THREE LOVE LETTERS FROM AN UNREPEATABLE GARDEN
ALIYA WHITELEY
You asked me in your last letter, my darling, to name my favourite bloom in the Garden. I think perhaps it is the only flower that produces a scent I am not permitted to smell.
It is kept in a glass house, specially built for the purpose, you see. Those lucky few of us who tend it daily must wear masks. There is a very good reason for this precaution, but it does mean that we all imagine the wondrous and famous perfume it exudes. And we take turns, late at night in the communal sitting room for the gardeners employed here, offering opinions as to whether it would be more like a rose or a lily, or perhaps unlike any flower yet created.
Sometimes the urge to assuage my curiosity on this matter is strong. Even to think of the flower, growing alone in that arched construction of glass, brings on my desire. But never fear, darling; my mind is stronger than my heart in this respect. No, not my heart – the demands of my body. It is akin to the need to taste strawberries simply because I am near them. These animalistic impulses of self-gratification must be mastered. We are not creatures of the garden, but its guardians. We must stand above it, and for it, at all times.
Imagine if the hordes descended. If the fence was battered down by the sheer weight of numbers, and they screamed and stamped across the perfect lawns, churning them to mud, and picked clean the fruit trees in the orchard, and ripped up the roses, all in the name of their own pleasure. They would pluck the flowers to make posies in the name of something good. For love, they might claim. For higher emotions.
Except there are so many of them, of us all, and there is only one Garden. Humanity is worth less than it. Every emotion we feel has been replicated so many times in so many ways, that they have become meaningless.
But fear not. The fence holds them at bay, and we maintain the fences, and the flowers within, and it is good.
My darling, I read back what I have written and must stress that I do not think our love (yours and mine) is cheap, or less than unique; I can imagine your face reading my foolish lines, your trusting little face falling as you think I do not care. Let me explain. I am the mind and the man; I am both, but that does not mean the two get along together. I can despise love as the swamp of sensation it has become, en masse, and the way many claim to be mired within it. For love: it means, because I am unable to rise above its sticky, fetid depths. Or do not wish to, more like.
But our love is not sticky, and it does not drag me down, it elevates me. It gives me wings to rise above the slime. How can this be? I do not know. I only know that just as there are many kinds of flowers in this garden so there are many kinds of love. And our love resembles that wondrous flower under glass. I will forever keep it safe. I protect it, because some things are beyond precious. I cannot explain further, and do not think I have to. I have your understanding about my complexities, just as you have my devotion.
***
My darling,
In your reply you asked me to elucidate further on the flower kept in the glass house, and so I will tell you the story of how it came to be, because although I am weary I cannot sleep, and the night is long and dark with only the snores of the other gardeners in the dormitory for company. But writing to you by soft candlelight makes me feel that you are close, and listening, and so I might do such a story justice with the time and care I lavish upon it as I imagine your enjoyment of the result.
This is only a story, of course. A story of origins, which are always filled with lies. But I like to think all stories either spring from truth or lead us to truth at their end. I leave you to decide which is the case with this particular tale, and after I have written it down I will tell you the very sad news that is keeping me from sleep tonight.
Here is the story:
There was a great sportsman. He was a boxer, and he had won many belts, knocking each opponent down. He was fast on his feet and with his tongue, and he would taunt those he fought, for he said battles were won with words long before fighting began. He knew this because he had survived a long and vicious war of words with the one person who should have said only kindnesses – his mother. She had repeatedly played the trick, throughout his childhood, of making herself bigger by reminding him of how small he was, and how she could make him even smaller.
But he had overcome her words to grow large, and strong. He was a warrior, and a survivor – rich and whole and beloved around the world. But after each victorious fight he felt a wave of shame for the things he had said and the blows he had landed, and he sent every defeated opponent generous gifts and heartfelt apologies to try to salve his smarting conscience.
A conscience is no easy thing to placate. It would not be quiet. Eventually the thought came to the boxer that he must be enjoying the act of destruction in some way, and that he was turning into his mother. He caught glimpses of her small hands when he examined his own meaty paws as he forced them into his thick padded gloves. It seemed to him that when he struck out at his opponents it was her hands that connected with their flesh. The fear began to grow in him that he would, one day, wake as his mother, shrivelled in hate, and all the experts in the world could not persuade him otherwise.
He stopped fighting. He sat in the grand mansion he had paid for with his winnings, and he walked through his vast garden. People came to his gate, hoping to see him, to cheer him, because he was much loved by the public. But nobody entered apart from the staff who were loyal to him, and who refused to speak to anyone about his sadness for they loved him too.
In fact, their loyalty was such that they had a meeting, in which many ideas were mooted in their goal to make the boxer happy again. The gardening staff persuaded the others that their best hope lay in the mysterious and vaunted Mrs Tea, and so they all agreed to pool their generous wages in order to employ her, and bring her to the garden.
