BONSAI BONANZA

Virginia

Uber rich people are like the deadly nightshade of gen pop—they might look all pretty and harmless, but they lure you in for a taste of their sweet lives, and then, gotcha!, poison your heart and leave you for dead. 

I know this in my bones, and still, I torture myself by working for them. But only because they’re the people willing to pay what I charge to care for their pretty potted plants. That’s my job, wisteria whisperer to the wealthy witches and wolves of West Vancouver.

Don’t get me wrong. I love what I do. I just wish I could do it for people who didn’t look at me like I was an invasive species out to steal their precious resources. So, when I stumble across a cardboard box on the sidewalk as I’m walking to the bus stop, I hesitate to slow down, but … there’s something green peeking above the open top. I try to look casual, like, “I don’t really care what’s in your trash. I don’t need your rich people’s hand-me-downs.”

But, whoa! There are four bonsai trees cuddled up inside. I look around, make sure nobody’s watching, and take one out. Judging by the circumference of the trunk, I’d guess it’s at least a hundred years old. Three others are the same. Then I see the small note with wobbly handwriting: 

Free if you promise not to kill them.

I look up at the house beyond the hedge. Leaving plants like these out on the sidewalk, prone to kidnap by any old conifer-killing klutz, makes no sense. I lift the box and carry it up the winding path to the front door. The grass is months past needing to be cut, the garden that edges the long walkway is overrun with weeds. If this was the opening scene of a true crime, re-creation documentary, I’d be the subject who was foolish enough to waltz straight into harm’s way.

Despite my unease, I ring the bell.

After a long minute, an elderly man answers.

“Oh, good,” he says, nodding at the box in my arms, “you found them before a dog did. I put them out a few minutes ago.”

I don’t know what I expected him to say, but it wasn’t that. “Umm, did you know these trees are precious? And they’re quite tricky to care for. You want to make sure the right person takes them home.”

“Do you know how to care for them, young lady?”

“I do,” I say, “and it’s clear you do too. I don’t understand. Why are you getting rid of them?”

He looks me right in the eye and scowls with the expertise of a man who’s been practicing his stare for seventy years. “They were my wife’s trees. Her pride and joy. She gave her goddamned shrubs more attention than she gave me. I don’t know how to care for those tiny trees because she wouldn’t let me touch them. Told me I’d kill them. So I thought, better to re-home the bloody things than have her tut-tutting me from the great beyond.”

The tone in his voice suggests congratulations on his wife’s death are in order, but the pain in his eyes says otherwise. “I’m so sorry for your loss.”

“Well, my loss is your gain. Mabel, my wife, said they were priceless. The pots alone are antiques worth thousands. We bought them in Japan in the 1970s.”

“Not that I wouldn’t love to care for these, but why not sell them?”

“Bah. Money. Do I look like I need more? I’ll be gone long before I can gamble myself into bankruptcy.” He gives me a serious look.

I return a questioning one.

“That was a joke.” He sighs. “Nobody understands my jokes anymore. At least Mabel did. One thing I miss about her—she knew when to laugh.” He taps the edge of the box. “So you like plants and you know how to care for them?”

“I do. I have a graduate degree in botany and own a plant-care business. I was just heading home from a client up the street.”

He waves his hand. “Put that on the floor. Come in. I’d like to show you my greenhouse. My wife’s greenhouse. Haven’t got a goddamn clue what I’m doing. I just put water on everything and hope that Mabel and I have separate rooms once I shed this mortal coil, or I’ll be spending an eternity hearing about how I murdered her babies. God help me.” 

“My name is Virginia.” I extend a hand.

He tips his chin. “Henry. Henry Bernard.”

Mr. Bernard leads me through several rooms to the back of his mansion and into the most gorgeous greenhouse I’ve ever seen. And I’ve seen my fair share of greenhouses in mansions. This structure was obviously built with love. But the contents? It looks more like a plant palliative care unit with a side of morgue than a greenhouse. 

While Mr. Bernard sits in a cushioned, wingback chair reading a book, I spend ninety minutes looking over hundreds of plants, checking soil moisture, making mental notes of which ones might be saved. Most of the pots contain rare varieties of flowers and small shrubs. If Mrs. Bernard was the green thumb her husband claims, my guess is she must’ve passed away several months ago, since many of these plants are too far gone. They’ve definitely missed their spring pruning and fertilizing. 

“Good news or bad news first?” I ask, pointing to what I assume is the late Mrs. Bernard’s chair beside him.

“Sit,” he says. “Just tell me, do I need to start kicking puppies to secure my place in an easier hell than the one I’m expecting?”

“Well, like people, all plants have a life span. We can’t expect them to live forever—except maybe a well-cared-for bonsai tree. But what you have here?” I wave around the room. “There are some unfortunate losses, but a lot of these plants can be saved.”

“And you can do that? Get me back in Mabel’s good graces? We had fifty-five good years together. I’d hate to ruin things now.”

“I can certainly do my best. And I’d hope she’d recognize that if you hired me to do this, you’re doing your best, too, and she’ll forgive a few oopsies.”

Mr. Bernard grunts. “Would you do that for me?”

I nod. And my stomach twists. After three years, I still hate this part of self-employment—asking for money to do something I’d gladly do for free and most clients could easily pay double my rate for. I steel myself for the grunt that expresses my rate is too high.

But Mr. Bernard doesn’t puff when I tell him my rate is fifty dollars an hour. He doesn’t wince when I say I need to spend at least twenty hours, preferably within the next few days, to do my best for his plants. And then two hours a week to make sure what we save flourishes. 

