The Bone Garden

By

Robin B. Devlin

It has been raining all day. I usually quite like rain because it makes things grow. I don’t like it so much today. It’s that cold, misty rain that doesn’t feed the ground but soaks into your clothes and chills you to your bones. Is it my imagination, or does it only rain like this on Mondays? Like it’s a special kind of rain that knows when you’re most fed-up.

That’s where I am, a drizzly Monday in February. February always brings with it a kind of moody disappointment. I’m a month and a bit into the new year, and already I’m sick of its crap. I think of Mum and Dad, how they make the same promises about quitting smoking and drinking, and taking me places. It’s always bull.

I’ve had a rough day as I trudge home. Even without the hole in the sole of my shoe, it feels like it’s taking forever. Oliver and his little band of chuckleheads cornered me in the lunchroom. They stamped all over my sandwiches and made me say thank you for putting me on a diet. To top it all off, Mister Roundtree had gone off on one. I don’t get how we are supposed to speak to the teachers about bullying when the bloody teachers are also bullies. I made the mistake of telling him that, and he put me in detention.

It’s really coming down now, raining cats and dogs, as my gran used to call it… Whatever that means. The rain trickles down my neck and soaks my back. I grip my school bag, my fingers so cold that I can no longer feel them. I change direction to cut through the graveyard and get home as quickly as possible.

Tossing my bag over the shoulder-high fence, I clamber over with all the grace of a baby deer and graze my shin on the rusty railing. Isn’t that just today in a nutshell? Cold, wet, and now I have to limp home to a microwave meal to top it off. Never did like Mondays much, or any day, come to that.

I’m deep in my fug as I trudge through the graveyard, and I hardly notice the rain now, distracted by how overgrown and lush the place looks. Delicate, pretty, bone-white flowers that I don’t recognise cover the ground. I think I hear humming, just on the edge of my hearing, but I get distracted by how green everything looks. I’m trying to think of a better word to describe it when I hear a voice whisper.

“Verdant. It means to be green with vegetation.”

A little freaked out, I stop in my tracks. “You what?” is all I can find to say.

“The word you needed: v-e-r-d-a-n-t, verdant. It’s a good word.” The voice is soft and light, like a memory or a whisper from the past.

“Where are you?” I ask, spinning around like a top, so much so that I forget that Newton’s laws are a thing, and my bag causes me to collapse in a heap.

“Careful. Look to your left.”

I glance around, but all I see is an overgrown grave; it’s old, so old that wind and rain have erased the name.

“There’s no one there!” I say, more annoyed than scared now.

“Well, there’s me.”

I almost jump out of my skin. This voice is much more… corporeal. The sweet little old lady walks towards me. Despite the fact that it’s stopped raining, she still has her umbrella up, and she walks over slowly.

“Er, did you just change your voice?”

“Oh no, I’m just the custodian,” she says, like that’s supposed to answer the question. She moves to a rose bush and starts to trim some of the dead foliage away. I hear a deep, contented sigh.

“What’s going on?” I ask, getting ready to run.

“They speak all the time, you know; most people don’t listen.”

I look around, confused. And then it dawns on me.

“Is it the plants?” The question sounds dumb even as I ask it.

“Well, now, that’s the question, isn’t it?” says the old lady, preoccupied with tending to the graves. “It’s either the plants, or the dead… maybe both,” she says.

This revelation doesn’t scare me, or give me the ick… It’s weird, for sure, but it kind of makes sense. I think for a moment, but a question bubbles up in my brain and pours out of my mouth.

“Do they know?” I ask. “That they’re, well…”

“Dead?” says the old woman mildly.

“We know, not that it matters,” says the voice of the Garden.

By now, I’m too fascinated to be scared. I don’t even care that I’m standing soaking wet in an overgrown graveyard. The little old lady indicates a small shed and beckons me to follow her. I walk into the little shed; inside, it’s cosy and warm. She’s got a portable gas ring set up, like the ones we used at scouts. She offers me a cup of tea in an enamel mug, and I gratefully accept.

“You’re not bothered by any of this?” she asks. All I can think of is the first Beetlejuice movie.