Mrs Tea was talked about reverently by gardeners for her gifts with flora. She could breed such beautiful flowers, strange wonders, that could lighten a despondent mood or gladden a sad heart, but her flowers could not propagate. Each one was a unique yet doomed experiment. For this reason her gift was not celebrated in a world where resources were running out; duplication was demanded by big business in an age of profit and production. But gardeners know that the sweetest moment is the unrepeatable moment. Gardeners live for each bloom and grieve each winter, never taking the rebirth of spring for granted.
So they paid for Mrs Tea to come to the boxer’s garden and create the most wondrous flower of all.
It was pretty to look at – rather like a daisy with blueish petals and a scarlet heart – but it was the scent that made it so special, and spectacular. The scent was perfection. Each person who sniffed it described it differently, but nevertheless each one found a peace they had never known before, and that peace lingered for days, months, even years. Some talked of toffee apples at the fair and others thought of exotic breezes from far-off islands. Another might remember the newly-washed hair of their baby children.
The boxer did not describe what he smelled. He took a deep breath in, and then smiled at Mrs Tea and his gardeners, who had formed a line in front of him and the wondrous flower. They were all hoping, hoping, that he would feel succour in his soul.
And he did.
He realised instantly that he was not his mother, and he was not not his mother, but either way his life was a distinct and separate organism, and we are all enclosed within our own thoughts; thoughts that others can touch, but never penetrate. Our mistakes are always our own, and we can either punish or cherish ourselves with them as we see fit. All this was, for him, a revelation wrapped in something like lavender.
He thanked Mrs Tea, and offered her a full time position to transform his entire garden. She accepted, and created many transient wonders, but none that equalled that first flower, which the boxer surrounded with a small arched glass pavilion in its honour.
The Garden became as famous as the boxer, and he returned to the ring and p
ulverised many more opponents with his words and deeds. Each defeated enemy received an invitation to sniff the healing flower, and all wrongs were righted.
The boxer was happy.
But then he noticed how each sniff of the wondrous flower took its toll upon its petals. Was it his imagination? No – after a particularly nasty match his beaten opponent breathed in the scent deeply, gratefully, and the boxer watched the flower quiver, and droop. A lone petal came free, and floated gently down to the ground.
The boxer panicked.
Now, gardeners know that flowers cannot last forever. Boxers do not. He was not ready to let that flower go. So he gave up fighting once more, and passed an order that nobody would ever sniff that flower again. He scoured the world for experts who could prolong its life, and under their care the flower survived for years, as did the garden. But it was thought that one sniff more would kill that wondrous flower; just one sniff, and its beauty would be lost from the world forever.
This is where I come in, my darling, as you know, bringing my green fingers to bear upon this marvellous place. To work here, to tend upon that flower, was not an invitation I could refuse even though it has parted us.
I have been here for – well, how long is it? I ask you as I consider you to be the keeper of the time that has passed between us, and the holder of our mutual memories, while I fill my minutes and my mind with floral thoughts. Anyhow, in that time the boxer sickened for the scent of the flower. But even as he withered he refused to take one more sniff. I asked him why, once, and he replied: I would rather die before I was responsible for removing its beauty from the world.
And that is what he did. He died.
But now to my sad news.
Our talents have been exhausted. The most wondrous flower is also near death.
It has one petal left, and that petal droops so low. We are all agreed that it is beyond our care. Outside the fence the sick and desperate clamour to be admitted in the hope of healing. What will they do when they find out it is lost? Will they break down the gates and rampage through this place I have protected and nurtured? We are all afraid for our lives, and sick at the thought of the death of the flower.
What should I do? I wish I did not have to wait for you to reply. If only I could see that dear face, and hear your wisdom. You would know what to say. Write back instantly, my darling, and impart your thoughts.
Should I come home and abandon the flower in its last moments? Should I leave the other gardeners in danger as I sneak away in the name of the love I feel for you? Or shall I die here, too, in defence of the failing flower?
***
Time is short; I will be brief.
In the absence of your guidance I made a decision, my darling. Why could you not write back with good speed? Well, perhaps the letter is en route. If so, I will never read it because I am leaving here tonight, before my actions are discovered.
The mind and the man are not the same. I told you that once. My love for you wished to defend the flower to the last, to make you proud of me. My mind spoke, in the long nights spent awake, of other things.
There are so many people outside the fence, all in need. One final petal on the flower. Only one person could ever benefit from its miraculous scent again.
Let me tell you of that scent. I can elucidate now.
It is the faint salty tang of the calm sea at sunrise, and it is caramel cooking to be poured on chocolate cake, and so many more smells mixed up together into one. It is not a single thought, or memory, or even an individual hope. It is the understanding of the complexity that makes up the simplest of beings. When we celebrate one being alone, we celebrate them all, because there is no way to encompass or elucidate more than the smallest moment of life. It is beyond us, as a species.
