Abe ran ahead of Helen and Marigold, shouting. But they paid him no attention. Helen and Marigold hooked arms and walked easily. They listened to the bay water brush upon the gritty shore. Marigold got lost in the flowers surrounding them. Helen was happier than Marigold had ever seen her. They had gone for miles without speaking, just watching. Watching the world, watching the sky, watching Abe.

“You ever think about her?” asked Helen. “Your Maggie?”

“Always. I think about her always.”

“What do you remember?”

“Oh, I remember the way she felt inside me, and the way I could tell she was just like me even before I met her. And when I first held her. I think about that a lot.”

“Do you ever wonder about where she is?”

“Most of the time I wonder if she’s even alive. And I wonder what she thinks of me if she is.”

“But you were so young, Marigold.”

Marigold forced a smile. “Maybe, but I’ll never forgive that stupid young girl. I don’t think I ever could.”

Helen said nothing, only stooped to pick flowers. She placed them in a basket with an armful of others. Marigold almost didn’t recognize this serene woman beside her.

“I don’t forgive myself for a lotta things,” said Helen. “But that doesn’t mean I have to beat myself up for them either. I’ve done things worse than you. A lot worse.”

“Nothing could be worse than losing your own baby.”

“Losing yourself is almost as bad as losing a child.”

“I just wonder how I could’ve ever been so stupid. That’s what I always think of when I think of Maggie.”

“Everybody’s foolish sometimes, sweetie. Especially when they’re young. You’ve got to be merciful to yourself.”

Helen was right, of course. Marigold had been holding her own personal sins against herself since she was a child. She’d been her own judge, jury, and executioner since the beginning. But it was hard to exercise mercy upon yourself.

They stopped beside the water’s edge and looked at the grass flats in the distance. A pelican dropped from the sky and plunged into the water. He emerged with a fish in his mouth.

“What’s it feel like?” Helen said.

“What’s what feel like?”

“When you touch someone. What happens?”

Marigold shrugged. “I don’t know. It’s a thick feeling.”

“Thick?”

“Like being stuck in mud kinda.”

“Being stuck in mud?”

“You know how when you hug Abe and you feel sort of overcome? It all just swoops down on you and buries you? And you feel like you might just drown beneath it all?”

Helen nodded.

“It’s kinda like that. Only the feelings aren’t all happiness and love. People don’t have happiness and love in them when they’re hurting.”

“So you feel stuck in their mud?”