“I, myself, am strange and unusual.” I quote. If she recognises the line, she doesn’t show it. Just sips her tea and smiles at me, like a favourite aunt.

“Yes, you are,” she says at last. “My name is Mrs Wren.” She adds, offering me a chocolate biscuit. I take it and nibble on the edge. I always eat biscuits like this, like I’m a hamster.

“I’m Marcus,” I say quietly, nibbling the biscuit. It’s a little stale but delicious. “Are they ghosts?” just bubbles out of my mouth.

“No,” says Mrs Wren, “ghosts aren’t real.”

“But talking plants are?” I counter, half expecting a clip around the ear. Instead, she lets out a soft chuckle. It’s a nice warm sound, like the snap and crackle of a cosy fire.

“Well, you know it’s not just the plants or ghosts. The Bone Garden is something else, something special,” she says. Suddenly, my mind is crowded with questions, the initial awe and wonder honed to a fine edge.

“But why…” I start. Mrs Wren silences me with a raised eyebrow.

“Some things just are, young Marcus,” she says. I swallow my knee-jerk response, knowing it’ll just lead to an endless loop of me asking ‘but why?!’ and Mrs Wren, infinitely patient, replaying ‘some things just are.’

“Whatever they are, you’re going to need some help; you’ve got brambles popping up all over the place. They can be a real pain to get rid of,” I say, glancing out of the shed to check that it hasn’t started to rain again. I inhale the fresh smell you always get after a rain shower.

“Well then, young Marcus, you’re just going to have to help me with that, aren’t you?” Mrs Wren said.

****

I spend the next day with one eye on the clock, ready to dash to the graveyard as soon as possible. I keep my head down and spend lunchtime in the library, looking for books on gardening, specifically how to eradicate all traces of brambles. I’m reduced to an analogue approach because older kids are using all the computers.

I’ve basically got two options with the brambles: I can either spend the time digging up and pulling out every trace, or I can nuke the site from orbit. And I’m all out of nukes. And it occurs to me the brambles wouldn’t be my first target anyway.

Brambles are a complete nightmare for gardeners, and even just for people who like green things. They choke the life out of more delicate plants, and at this time of year, they are right on the cusp between looking like something from a Tim Burton movie and springing back to life with pale and rather pretty flowers. And to top it all off, they seem to take it as a challenge when you cut them back. I picture myself hacking away with a samurai sword, or better yet, with a scythe, and the bramble growing back, regenerating like Wolverine. Even a bit as big as your thumb left behind and bam! Night of the Living Blackberries.

I skip lunch, don’t even realise until the bell goes, and stuff my notes in my worn-out school bag. Time drags, but after an eon or two, it’s home time, or more specifically, graveyard time.

I duck down the side street and toss my bag over the fence, calling out to Mrs Wren. I don’t get an answer at first, so I content myself with taking the dead heads off one of the plants. I hear that contented sigh, and pat the ground a little uneasily.

“That better?” I ask, feeling a bit foolish in spite of myself.

“Much thanks,” the Garden sighs.

Not for the first time, the thought goes through my head that I’m losing the plot. I’m kneeling by a random grave and just talking to myself.

“You’re not going crazy,” assures the Garden, “if you were, you would never question your reality.”

“Right, so, because I think this is nuts, means it isn’t nuts?” I ask, losing a little of my inhibitions.

“It’s a tricky one, isn’t it?” says the Garden in its peaceful, almost sleepy voice. “What you are experiencing is called a Paradigmatic Outlier.”

For want of a face to address, I look blankly at a rather lush patch of ivy. “I was with you all the way up to ‘you are experiencing…’” I say.

“Right, your paradigm is your world view… water is wet, fire is hot…”

“Millwall suck, and plants don’t talk,” I finish.

“An outlier is something that occurs outside of that. But is, nevertheless, real, the way a person from the 1400s would see today’s world as unimaginable and alien.”

“So, you’re some kind of scientific breakthrough that the world isn’t quite ready for?” I say, pulling weeds out of one of the more overgrown plots.