“Too goddamn much death in my life this past year. That’s a small price to pay to keep what Mabel loved alive.” 

“With all due respect to your wife, Mr. Bernard, I’d love to have you work alongside me so you can experience the joy Mrs. Bernard got from caring for these plants. And you might think I’m crazy, but her plants will appreciate it too.”

He scoffs. “You sound just like her. She talked to them like they understood what she was saying. She hated when I cursed in front of them.”

“They do understand. They absorb the energy.”

Mr. Bernard holds eye contact with me for several long seconds, and I wonder if he’s worried his grief has been hurting the plants. I risk it and guess that he’s spent hours each day out here in his well-loved chair. “More would’ve died if you hadn’t sat with them. Every time you exhale, it’s fuel for them. We’ll make Mrs. Bernard proud, I promise.”

“I’m paying you forty hours up-front since I don’t want to be in your debt if I die between visits. You keep track of your time, and tell me when I owe you more.” He pushes himself to standing. “I’ll get my checkbook.”

* * *

I grab an Uber home since I can’t carry the four boxes of plants Mr. Bernard insists I take with me—the bonsai trees, plus all the flowers that are likely too dead to save. He doesn’t want to look at them anymore. He told me if I can save the plants, I can keep them. And if I can’t, I should sell the pots and pocket the money.

A few blocks from home, I text my sister, Georgia, and ask her to come out to carry in a few of my prizes.

She meets me at the curb. “Really, Virginia?”

“Just help me get them inside. I don’t want to leave them on the sidewalk for someone to steal.”

“Who would steal boxes of dead plants? And these are going in your room.”

“Chill out. I’m not holding on to many of them. Not for long.”

On the ride home, I’d looked up the pots that the bonsais are planted in. I snapped pictures, and Google Images found their sisters. Mr. Bernard hadn’t exaggerated. Each is valued at over a thousand dollars. They’re pretty, but really, half a month’s rent for one ceramic pot?

Rich people … I truly will never understand them.

I pull the check from my wallet and dangle it for Georgia to see. She eyes it, then me, like it might be counterfeit. She attempts to steal the flimsy paper from my grip, but I snap it away.

“The rent you owe me?”

“The dead plants will pay you back. I’m using this to attend the Come Into Power seminar next month. Deadline to apply is Friday, and this is exactly what it costs. It’s too perfect. Obviously meant to be.”

“Virginia,” she warns, picking up one box and then another, finding her balance. “Another get-rich-quick scheme?”

“Ha. No.” It’s not. “I’m not an idiot.”

Georgia lifts a teasing eyebrow. I’d smack her, but my arms are full as well. “This is an investment—in me, in my future.” 

“Yes, because you’re an entrepreneur.” Georgia almost chokes while exaggerating the French pronunciation.

“One day, you’ll see.”

“I’ll see when you’ve paid me all the back rent.” Georgia pushes open our door with her butt, and I follow her inside with Mr. Bernard’s check burning a hole in my pocket.

The plants from the four boxes cover our kitchen table and the counter beside the fridge. Aside from the bonsai trees, all the other plants really are too far gone to save. It breaks my heart, but I empty their soil into the compost bin in the backyard. Our ground-floor suite is too small for two people, but the giant yard more than makes up for it. And the landlord lets us pay part of our rent in-kind—which means I make sure the gardens are well cared for in exchange for a hundred-dollar discount on my share.

With the pots soaking in the bathtub, I make dinner while my sister hand-stitches the final touches on a 1950s dress pattern in our living room-slash-studio. Unsolvable Crimes: Solved plays in the background. We’ve seen every episode at least twice and have turned the show into a predinner drinking game we call “Truth or Lie.”

To earn a sip of wine, we have to declare whether the criminal is telling the truth or lying, before the narrator’s voiceover explains how the investigator was able to tell. I am the reigning champion, able to read body language and tone of voice from the first time we watch an episode. Aside from being a plant whisperer, that’s my superpower. 

“Instead of wasting two thousand dollars on a weekend listening to a billionaire give you business tips you can learn for free on the internet, I think you should invest in your education—get a certificate in criminology. You could make so much more money than you’ll ever make watering plants.”

Georgia has said this more than once, and I’ve considered it more than once. And yet I always come to the same conclusion: one path is filled with lightness and life and oxygen and hope, the other is paved with horror and sadness and the broken lives of victims and their families. There’s not enough money in all the world to convince me to take that route. I prefer to keep unsolvable crimes trapped in the frame of our old TV, right where they belong.

Silence is my answer. Georgia redirects the conversation. “Guess who I saw on the mid-day news.”

“Good guy or bad guy?”

“Depends …” she contorts her mouth and wrinkles her nose.

My enthusiasm about the bonsai trees and the giant check in my pocket deflates. I know exactly who she’s talking about. “Did he save a bus full of puppies from driving off a cliff?” 

Virginia laughs. “Close, actually. He donated his clinic’s services to help over a hundred dogs that were in a puppy mill.”

I roll my eyes.

“He’s still not wearing a wedding ring,” my sister sing-songs.

The alleged love of my life—Frank—who I fell for during my sophomore year of university and graduated two years ahead of me. He went on to veterinary school, promising we’d do the long-distance thing, that he’d stay faithful so we could build a real future together after we both finished our respective programs. But he fell for a woman who offered to bankroll his clinic.

I should’ve known better.

If Dad taught me nothing else, it’s that men will always level up, given the chance.