When brittle leaves begin to fade and fall, my four-year-old son and I go out to plant hyacinth bulbs. My burled joints creak as I plunge a trowel through the soil, revealing naked worms reeling in crisp air, burrowing back through dank holes. “Look at the worms,” I say to my son. He cranes his face into the hole, then pops up, nose covered in soil, a worm writhing between thumb and finger. “Gentle,” I murmur. The worm thrashes on his now-open palm. He hunches over it, crooning, “Hello, sweet worm,” before brushing worm-skin with boy-lips and letting it drop. 

In the spring, we’ll pick the hyacinths and bring them to the grave of a sister he will never meet. I’ll teach him where to find the metal vase for our flowers. Together, we’ll pour water from the jug to fill the vase and splash the stone. With cloths, we’ll rub the dust that settles on the name beneath our open palms. Then he’ll crane his face down to murmur, with gentleness that makes my heart writhe and thrash, “Hello, sweet sister.” I’ll hunch over him like a burled willow weeping brittle leaves. 

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Orah Dawn Levin-Minder lives in Massachusetts with her partner, their five children, and their giant rescue puppy Elsa. She published a Tiny Love Story in The New York Times, and “Planting Hyacinth Bulbs” originally appeared in River Teeth’s Beautiful Thing series. Instagram: @orah.minder