“Maybe… or maybe it is magic after all. Maybe I’m the one who’s going insane, and you’re my caregiver; who can say?” says the Garden, falling into a deep companionable silence.

Mrs Wren comes out of her little shed. She smiles when she sees me; I can’t help but return the smile. She makes her way over, leaning on a walking stick that looks like it is nothing more than a repurposed branch. I stand as she approaches, brushing loose grass from the thin, worn-out knees of my school trousers.

“How was your day, young Marcus?” she asks, and unlike when other adults ask, I get the feeling that she is genuinely asking.

“Not bad, a bit boring… and the library at school doesn’t really have anything good on gardening, and I couldn’t get on the internet.” I go on to tell her about all the information I have gathered to help us in our war against the brambles.

“Well, you had best get to work then,” she hands me a pair of thick, sturdy gardening gloves and goes back to her shed to put the kettle on. I crack my knuckles and pull the gloves on, glaring at a thick knot of brambles. I start to pull out the thick, woody stalks. Even through the sturdy gloves, the thorns bite into my hand, and my little noodle arms are aching after only ten minutes.

“Hasta la vista, brambles,” I growl in victory, as a massive clump yields to my efforts. My hand stings like crazy, but I start to cut up the vines, tossing them to one side. I didn’t notice a bramble snaking around my ankle until I went to move away and ended up on my arse.

“Oh, a wise guy, eh?” I grunt as I use the cutters to free my ankle, little dots of blood showing where the thorns had bitten into my skin through my sock. I put my ungloved hand out to steady myself as I get to my feet, and, predictably, end up plunging my hand into a bush of nettles. I say the rudest word I know, and somehow that makes me feel a little better, even as blisters form on my hand.

“Urtica dioica,” I hear in my head, the voice of the Garden speaking to me, “the common burn nettle.”

“Fudge’s sake!” I say, tossing the brambles onto the small pile I’d been building. “It stings like a…”

“Dock leaf,” said Mrs Wren, putting down the two mugs of tea she was carrying. After a few moments of foraging, she hands me a large, soft leaf. “Rub it into your poor little hand.” She rubs the big leaf into the tender pink rash that speckles my hand.

“Was a time when you might need one of these little buggers,” she says soothingly, indicating the nettles. “It was used to treat rheumatism.” I work the dock leaf into my hand, doubtfully, but the cool sap does seem to help the burning.

“Bloody things,” I say, flexing my hand a little; it still stings, but not as badly. Mrs Wren pulls on her own canary yellow gardening gloves. She pulls out a few of the nettles, tossing them into a wicker basket rather than onto the pile of brambles.

“Tea,” she says simply. I think on this for a moment, then it dawns on me.

“Oh, you can drink them?” I say, my chipped enamel mug halfway to my lips.

“Yes, like anything else that’s dangerous; it’s got a lot of uses. Don’t worry, though—yours is just Yorkshire Tea.” I take a sip of my tea; it’s familiar and delicious. I finish it down to the dregs and toss what’s left at the roots of a large cherry blossom tree.

“Do you have a spade?” I ask. “I’m going to need something a bit bigger than the trowel if I’m going to get rid of the brambles for good.”

Mrs Wren pats my hand, smiles mildly, and returns to her shed.

“Tomorrow, young Marcus, tomorrow,” she says. “Oh, and bring a crossword.” She gently picks up an errant spider that had wandered into her shed. “The Garden is a bit of a know-all and likes to do them.” She places the spider on a plant by the door of her shed.

The sky is darkening with hues of royal blue and steel grey as I venture home and manage to get in before the clouds burst. Mum is out, probably at bingo, and Dad is half asleep on the sofa. He’s on nights this week, so he has only just got up. He snores loudly, rousing himself to full wakefulness; his hands automatically search for his cigarettes, find them, and go to light one. I warn him that he’s about to light the filter, and he grunts, thanking me. He gets ready for work and heads off.

I spend the night googling my arse off with Dad’s old (essentially steam-powered) laptop. I learn all there is to know about brambles that I can fit in my head. Only at about ten o’clock, when Mum comes home from the bingo (“Not my lucky night, hon”), do I realise that I have Roundtree’s stupid pop quiz tomorrow. Oh well, it’s too late now; just got to roll the dice and hope I know the difference between a fjord and a cape. Should be alright.

