Houseplant

The moment she set it on his desk, he looked up from the laptop, glared at it, and said, “Don’t put that there.”

She scowled down at him, hand hovering near the plant. “I don’t have anywhere else to put it.”

He looked up at her. “You still don’t, now put it somewhere else.”

She rolled her eyes. “It’s just a tiny little plant.”

“Then, it’ll fit somewhere else,” he replied. “Now, please move it.”

A heavy sigh followed the eye roll. “It’s not hurting anything.”

“That’s not the point,” he said, then felt it prudent to return to his work.

Another sigh. “Then, what’s wrong with putting it here?”

“Because this is my desk,” he said, peering with exaggerated intent at the spreadsheet. “And I don’t want it here.”

Her brows lifted, but she decided to try a different tactic first, suggesting, “It brightens up the place.”

“It’s green,” he replied, really wishing that she would take the plant away so they could avoid an argument. But that didn’t seem likely to happen. “So’s my blotter.”

She rolled her eyes and tsked. He tried not to be triggered by it.

“Can I just leave it here for a little while?” she asked, employing her patented subtle hint tactic.

“No,” he replied, pushing his face closer to the screen to suggest that he was too busy to talk about it.

Her arms folded, ready for an argument. “Why not?”

He rolled his eyes in resignation. He didn’t even need to see her folded arms to know that things were going down, so he took a deep breath to rally his wits and turned to face her.

“You really want to know why?” He knew that that question never heralded anything good, but his steam was building and now he was ready for a fight.

She smirked, indicating that she was ready for him, too. “Tell me.”

“Encroachment,” he curtly replied.

She blinked a few times as she absorbed the answer. “Encroachment?”

He knew there was no use prevaricating, so he just got right to it. “Yes. From the moment we were married, you have steadily taken over the entire house until I have very little that I can genuinely call my own.”

“That’s not true,” she automatically replied.

“No?” he said, meeting her eyes. “You decorated the entire house with your taste. You dictate what does and doesn’t get hung on the walls and what furnishings we have. You even chose the windows we needed.”

“Okay,” she interrupted, clearly thinking that she had the upper hand already. “But as I recall, you didn’t care about any of that.”

“As if I had a choice,” he replied.

She rolled her eyes. “So, what does that have to do with ‘encroachment’, or don’t you know what that word means?”

“I’ll tell you. “He was eager to argumentatively knock her down a peg. “Slowly but surely, you’ve been taking over all the shared space with your things. Your decorations, your personal things. Everything. And the little space I have has been shrinking at the same rate.”

“That’s not true,” she countered.

“You’ve practically taken over the entire bathroom vanity with your things,” he replied. “You’ve taken over both drawers and the medicine cabinet. I don’t even have room for my toothbrush anymore.”

“Don’t be silly,” she argued. “It’s not that bad!”

“Isn’t it?” he continued. “I used to have one whole half of the bedroom closet, but now I only have half of that and everything I own is shoved way over to the side to accommodate your outfits and shoes.”

“That’s not -” She stopped herself once she realized that what he’d said was true, so he decided to go in for the kill.

“The only thing I have left that I can call truly my own is this desk,” he said. “This one tiny desk in this entire house, and it’s hardly big enough for the laptop and printer, let alone anything I might want to display on it, so what makes you think there’s room for a plant?”

She scowled and pointed at the plant. “It fits right on the corner, and it’s not in your way.”

“That’s not the point,” he retorted. “The point is that it’s my desk, not yours, and you can’t just take it over like you did the rest of the house.”

She rolled her eyes. “I’m not ‘taking over’ your desk! It’s just a plant!”

“Prove it,” he challenged. “Plant it elsewhere.”

She sighed heavily. “Fine! But can I just leave it there until I find another place for it?”

He sighed, too. “Fine. Just so long as you find another place for it.”

“I will,”‘ she irritably replied.

“Good!” he curtly replied.

“Good,” she echoed and stormed off.

It was still there the next day.

“I thought you were going to move it?” he asked her the moment she walked by.

She thought she could just sneak past. His face was plastered to the screen, pouring over figures, ruining his eyes. But some sixth sense warned him of her presence and without even pulling himself away from the screen, he threw the question at her, and she stopped dead in her tracks.

“I’m looking for somewhere to put it,” she replied. “Can I just leave it there for a little while?”

“No,” he said, certain that if he gave her an inch, she would surely take a mile. “Find a spot for it today.”

“I’m too busy today,” she honestly replied. “Can it wait until tomorrow?”

He sighed. “Okay, but I’m not moving it for you. Find a place for it, or it goes in the trash.”

She rolled her eyes. “Fine!”

“Fine,” he replied.

It was still there a week later.

