The Red Garden

by Alice Hoffman

“You forgot that the world was this beautiful,” John said to her then, and she knew she’d been right in her first impression, that he was indeed an angel, and that he’d been sent to her, and that while she had believed she had come out on this morning to finish her life, there had been a different plan meant for her all along.

He had no idea that the universe could be found in a single instant, a drop of water, a blade of grass, a leaf of an apple tree.

Sara had told me that a woman who could rescue herself was a woman who would never be in need.

as the years went by I understood that his loyalty asked for no reward, and that love comes in unexpected forms. His wish was small, as hers had been—merely to be beside her.

“It’s better to burn out beautifully when you’re young.” Ava got a funny look on her face when she heard her daughter say that, as if she’d thought similarly once, and had lived that way, and was only now realizing the flaws in such a philosophy.