****

It wasn’t alright. I completely shanked the test; it’s as if I sat at my normal desk, at the back near the window, and Mr Brain went on a little holiday and didn’t invite the rest of me. I got off fairly lightly. He tasked me with writing a 1,000-word essay on geographical features to be handed in on Monday, and that’s a problem for ‘Sunday afternoon Marcus’. Right now, I’m ‘Friday Marcus’, and even if it is drizzling, I make my way to the Garden in a way that would make Gene Kelly spin in his grave (our oddball History teacher, Mr Howard, had played ‘Singing in the Rain’ for us just before Christmas last year).

I arrive at the Garden, my hand automatically placing a stone on a headstone, the name and dates erased by time.

      “I’m home,” I call out, then correct myself to “I’m here!”

The Garden whips some leaves playfully around my ankles. I go to Mrs Wren’s little shed, where she is asleep in the battered and patchy wing-backed chair. As quietly as a mouse, I get the watering can and put a few drops of plant food in the water, being very careful not to spill any on my skin. The Garden lets out a deep sigh, the noise I make when I see pizza. “I know it’s been raining, but these guys here look like they could use some extra help.” I place the heavy watering can down and start to attend to the ivy that’s growing up the cherry blossom tree. Some of the leaves have withered, and I pick them off. When I’m done, I take out the book of crosswords that I bought and read out one of the clues.

“Two down, ‘String problem’, 6 letters, ends in Y.”

“Knotty, K-n-o-t-t-y,” comes the answer; I jot it down.

“Oh, I’ve got you now,” I say, my back against the cherry blossom tree. “11 across, 9 letters, ‘Geosmin scent’.” I can almost feel the Garden thinking it over when I hear its low voice.

“Haven’t a bloody clue,” then the soft chuckle that it always does when it’s amused.

I pick a daisy out of the little patch of them when I see something glint in one of the graves that I have cleared of brambles. Taking the hand trowel, I scrape the dirt from a chain, worn by time. I pull on the chain and very carefully dislodge the object from the damp soil. It’s a locket, oval-shaped and made of deep yellow gold. It’s engraved on the outside with scrollwork and feels a lot heavier than it looks. I pour a little water from my bottle over it, washing the loose dirt off it, when I hear movement behind me.

“What do you have there?”

“I just found it; it was kinda half covered in soil,” I answer, offering the locket to Mrs Wren to examine. She holds it for a moment, weighing it thoughtfully in her hand.

“This was very precious to someone; the Garden must want you to do something with it,” she says, a thoughtful cloud over her eyes. She hands back the locket. It’s probably my imagination, but it somehow feels a little heavier. I look around the garden. A few bluebells have popped up, and soon there will be a wonderful blanket of the vibrant flowers.

“How do I know what to do with it?” I run my finger over the delicate catch mechanism, and it pops open. It’s stiff, and I carefully pry it open. Inside are two tiny black-and-white pictures: one of a man in uniform, the other of a pretty, dark-haired girl in her early twenties. I pull the ivy clear of the headstone.

Here lies Reginald Pigeon
Beloved father and husband
5th February 1921 – 13th July 1999

“So, I need to find Mrs Pigeon,” I say, more to myself than anyone in particular. Mrs Wren massages the small of her back and drains the last of the tea.

“Sounds like a quest, young Marcus,” says Mrs Wren.

“Well, yeah, I mean, she would be over a hundred by now, though, if she’s still around.” I wrap the locket in a clean tissue, so it doesn’t get scratched by my keys. “I’ll do some Google-fu when I get home,” I say. “For some reason, I can never get a phone signal in the garden; it could be something to do with the electromagnetic field or, more likely, simply the crappiness of my ancient phone.” Mrs Wren cocks an eyebrow at me.

“So just because a thing is old, you should give up on it?” she teases. I poke my tongue out, laughing.