She’d had an early doctor’s appointment, and he couldn’t confront her about it, so he did what he had done for the past week. He ignored it. Or tried to. But as the day progressed, his eyes strayed to it, and he noticed that the leaves were withered. He stuck his finger in the pot and felt dry soil.

“God damn it,” he muttered. “She can’t even water it?”

He eyed it disdainfully. They’d already argued about it several times. If she wasn’t going to move it, the least she could do was water it. It would serve her right if it died because of her neglect. She didn’t even care enough to find a better place for it, like maybe somewhere in the sun. He was ready to let it wither away just to teach her a lesson. Maybe then, she might actually move it, albeit to the trash can. He glared at it and finally sighed, got up, and fetched it a drink of water, carefully pouring it in so that it didn’t overflow. The soil drank greedily, and he thought the plant smiled. Fine. He wasn’t going to let it die because of her. But she had to take responsibility for it soon, or else.

When she got home, they had a horrible fight over it that sent her crying to the bedroom. It was a big over-reaction to a spat over a houseplant.

“Did you find a place for the plant?” he asked as she walked past behind him the following day.

“I’m busy,” she replied. “I’ll do it later.”

She didn’t.

“When are you going to water your plant?” he asked the next day when he just happened to glance up and see her by the window.

She didn’t answer. Instead, she just walked away, and he wasn’t going to repeat himself, so he watered it himself, just enough to wet the soil and keep it alive another day.

“Are you going to find another place for the plant?” he asked as he passed her, lounging on the couch a few days later.

Her arm draped over her eyes, she muttered, “I’m tired. I’ll do it later.”

It was still there the next day.

“Are you ever going to water this thing?” he snapped a few days later, feeling like a starting an argument.

She just shook her head and said, “It looks fine. I’m going to lie down for a while.”

It wasn’t fine, and he ended up watering it himself. Again. And it repaid him by growing vines that left the pot and spread across the desk, encroaching on his workspace.

“Can you please find a place for it today?” he testily demanded when he moved some papers on his desk and nearly knocked it to the floor. It and its pot had grown significantly, thanks solely to him, and there was hardly any room to spread out his stuff anymore.

“I’ll try,” she sighed heavily, but then lumbered away. It was still there the next morning.

It became a daily routine. He would ask, and she would prevaricate. He would grow increasingly more annoyed, and she would grow increasingly more depressed, until he finally figured out that something else was bothering her and asked what it was, and when she finally told him, the placement and care of houseplants became the least of their concerns.

“You really should get rid of her things,” his sister said after everyone else had left.

He nodded, unable to speak without choking. They sat at the kitchen table, surrounded by dozens of casseroles, pies, and assorted leftovers. He’d deliberately avoided alcohol, but she had a last swallow of scotch in her glass. Her husband was driving, and at the moment was bringing their car around. They’d had to park down the block, and he’d said he’d honk when he got there.

“You don’t want to be reminded of her like that,” she advised. “Not right now, anyway.”

He nodded. It had been so sudden. Too sudden. The doctors had told them that she had longer to live. They’d lied.

A honk from outside brought her to her feet. Putting a hand on his shoulder, she quietly offered, “Call me if you need anything.”

He nodded, but he didn’t have the will to lift his head or to see her out. After the car pulled away, silence rang loudly throughout the house.

It took a long time to build up the energy and still longer to make the decision, but he finally sat down at his desk after finishing the monumental task. He didn’t bother with auctions or online sales. Everything went to resale shops, and what one wouldn’t take, another did. He didn’t even bother with calling ahead. He just hauled everything with him wherever he had to go. But it was still hard and he didn’t even know how he’d managed to get it done.

Everything of hers was gone. Like she had never been there. As if she had never existed. The closet was all his now. The bathroom vanity, too. Everything was his. Then he noticed the plant. The plant that had grown bigger with watering, requiring that he buy it a bigger pot so that it could take up even more of his personal space. It was hers, and it had to go, like all the rest of her things. That’s what was supposed to happen, right?

He stared at the pot for God only knew how long, as every argument over it rang in his ears. He hated the stupid thing. He hated being the one stuck caring for it. He hated how the vines crawled everywhere, and he hated that, no matter how many times he brushed the desk off, dirt still somehow leapt from the pot and scattered all over the place. He wanted to grab it and chuck it into the garbage bin, and maybe he’d rip it apart just for good measure. He would do it, too. That would serve it right for all the things he had to do for it just because she wouldn’t!

He stared at it.

The plant was withered. He’d forgotten all about it. He hadn’t even been at the desk in a very long time. Even the watering can, which he bought just because he was sick and tired of using a perfectly good glass every time the damn thing was thirsty, was dry. He got up, refilled the can, and gave the plant a little drink, just enough to start it on the road to recovery. And he sat again, staring at it, waiting for the leaves to uncurl again.

As he waited, silence rang loudly in his ears. The plant took up a third of the desk, encroaching on his personal space. He really missed that.