The Treehouse Near the Pear Tree

Camila pulled up to the curb and put the car in park. She left the engine running for a moment while she took several long, deep breaths. Slowly, she turned the key in the ignition. The engine’s purring hum went quiet, and the silence billowed around her in its absence as she looked up at the house. After a moment, she pushed the car door away from her and stepped onto the street.

A sort of reverence stole over her as she stepped onto the porch. Shadows stretched long over the floorboards, and they creaked underfoot. Tenderly, she outstretched her finger and pressed the doorbell. The dual tone sounded throughout the house as Camila smoothed her blazer, feeling estranged from the once familiar sound.

She waited on the porch long enough to notice a light breeze kick up, tousling the leaves of the slender birch tree near the sidewalk. The leaves shimmered out their noise as patterns of light danced all over the porch. Camila gazed at the sunspots dancing over her clogs and took another slow breath.

The door clicked open to reveal an older woman, perhaps 70 years or so, sporting a ragged purple bath robe and a head scarf wrapped loosely around giant foam curlers, into which her silver hair was wound. On her nose were perched wide-lensed glasses with oversized frames, magnifying her blue eyes to twice their natural size.

“Yes?” she grunted.

“Greta?” Camila said. “Can I come in?”

Greta held the door open wide and stood back. “I’ve been waiting,” she said, casting her eyes down the road. “Come in, come in.”

Camila stepped over the threshold and into the house. Her feet landed softly on musty carpet, causing a balding long-haired Daschund to raise its head from its pillow and whuff uncertainly.

“It’s been a long time—” Camila began, but her phone began to vibrate violently in her pocket. “Sorry…” she said, fishing her phone out of her jeans as text after text came buzzing into her hand.

“Take it, take it,” Greta said, waving both her hands in Camila’s direction and shuffling towards the stove. “Freddie and I were just about to make some tea. Would you care for a mug—while you’re here?”

“Please,” Camila said. “I’ll just step out if it’s all the same to you.”

“Sure, sure,” Greta said, and began whistling softly through her teeth as she moved throughout the kitchen.

Camila slipped out the sliding glass door and into the shaded yard. She scrolled through the texts rapidly for the general timbre of their content before an impending feeling of overwhelm clawed at her like a cat at the arm of a sofa. She exhaled sharply, instantly pocketing her phone. Nausea rolled upwards through her and her mouth flooded with saliva. Instinctively, she stumbled away from the house and towards the tall wooden fence, which was looking rather weathered. I’ll have to replace some of these boards soon, Camila thought dimly, or at least sand and re-finish.

She leaned against one of the sturdier posts and spit, trembling slightly. Breathe. The texts can wait.

The wind picked up again, brushing loose hairs against her clammy cheeks and parted lips. Knocking her hair out of her face with the back of her hand, Camila looked up towards the sky.

Her eyes met with the old treehouse, still sporting a now decrepit ladder leaning haphazardly against the base of the oak tree. It looked smaller than she remembered, and more clumsily built—but its roguish spirit still remained, as did the small, raiseable glass window of which her father had been so proud.

During the hottest summer months of her youth, she would clamber up the ladder with a book under her arm, breathless and sun-kissed. She spent many hours laying on her belly flipping languidly through the pages, the air of the treehouse fragranced by the neighboring pear tree. Boughs dripped in through the open window, heavy with fruit—and with the turning of the season into autumn, Camila would often pluck a golden pear from its limbs and touch her tongue to its sandpaper skin before sinking her teeth into tender flesh.

I wonder if it could still support my weight, Camila thought as she waited for her breathing to slow. She could almost smell her mother’s signature brie and pear pie wafting from the kitchen. She used to love watching her mother cut the first oozing slice, tender roasted pear slices nestled amongst velvety cheese and flaky crust.

“One piece of this,” she used to say, “and you won’t need to eat for the rest of the day. Everything you need.” She would always tap Camila’s head upwards as she said this, forefinger bumping gently under her daughter’s chin. Then her hand would go to her own face, just under both her eyes. Looking back, there had been so many warning signs about the state of her mother’s health, but Camila had been too young, and too preoccupied, to understand the nuances of her illness.

Camila looked to the wizened pear tree, snapping back into the present. In the early-August sunlight, green, hardened pear embryos hung from every limb, suspended and promising and impossibly perfect. They weren’t yet ready to eat—they had maturing to do.

From behind her, the kitchen window slid open.

“Peppermint, green, or chamomile?” Greta called through the screen.

“Mint,” Camila replied, still gazing at the unripe fruit. “I’m coming.”

She wiped her eyes and wiped her feet and stepped back into the house.

“Here you go,” Greta shouted, sliding a white, steaming mug across the kitchen counter towards Camila. “I double bagged it. Looked like you could use a boost.”

Camila cleared her throat. “Thanks,” she said, clasping the mug. The teabags bobbed in the undulating hot water like reverse buoys in an ocean, tethered to the sky rather than the sea floor. Camila pulled at their strings, commanding them back and forth in her mug.

“Greta,” she said, “let me take a look at the shower and see if I can fix it.”

“Oh, well,” Greta said, “faucet was working one day, and the next it sprung a leak.”

“Right,” Camila said, “I’ll just be a minute.”

She worked methodically, and in silence. The replacement showerhead was a simple fix, made easier by sips of warm peppermint tea. She tidied up, drained her mug, and placed it in the kitchen sink.

“Bye, Freddie,” Camila called as she made her way to the door. “Goodbye, Greta.”

She pushed the handle towards the afternoon air, the birch tree whistling softly in farewell.

“Greta,” she said, pausing in the doorframe. “Will you have any extra pears this season? If that old tree’s still producing half as much as I remember, you may end up wondering what to do with all of it.”

“Oh yes,” Greta said, “There’s plenty. Please come back and get some.”

“Thank you,” Camila breathed. “Maybe I will bring you some pear pie, if you’d like that.”