****

It’s dark by the time I get home. I text ahead just in case Mum or Dad has missed me. I get a text in return that just reads, “k”, so I take my time. I google the name Reginald Pigeon with my town name. There aren’t a huge number of results, but too many to trawl through, so I try looking at the image results.

This is better. A bigger version of the photo from the locket smiles back at me: Reg, looking resplendent in his uniform, corporal stripes on his shoulder, his cap at a slightly jaunty angle. He smiles at me, eyes still twinkling after all these years, with a slight gap in his front teeth. I smile back at the picture on my phone and tap it to open the site; it’s an ancient blog post from before I was born. The last entry seems to have been made in 2005.

There is another picture of the pretty girl from the locket, wearing the locket itself around her neck. The caption says “Grandma Elspeth”. There’s a contact email, so after I stow my schoolbag and fix a snack, I do some more digging on the glacially slow family laptop. It turns out that the email address leads to a Facebook page as well, so I email the address:

    To: UrbanDove@vodomail.com

    From: M.white@acmemail.com

    Subject: Locket

Hi,

I think I have found something that belongs to you. I’m not a weirdo. Here’s a picture of it. Email me back.

Cheers,

Marcus.

I hit send and spend the evening watching gardening shows on the iPlayer, making a mental note to ask Mrs Wren if she has any compost; if not, we can start a heap.

I must have fallen asleep in my uniform because I wake in the early hours of the morning still wearing it. It’s dark out, but the sky has that odd quality you sometimes get pre-dawn that makes everything look like a movie. I check my emails on the off chance I’ve been emailed back.

And there is an email.

    To: M.white@acmemail.com

    From: UrbanDove@vodomail.com

    Subject: Locket

Hiya,

OMG!!! That’s totally my Gran-gran’s locket! I have a picture of me as a little girl wearing it. Where are you?! I’d be happy to pay a reward. 🙂

Thanx,

Sash

I dash out a quick reply. There’s a coffee shop in town that I like, with a lot of cool vintage movie memorabilia on the walls. I hit send, and, against my better judgment, I put my mobile number in there as well. I figure if she’s a nutcase, I can just walk away and ghost any unknown numbers that call me.

****

The coffee at Boomer’s is always good. Sometimes, in big chains, they burn the beans to improve the coffee’s flavour profile. It’s a quick-and-dirty workaround that fools some people, but in reality, it just makes the beans taste bitter. Boomer’s uses good beans—not the best, but good.

I take my coffee black, no sugar or syrup, and I’m sipping my go-juice when Sasha walks into the shop.

She stands in the doorway, looking around. Dressed in a very cool boho-style skirt and baggy jumper, her jade-green eyes dart from face to face. I stand and call out to her, and she walks over, her boots clicking on the floor.

“Marcus?” she asks, sitting down.

“Yeah—you’re Sasha?”

She smiles. I take the locket out of my pocket, wrapped in a tissue. She touches her chest.

“Oh, my God! I can’t believe it. I lost this when I was little!”

She runs her thumb over the catch and opens it, her smile pure joy.

“Well, I guess that it is yours, then,” I say.

“Marcus, thank you so much.” She reaches into her purse, but I shake my head.

“I’d like to hear about them, though,” I say. “And a coffee would be nice.”

Sasha tells me about her great-grandparents: how her grandad was a fireman during the Blitz and, after the war, went on to teach English—finally, in his retirement years, becoming a crossword puzzle setter for one of the broadsheet newspapers. I nod along as if I knew him personally. She tells me about her great-grandmother, too: a sharp-eyed but kind-hearted lady for whom nothing was too much trouble, and who truly believed that tea had special healing powers.

By the time I’m draining my coffee, she asks me, “Where on Earth did you find it?”

I don’t really want to go into the details of the Bone Garden, so I skirt the issue and tell her I found it while I was taking a shortcut through the churchyard. If that explanation doesn’t ring true, she doesn’t show it.

****

Later in the week, I’m keeping my head down and trying to eat my lunch; the noise of the canteen is like a chrysalis, a cocoon that I can nestle inside until I’m good and ready to leave.

