet of evening, her eyes closed. Sometimes she felt that she could see the world better without looking. And how badly she needed to see it now- to understand it! Never before had she felt so strongly both the desire to stay behind and to run ahead at the same time. The harvest was over, autumn was setting in, and she could see the road stretching out before her, but she couldn’t find where it led.

“Hey.”

She opened her eyes. Isaac stood in front of her, a fruit basket under his arm.

“Hi,” she answered, smiling through squinted eyes as if she had just woken up from a nap. “What do you have there? Apples or pears?”

“Pears- and they’re juicy, too.”

“Perfect, that’s just what I wanted.”

Isaac smiled, stepped onto the porch, and sat on the bench beside her. He set the basket on his lap. “Take your pick.”

“Thank you.” Gabrielle looked over the pears and chose one that looked especially ripe. “Wow,” she said, surprised by the flavor when she bit into it. “You were right. These are juicy.”

He chuckled. “I told you.”

“You know,” she said, taking another bite, “I don’t think I will ever be able to eat pears again. I’ve had too many good ones, and now I’m ruined.”

Now he really laughed, “Maybe. Was it worth it?”

She smiled. “Sure. It’s always worth it. Finding something you love is always worth it, even if you can never have it again. You’ll always remember it, at least. Even if I never have another pear again, I'll remember how good this one was.”

Isaac turned and looked at her, watching as she watched the world around her. “Gabrielle?”

“M-hm.”

“See that pear tree there?” he asked, pointing to one near the center of the orchard. “There is not one pear left on that tree.”

“Oh, I think there might be one.”

“No, there’s not. I know because I just picked the last ones. That’s why this basket is so full- it finished off the whole tree.”

“Really?” she asked, surprised. “Not even one… The harvest really is over.” She took the last bite of her pear and threw the stem into the bushes.

“There are more out there, for sure,” he said. “But yes, it really is over.” They were quiet for a moment. She was thinking of the road before her. So was he. “Gabrielle?”

“Hm?”

“What happens now?”

“What do you mean?”

“Most everyone who works the harvest leaves to go home or they go back to school. What about you? Are you leaving now, too?”

“Ah, that’s what you mean.” She paused and thought, trying so desperately to see the road, but it bent and twisted and there was no sign where it led. “I don’t know,” she sighed.

He nodded. “You told me, once, that timing was everything- that things are only beautiful for a season.”

“Right.”

“The season is over.”

She smiled. “I didn’t mean the literal seasons, Isaac. I just meant… well… like you can only pick pears as long as they’re on the tree, you can only live one season of your life until it ends. No matter how much you want to turn fall into spring or winter into summer, once you notice things changing, you have to change with it.”

“I know you didn’t mean literal seasons,” he said. “But I’ve seen the change in you.”

“I have, too. But this is not the usual change, and I’m not sure what to do with it.”

“In what way?”

“Well,” she began, choosing her words carefully, rolling them around on her tongue, tasting them, before speaking them. “I’m not one to settle down, you know? I stayed in one place for too long thinking I couldn’t manage to change the path I was on, but then I realized I had two feet and they could carry me anywhere I wanted, you know?” She sat up straighter and crossed her legs underneath her. “Now that I’ve set off on my own, it’s hard to go back.” Gabrielle turned and looked at him. He searched her eyes for answers but found only questions.

“Who said anything about going back?”

“Oh, no, that’s true. I don’t mean going back home, though,” she said. “I mean going back to that life and that idea. I’ve been on my own on this road for a while now. Everyone else has been fleeting. A season- like I told you that time. You remember, when we were out picking apples with-” he nodded and she stopped. “So, yeah, everyone has been a season, exciting and beautiful but temporary, and then I am free again.”

“I know you love your freedom, but... in the end, what do you really want? Solitude is a romantic word, but after too long it turns into loneliness.”

Gabrielle turned her head slightly and looked up at him from the corner of her eye. “Isaac. I said I cherish my freedom, not that I want to be alone forever.”

“I know those are normally different things to most people, but it seems like that’s the same thing for you.”

She laughed. “No, not at all. I think people can be together and be free individually at the same time. Like two planets orbiting the same sun, or two birds flying in the same direction.”

“That’s true,” he said. “After all, everybody needs somebody.”

“No,” she replied firmly and with a quick shake of the head. “No, that’s not true at all. ‘People’, in the general sense of the word, need ‘people’- also in the general sense of the word. Education, interaction, support, warmth, kindness, affection. But no singular person needs any other singular person.” She turned to face him. His brow furrowed and he looked as if he were trying to understand another language.

