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THE GARDEN WHERE BLACK FLOWERS GROW

& OTHER STORIES

BY

TIM JEFFREYS

Copyright © Tim Jeffreys 2008

All rights reserved.

Cover illustration by Martin Greaves.

No part of this book may be reproduced or transmitted in any form or by any means, electronic or mechanical, including photocopying, recording, or by any information storage and retrieval system, without permission in writing from the author.

For Joyce Britton

and for Cucu!

Contents

The Garden Where Black Flowers Grow

MOST OF THE houses on Upper Mauldin Street were uninhabited. Their windows had been replaced with chipboard, and their doors locked and bolted. The houses were shadowy, set back from the road, with unkempt gardens to the fore and who-knows-what behind. Children would roam the street, at dusk, in October, shuddering to imagine what lurked in the sealed up darkness behind the brickwork.

Yet it was Upper Maudlin Street’s occupied houses - unkept, unswept, in disrepair and apparent despair – that most unsettled the children. They would gleefully spin tales about any inhabitant glimpsed through a window. This one at number nine was a witch, who trapped and gobbled up any child caught trespassing in her wild front garden full of thistles and cats. At number twelve lived a family of thieves, sometimes seen prowling before the large bay window, scheming and sketching out their crimes. There were other stories to be heard about number twenty-five, where an old man lived alone, or thirty-one, where a curious character – by all accounts - had been spotted coming and going.

And what of number six? No house was speculated upon more than number six. When the children spoke about number six, they did so in hushed voices.

Nobody was quite sure if number six Upper Mauldin Street was occupied. Someone had been glimpsed at night, tending the front garden by moonlight. The house was narrow and daunting, but for the children it was the garden that set it apart from other residences in the street. They did not go to number six to spook themselves, then run shrieking and laughing as fast as they could. For them, the garden gave the house a very real kind of horror; for it bloomed with woeful, black and terrible flowers. The sight of these flowers alone could plant a sliver of ice in the heart of a passer-by.

The flowers grew high on thorny stems. Their heads peered over the garden wall. They both repulsed and fascinated the children, reminding them of things sometimes glimpsed in their dreams, or speaking to them of impenetrable feelings they had not yet experienced, and smelling thickly of scents they could not yet comprehend.

One night in late summer, Ben Champion, eleven years old, ran the length of Upper Mauldin Street. He did not glance up at any of the houses he passed. His vision was cloudy with tears. One of his hands was clenched tight in a fist, which he held out from his body as though he held an item unspeakably precious. He ran straight to the house at number six. Then, seemingly undaunted by the heads of the black flowers swaying behind the wall as though with a will of their own, he pushed through a gap in the rusted fence and entered the garden. With his free hand he did his best to push back the thorny stems that threatened to scratch and needle him. When his clothes caught, he would wrench them free. He was hot and sobbing. Finally, he found a clearing amongst the flowers, a fresh patch of recently turned earth. Grasping up a stick, he began frantically to dig a hole. When the hole was barely three inches deep, he hurled whatever had been clasped in his fist into it, inadvertently sprinkled in a few tears, then quickly filled it in. With barely a pause, he hurried to escape the garden. Once in the street again, he ran from the place, ran all the way home – but before he did so he stopped for a second to wipe his eyes and glance up at the house at number six. A shadow of contempt appeared on his face as he studied a second floor window. A moment later, he had fled.

It hadn’t been this way a few months previously, when Ben Champion first strode with purpose along Upper Mauldin Street, headed for number six and its dire and formidable jungle out front. That time, his face had not been burning with grief and anger, but had been proudly raised with a smile on the corners of his mouth and a determined look in his eyes. A flock of younger children had followed in his wake. They would whisper across to each other: “He said he’d go in!” and “He doesn’t look scared!”

When Ben reached number six he stopped and stood in front of the house, surveying its grounds and silent façade. He glanced at each window in turn, noting that all had their curtains drawn enough to leave a small gap: a gap wide enough for someone inside to view the street without being seen themselves perhaps? Slowly, Ben let his eyes drift down to take in the black flower heads that loomed up over the front wall. A shiver passed through him as he watched them dancing hypnotically in the breeze. He imagined he had stumbled on a nest of huge black cobras that now pinned him with their eyes, ready to strike. For that was the impression given by those flowers: that they were sentient, deadly, waiting.

Ben made no move. He stood still for a while. The children gathered around, keeping a safe distance. They gazed at Ben expectantly.

“Alright,” said Ben. “I’m going in. Here I go.”

The children gasped and clutched each other. Some laughed nervously, or whispered to themselves. Ben felt their eyes on him as he moved toward the gate. He was also aware of the large flower heads, which he imagined had turned slowly to follow him as he stepped up to the gate. The flowers were taller than him. He was acutely aware of them bearing down on him, but there was to be no turning back now. Ben was new in town, and had staked his reputation on this dare, initially because he had thought it so ridiculous to be afraid of flowers. Now he was up close with them, it did not seem so silly. The other children had been right. The flowers were horrible things. To keep from turning heel and running home, Ben tried not to look at them. He placed one hand on the iron gate and pushed. He pushed harder, forcing the gate back against the high grass and brambles that blocked it.

The black flowers grew close together, leaving no path through the garden to the door of the house. Cautiously, at first afraid to touch the thick thorny stems, Ben began to search his way through. On entering the garden, he had been hit by a strong scent, sticky and cloying. Although he didn’t realise, tears had begun to spill from his eyes. Later, had someone asked him to describe that garden, the only thing he could have thought to say was that it was filled with sadness. That would have been the only vocabulary he had at his disposal, but it did little to explain the feeling he had on moving through the place. The flowers, their scent, everything in fact, spoke of a darkness - something cold and wretched and indefinable. Ben’s only impulse, as he picked his way through, was to escape from there, but the further forward he managed to get, the more determined he became to reach the front door and fulfil his dare. All the while the flowers loomed, seeming to lean in toward him, reaching inwards, blocking the sun, enclosing him. He had almost reached the door. He was almost there. Before he arrived, though, he came across a small clearing in the garden. He noted that the earth in the clearing had been freshly dug. Then, at last, with arms and face scratched, and with many a pull in his clothes that his mother would scold him for later, he reached the front door. It was ajar.

Overwhelmed by curiosity, and a sudden courage, but with his heart pounding madly in his chest, Ben reached out a hand to push the door inward. He thought that if a garden could be as wicked as this one, then the house inside must be some kind of hell; and he wanted one quick glimpse of something he could speak about for the rest of his life.

As Ben reached out a hand, the door suddenly drew inward of its own accord. The boy let out a small shriek. He backed up into a nest of thorny stems, which suddenly seemed to close around him, coil, stab and trap. Ben yelled in surprise. The heads of the black flowers drew inwards, blocking the sunlight. Seeing this, Ben screamed. So they are alive! he thought. Before him the door of the house continued to widen. Beyond it, Ben could see the gloomy interior, and in that gloom what looked to be the figure of a man. He began to panic, thrashing against the tangle he was caught in, ripping his skin against the thorny teeth that had sunk into his clothes, pinning him. It seemed the more he struggled and thrashed about, the more trapped he became. His eyes grew wide as the front door creaked open. He heard the children in the street yelling. He heard their feet scatter as they fled. He wanted to shout after them: Help! Get help! But he was frozen with fear, helpless.