March has brought with it an odd, false spring. We’ve had a few very warm, dry days—so much so that I’ve taken to carefully monitoring the moisture levels in the roses. It would be a shame if, after almost waterlogging them and after almost being choked by brambles, we lost them to a lack of care.

“Oy, Fatso,” Oliver’s thin mocking voice calls out.

I close my magazine and get ready to leave.

      “Where you going, piggy?” he laughs, blocking my path.

I sigh, looking up at him.

      “What did I ever do to you, Oliver? Eh? I mean, I’ve never so much as said you look like a badly shaved Wookiee. All I get from you is a torrent of fat jokes. I’m not even fat, you imbecile.”

“Da hell you call me?” he says, his mocking smile replaced by the dead-eyed stare of a shark.

I drop my bag and look around. As always, Oliver has his two little helper bullies with him; they’re goading him on and want to see violence. It occurs to me that although I’ve got very good at dodging lazy, clumsily aimed hits when the teachers aren’t paying attention, I’ve never been in a fight.

“I said you’re an imbecile. A cretin. Educationally subnormal,” I rattle off.

I feel stronger with every insult that comes out of my mouth, keeping my eyes on all three of the chuckleheads. Their attitude has changed; this isn’t how this encounter is meant to go, and even Oliver seems wrong-footed.

“You what?” he grunts.

“I said you could lose a battle of wits with a dead dog. You smell like a stagnant pond, and your insignificant micro-penis will only ever be of interest to biologists.”

I’ve balled my hand into a fist, trying desperately to remember whether you’re meant to have your thumb on the outside or inside of your clenched fist.

Everything goes from running in slow motion to all happening at the same time.

Oliver shoves me, and I swing out blindly, hitting him on the shoulder as hard as I can. It hurts my hand like hell, but by now I’m just thinking about getting out of here. I feel a hand grab me from behind as I cock my fist, ready to go down swinging. Oliver punches me in the gut, hard. I’ve already tensed my stomach, and I can barely feel his walnut-like knuckles strike me. I return the favour, my small, hard fist striking him in his own gut. Oliver stands there, dumbfounded, like one o’clock half-struck. I use my elbows to lash out, I find the sternum of one of his friends and the eyebrow of the other. I feel the dull impact, the eyebrow of one hitting me square on my funny bone, but I’ll be damned if I’m going to call out. There’s a small crowd around us by now, one of the useless teachers is making their way over, investigating, I back away from the three of them.

“Enough. Now, I’m leaving. You can follow me out, and we can finish this, or you can piss off and not bother me again,” I say, shouldering my bag. “Frankly, I don’t care which.”

And I just leave them standing there with their mouths open.

****

I toss my bag over the fence and clamber over after it. I call out for Mrs Wren and see her shakily making her way over to me, relying more heavily on her walking stick now than she has been. I pretend not to notice and hike my smile up.

      “Teabags!” I say, pulling a magazine out of my bag.

“Charming,” says Mrs Wren playfully, “and the same to you, I’m sure.”

      “If we keep the used teabags, we can mix the tea in with some soil, and we’ll have nitrogen-rich fertiliser, which might help with the white roses that are just coming into bud,” I say, presenting my copy of Gardener’s World to her. “What do you think?”

      “I think you have the soul of a true horticulturist,” she says, studying the article very carefully.

I pace around the garden, picking up snails and depositing them over the side of the fence.

The Garden sighs in relief.

I absently pat one of the gravestones. Having got rid of today’s batch of snails, I set to finish digging out the brambles. They’re stubborn, but they’re ultimately parasitic; you just need to show them who’s boss and not give them any mercy.

Mrs Wren sits in her comfy deck chair and inhales deeply.

      “I love the smell of rain. What do you call it?” she asks, sipping her tea.

“Petrichor!” I say as inspiration hits. “11 across, 9 letters: ‘Geosmin scent’. P-e-t-r-i-c-h-o-r.”

Pulling the battered book of crosswords out of my bag, I fill in the elusive clue.

“Thanks— that one has been driving us nuts,” Mrs Wren says, smiling, looking confused for a moment.

The Garden chuckles, which just makes the three of us laugh even harder.