It does not matter that the wondrous flower is now dead, or that the hordes behind the fence will break it down and trample the garden and the gardeners to destruction. And love! I was right about love. That is also meaningless, and commonplace. There are too many of us for love to be celebrated, or even taken into account when making decisions.
And so, my darling, goodbye. I am happy, if that means anything. Well, it means something to me, and that is all that can matter. I can picture your face, your plain and trusting countenance projecting pain as you read these words. So let me put it simply. I do not resemble that famous boxer in any way at all. I do not shy away from causing pain if I must. In fact, I find I can almost enjoy the act. As an example, I have left you twice now, haven’t I?
The boxer said he would rather die than kill the flower, and he did. I would rather live, for what good is the most beautiful scent in the world if nobody can smell it?
I go. I steal away before the others wake, and I venture forth with the sole purpose of maintaining my personal contentment. I will be the one person on this earth who manages that difficult feat. But this is my new mantra: the happiness of one is better than the happiness of none. And if there can be just one happy man, why should it not be me?
***
Aliya Whiteley’s latest novella, ‘The Arrival of Missives’, is currently available from Unsung Stories. Her 2014 novella ‘The Beauty’ was shortlisted for the Shirley Jackson Award and made the James Tiptree Jr Recommended Reading list. She lives in West Sussex.
THE END OF HOPE STREET
MALCOLM DEVLIN
illustrated by Richard Wagner
Number 5
The Potterton house became unliveable at a quarter past three on Saturday afternoon. Lewis Potterton had been sitting in the lounge reading the business section of the Daily Telegraph when he first recognised the symptoms, but when he got to the hallway to call his wife and daughter, he saw they were already hurrying downstairs, his wife Lydia fresh from the shower and still wrapped in a towel.
They hesitated for a moment, surprised at how, in a moment of bemused concordance, everyone else’s actions had mirrored their own. No-one spoke, but then no-one needed to. It was true that there had been frictions between them over the past few months – Lewis’ work had demanded long hours of him, Lydia appeared helpless under threat of redundancy and Monica had felt ignored by the both of them – but standing there together in the hallway, there was an unshakable sense that the connection between them ran deeper and stronger than any of them had previously anticipated. In that one precious moment they were still and hyper aware, listening to the sounds of the house settling, sounds that only the previous day had been normal and reassuring.
There was no verbal cue and instead, as one, they made for the front door and let themselves out, hiding their haste from one another until they were safely together on the front lawn where they stopped and looked back at the house that Lydia and Lewis had lived in since they had married fifteen years earlier, the house that Monica had known all of her life.
It was a bright sunny afternoon, and Lewis was struck by all the times he had woken in the night, fretting about what he should rescue in the event of a fire. The laptop, the accounts, the family photographs. He’d had a plan for them once, but that afternoon, he knew the most important parts of his life were there with him. His wife, his twelve-year-old daughter, his health so he could take care of them. Everything else was as good as gone now, locked and lost inside the house they would never enter again, and at that moment he really didn’t care anymore.
***
It was the Feltons who took the family in. They lived two doors down at number seven, and on that particular afternoon Una Felton had been putting the recycling out early as she did every weekend. She saw the Pottertons standing together on their front lawn. She saw how the father (Louis? Larry?) stood with his arms around his wife and daughter and she saw how all three of them stared at the house they had lived in and she recognised the look of sadness and pride in their expressions.
She’d been unhappy when the couple had first moved to Hope Street. How long had that been now? She remembered them driving up to view the property in that ridiculous red sports car
. He had a pony tail then and she tottered on heels across the lawn. Hidden behind the net curtain in the lounge at number 7, Una had listened to their unguarded enthusiasm and assumed the worst. They were young, she’d thought. They were loud and vulgar. Maybe they’d come armed with the means to lower the tone and the price of the neighbourhood.
With hindsight, it had been a rather unChristian assessment but when she saw them looking so lost in their front garden, her heart went out to them completely.
She unpeeled her gardening gloves and joined them on the lawn, looking up at the new veneer of darkness their house wore.
“Oh good heavens,” she said, her sincerity genuine. “Come with me, let’s keep you warm. Let’s see what we can do.”
They exchanged glances with each other before they followed her, and they each saw the same feeling of being utterly lost reflected back in each others’ eyes. They joined hands and followed Una, back up the path to the pavement and along the road, past the untidy lawn of number six to the pristine one at number seven.
In the lounge, sitting in his favourite armchair, Alasdair Felton looked up from his newspaper, surprised to see his wife bringing guests back into the house without having organised a concerted campaign to make it look a fraction tidier than it already was. Una ignored him – she often did when she had something more pressing on her mind – so he watched and smiled as she fussed around, her frown of concern masking an irrepressible enthusiasm for her newfound purpose.
Interzone #266 - September-October 2016 Page 10