I pulled into the driveway and slammed on the brakes. There they were — my husband and his ex-wife, digging up the flowers I had spent months nurturing. Janet? I hadn’t even known she was coming over. Last I’d heard, they barely spoke. So why were they here… together… in MY garden?
Heart racing, I ran toward them, demanding answers. Rhett froze, speechless. Janet turned to him with a smirk, as if she had been waiting for this exact moment, and said loud enough for me to hear:
— “Oh, you didn’t tell her? She deserves to know… what we buried.”
The world tilted. The shovel clanged to the ground. I blinked between the two of them, searching for clarity. Janet wiped her hands on her jeans, calm as ever, while I struggled to stay upright.
— “I… I didn’t think we’d need to bring this up,” Rhett murmured, his voice breaking. “Not anymore.”
— “Bring what up?” I snapped, stomach knotting.
Janet gestured toward the freshly dug hole.
— “See for yourself.”
I stepped closer, hesitant. The hole was about two feet deep, and peeking out from the dirt was… a corner of a wooden box.
Rhett knelt and gently pulled it free, brushing away the soil. This wasn’t a forgotten storage bin or time capsule. It looked handcrafted, deliberate. And when he opened it… my heart plummeted.
Inside were dozens of letters. Some yellowed with age, some newer, all addressed to a name I didn’t recognize: “Arlo.”
Before Rhett could speak, Janet said,
— “Arlo was our baby.”
Silence swallowed me.
— “You had a child?” I whispered, stepping back.
Rhett looked ten years older in a moment.
— “He was stillborn. Twelve years ago. We buried these letters as a way to say goodbye… we’d write them every now and then, then stop. Life went on, but I never stopped thinking about him.”
My mind reeled.
— “Why didn’t you ever tell me?”
— “I wanted to protect our life… our life together,” he said, rubbing his forehead. “I thought I’d made peace. But a few weeks ago, a letter arrived in the mail — no return address. Just these words: ‘Go back to the garden. The truth still grows there.’”
— “We thought someone might have found the box… or maybe it needed checking,” Janet added.
I looked at the letters again. Decades of grief, love, and memory, buried under my rosebushes.
— “I’m sorry,” I whispered. “I didn’t know.”
Rhett’s eyes softened, raw and vulnerable.
— “I wanted to protect you. Maybe I made the wrong choice.”
Janet nodded.
— “This isn’t about the past. It’s about honoring it. He never stopped loving you. But grief doesn’t stay buried just because we cover it.”
We sat quietly on the porch. I read a few of the letters — simple words, no drama, just two parents speaking to a child they never met, telling him about their lives, their seasons, their dog, the music they hoped he’d love.
Then I noticed one small twist. One of the newer letters wasn’t from either of them. It was from Rhett’s mother, who had passed two years ago.
— “I found this in her things,” Rhett said softly. “She never sent it. I buried it last month… and I think that’s what set this all in motion.”
Suddenly, it all made sense.
I thought the day would break us. Instead, it opened something long shut.
Over the next week, Rhett and I spoke openly about Arlo. Janet even returned with coffee and old photos. I realized I wasn’t in conflict with the past — I was part of the future.
We built a small wooden bench over that spot in the garden, something quiet and respectful. I planted new roses nearby — blue ones. Rhett said they were for Arlo, named after the sky.