****

As it starts to get dark, I gather my stuff to head home for the night and lean against the shed doorway. I call inside to Mrs Wren. She’s fast asleep in her armchair, a pile of knitting by her side, the ancient transistor radio playing some kind of oldie.

I sneak in and tuck her lap blanket around her legs.

      “She’s just tired,” I hear The Garden say. “She has dug out a lot of brambles in her time.”

I get the feeling it’s meant to mean something more to me, but if the garden has a greater meaning behind its words, it doesn’t expand on it.

****

It’s Saturday, so since I have no school commitments, I can spend the whole day in the garden. I stop off on the way to buy some teabags, biscuits, and a packet of poppy seeds.

I remember loopy Mr Howard telling us how poppies grew in the battlefields in France after the First World War. The soldiers’ blood acted as a fertiliser.

The seeds I have bought are Prickly Poppy, or Argemone albiflora. The package says they’re ideal for wildflower gardens, and they will look lovely in a nice patch by one of the graves that are now—mercifully—bramble-free.

I vault over the fence almost casually, shouting out a greeting as I do.

There is no response.

Mrs Wren’s shed door is closed, and the garden is silent. I knock on the door gently. Then, as my heart starts to beat a little harder and a sour, metallic taste fills my mouth, I try the door.

Mrs Wren is slumped over in her chair, and for a moment, nothing else exists in the world.

I move over to her and touch her hand. Her skin is warm to the touch. I say her name, and, thankfully, she stirs. She does not snap awake or look around confused; she blinks a few times and smiles at me.

“Oh, hello, dear,” she says. “I must have dropped off for a bit.”

I smile back at her. It occurs to me for the first time how old she looks. She has always had a grandmotherly air about her, but she looks small and frail in this moment.

Busying myself with the portable gas ring and kettle, I ask how her day has been.

“Good, good,” she answers.

“I bought some seeds for your garden,” I say, offering her the packet of Prickly Poppies.

Then, out of nowhere, she says something odd as she gratefully cracks open the biscuits.

“Young Marcus, it’s important you know this. Having a garden isn’t like owning an object. Gardeners never really own their gardens; we just look after them for a while.”

“Custodians?” I say, hamster-nibbling my biscuit.

“Exactly. We look after them for a time and then…”

Her mind goes far away, looking off into the middle distance.

    “Someone else does,” she finishes, patting my knee.

“Not thinking of going anywhere, are you?” I ask tentatively.

“No. Not yet, at least—but you should have this.”

She hands me a small key that looks like it would fit the sturdy padlock on the gates of The Garden.

I take the key and put it in my pocket.

Mrs Wren nods off again, so I take the kettle off the gas ring and step out into the fresh spring air.

“You’re worried,” says the Garden.

“No, I… Is she going to be okay?”

I pace along the edge of the graves, picking out dandelions that aren’t quite where we want them to be.

“I don’t know. But every garden needs a gardener,” the voice of The Garden says, the professorial air gone from its voice. Now it sounds oddly like Mrs Wren: kind and gentle.

“But what happens when a gardener dies?” It just falls out of my mouth.

“Then, young Marcus, someone who listens takes their place.”

The Garden’s tone is final. I know I won’t be getting any more out of it tonight.

It all tumbles together in my head, and I know what The Garden is trying to say to me.

Mrs Wren chose me.

****

Time passes. The flowers grow and bloom. The garden changes: the colours of the flowers burning vibrantly in the summer sun. Bees have taken to hovering around the lavender. I buy a cheap “bee hotel” and put it on the wall of Mrs Wren’s shed.

I call out to Mrs Wren when I walk through the gate, but I get no answer.

I try the shed door.

Something feels wrong.

The garden is too quiet—no music on the little radio, no warmth from the shed, no Mrs Wren.

I walk to her favourite place in the garden, under the cherry blossom tree.

A fresh grave lies under its shade.

“She asked to be buried there,” says The Garden.

I feel like a wad of damp cardboard has been shoved down my throat. Blinking tears out of my eyes, I go over to the rosebush. The flowers are heavy and full. I cut one off and lay it on Mrs Wren’s grave.

The End