“Sure they do,” he replied. “We all need people. I need people.”

“See: again you said ‘people’. In the plural.”

He sighed. “Gabrielle, don’t you understand what I’m trying to tell you? I need you.”

“That’s where you’re wrong.”

“How can you say that?” he asked, his voice tinged with a pinch of irritation and a dash of hurt. “How can you sit there and tell me who or what I do and don’t need? It’s my life, isn’t it? Don’t you think I should know?”

She smiled. “People seldom know what they need, Isaac.”

“Don’t you want to be needed?” he asked, genuinely confused. “I want someone to need me.”

"Huh." Gabrielle rolled her eyes, looking away. “Is that really what you want?”

“Well, yes…” he replied, somewhat doubtfully. Whether he doubted himself or her she wasn’t sure.

Gabrielle took a deep breath and let her eyes wander over the orchard. For a moment she watched silently as the leaves on the trees were illuminated with the falling sun, painting over their deep emerald color with gold and the promise of night. Again she turned to Isaac and watched him. She watched his eyes while he thought, saw how he looked to her expectantly. He opened his mouth to speak again, but she put a finger up to silence him.

“Someday… when I do decide to give myself to someone, it won’t be because I need them or because they need me. I need to breathe, but I don’t really care how that happens as long as it does. I need to eat, but, when it comes down to it, I don’t need to eat any one thing in particular. And, if I’m hungry enough, I’ll eat almost anything. That’s why I don’t want to be needed. There’s no romance in it- no love. It’s just hunger… desperation. When I give myself to someone, it won’t be because I need them or because they need me. When I do that- when I give my life over to someone- it will be because I chose that person and because that person chose me. And every day they will wake up and choose me. And every day, I will wake up and choose them. Even on the days when I’m mad, even on the days when I’m sad or annoyed or tired or overwhelmed, I will choose that person, because I will love him, body and soul. To be needed is nothing. To be loved is everything.”

Isaac, who had been watching her carefully as she spoke, finally looked away. He took a deep breath and closed his eyes, rubbing his hands over his knees as he thought.

“I’m ruined,” Isaac finally said, opening his eyes. The sun had nearly dipped behind the horizon and all he could see was her silhouette in the darkness, framed with moonlight. “The way you’re ruined to pears, you’ve ruined me. I’ve tasted you- what it’s like to talk to you every day and work with you every day and just be with you every day, and I don’t know what to do about it. Because... I need to stay here- this is my family’s place, and they count on me- but I want to be with you. I don’t know how to ask you to stay, but I don’t know what I’ll do if you leave.”

“You know what’s funny,” she asked, suddenly feeling a lump in her throat. “I feel exactly the same way. I don’t know how to stay, but I don’t know how to leave, either. But I think I need to. I think I have to leave.”

“I understand.”

“You have to know, Isaac, it’s not the pears that are making it so hard for me.”

Isaac laughed. “I know. But I think that’s what I have such a hard time with. How can you love someone and still walk away?”

“I never told you I loved you.”

“Yes, you did. Not with words, but with your eyes. This morning I saw it and I couldn’t believe it because we haven’t even known each other that long but, Gabrielle, I felt it, and I love you, too. So tell me, how can you love someone and still walk away?”

She felt tears stinging the backs of her eyes. Her thoughts were twisting and tangled in her mind. “If we aren’t walking the same road, how can we walk together?” she asked.

Isaac gripped the edge of the bench and leaned forward, almost as if the answer would be written on the porch floor.

“Can we find some sort of compromise?” she asked.

He shrugged. “I’m sure, but I don’t know what.”

"Perhaps I just need a little time,” she said. “Perhaps with just a little time, we can find the answer we’re looking for.”

“Perhaps,” he said.

“But if you need me- if it’s just that you need me- you will find someone else to fill that need. It won’t be long because you’re hungry now. And maybe you’ll always need me but you’ll want someone else and you’ll have someone else.”

Isaac stood, picking up the basket of pears. “I want you,” he said. “Now go decide what you want.” He leaned over and kissed her cheek. “I’ll see you soon,” he said.

“Yes. Tomorrow morning.”

“No, not tomorrow morning. I have to leave for the week, remember?”

“Oh. That’s right.”

“Will you be here when I get back?”

She rubbed her hands over her face, thinking. “Yes,” she finally said. “Even if it’s just to say goodbye, I’ll be here.”

In the dark she couldn’t see it, but he smiled. “Goodnight, Gabrielle.”

“Goodnight.”

He turned and she watched as he walked away, a dark form fading into shadows and moonlight.