Roots

She lay on the bed, slowly willing herself awake.  The air was still and dry.  Getting up, she rubbed her eyes, touched her hair.  She walked to the kitchen and poured a glass of orange juice.  She sat on the counter and drank it, staring out the open window at the faded brown hills.  Someone next door was playing the stereo.  Blurred music, indistinct sound waves, a song she knew but couldn't recognize.

She slid off the counter, the tile floor cool under her feet as she walked to the sliding glass door.  It opened with a rattle and she passed through.  Outside, she sat cross-legged on the dry grass, pressing her palms against the ground.  Palm fronds rustled quietly against each other at the edge of the yard.  She closed her eyes.  She imagined roots growing from her hands, stretching and spreading into the ground, connecting her to the land she loved so well.  She pictured them expanding, drinking, growing.  Skimming close to the surface to be near the sun, diving deep for the cool water underground.  The roots would spread all the way to the hills and she would stay here, cemented, and never have to leave.  Always in the sunshine with the blue skies above and the quiet winds and the palm trees and the neighbor's stereo.  There would be stucco walls and dry ground and it would be enough.  She would be content.