Overgrown Garden by Carmen Schaller

Inspired by “overgrown garden”, a song by beetlebug

 

You found me behind the fountain, just an earth-colored girl with moss behind my ears. The seeds in my heart were dormant. They had never seen the sun, never tasted tears until you appeared like an angel, your smudged face lighter than anything I had ever seen. You were so alive, more alive than the vines and trees that were my old friends. I never even knew I could breathe until you taught me how. Suddenly, the world burst open, and there were a hundred million possibilities. Summer was young back then, and we lived each day like it would last forever. We took our time.

Your smile was the sun, and the wildflowers in my hair bloomed under your gaze. Your soft, green eyes pined upward at the candy-sweet fruit that grew just out of reach, and the roots in my veins ached to satiate your hunger. Everything you were, I desired. Everything you desired, I longed to be. Your soul was brighter and more beautiful than the carnations that flowered and died again and again as you came and went. When you were gone, my chest ached and throbbed. You were everything.

One day, you came to the garden with glazed eyes and a name on your lips. Tiny sprouts burst through my skin when I saw you, but I forgot the pain when you called out to me. Then, oh, then you looked straight through me. You were miles away, dreaming of a human girl with skin as fair as yours and hair that fell, tame and clean, only to her shoulders. My carnations died once again, and the pain in my chest felt like a knife through my heart. You told me how her eyes were full of stars, but I knew that she could never shine like you. She was only a human girl who burned in the sun and bore not a trace of the earth. My head filled with bitter sap. You left that night floating on a dream, leaving me in empty darkness.

Day after day, you came back, but I felt like a weed in your garden of hopes. I could never make you love me as I was. You used to tell me that I was beautiful, but I could no longer believe that you admired my copper skin and long, tangled hair. The pain in my chest grew and grew, and I never felt your sunshine anymore. Your smiles were not meant for me. I hated this human girl. I disdained her. But more than anything, I envied her.

It was on a hazy afternoon that I did it. You didn’t come that day, and I lay by the fountain for hours, wondering if you had forgotten me. It was the first time I had ever cried. I wasn’t even sure that I could. You had never shown me how. I climbed into the fountain, letting the drops rain from my eyes and salt the shimmering water. I pushed my head under the surface and began to wash my hair - another thing I had thought impossible. I dug my fingers into my hair, tearing the flowers out by the roots. The water clouded up with dirt and sap. For hours, I worked my hands through the mass of hair until every trace of flora had been removed. In one hand, I clutched a small knife which I had made out of sharp stones and thorns. Without a thought of regret, I sawed off my crown of curls until there was only enough to touch my shoulders. It hurt. Wilting flowers and vines floated all around me, ripped from the garden of my head. The scent of lavender rose from my raw scalp, and with a jolt, I realized that it was the smell of my own blood. I clambered out of the fountain, suddenly dizzy and sick, and collapsed on the ground.

Your voice woke me. You were at the gate, calling and calling for me. Dawn was just beginning to fill the sky. I got up and ran to you, anticipating a gasp of awe and admiration. What would you think now that I was clean and void of earth’s kisses? Surely you would love me if I was human.

And then I saw you.

Crying may have seemed impossible before, but now it was the only reality. Your beautiful face was streaked, and your hair was tangled and messy. You fell to your knees, and the world shattered. “She hates me,” you cried. “She never wants to see me again. She’s never coming back.”

I should have felt satisfied. I should have been happy that she would never have you. Instead, I found myself sobbing almost as hard as you were. I couldn’t be happy - not when your world was falling apart. I knelt beside you, held you, cried all over you. We toppled over and lay there, two broken hearts, spilling over one another in wave after wave of grief. The pain in my chest was unbearable, but I could feel you more than ever. If I had known what it meant, I would have called it bittersweet, but you didn’t teach me that word until weeks of dull-eyed looks and quiet company had passed. It was on a much brighter morning that I finally saw peace in your countenance.

“Bittersweet,” you explained, “It means happy and sad, all at once. Sad that I’ll never see her again, and happy that I finally realized.”

“Realized what?” I asked breathlessly. It had been so, so long since you looked at me that way. I had almost forgotten what joy tasted like. Around us, crimson rhododendrons blazed in the sleepy air, but my eyes were fixed on your face. Almost trembling, I reached out and brushed a few stray curls away from your eyes. You caught my hand before I could pull it away and held it in yours. A shiver went up my spine, and the warmth of your stem-colored eyes seeped into mine.

You didn’t answer. You simply leaned closer until your lips brushed the slope of my copper neck. A tingling sensation covered my body. Sprouts once more broke through the skin on my shoulders as vines crept up my legs. When you leaned back, you opened your hand and laughed your soft, whispery laugh. I looked down. You still held my hand in yours, but mine had sprouted dozens of blooming buttercups all over. Embarrassed, I tried once again to pull it away, but you held on until you could plant a kiss on my mossy knuckles.

I thought that that was the most perfect day that would ever occur.

And then, three days later, the world smiled on me again.

We were sitting in the shade of a marigold patch, breathing in the pollen-tainted air. The leaves in my hair were growing back, and the vines winding around my legs were covered in bright purple clematis blooms. You were just barely close enough for your shoulder to bump against mine whenever you shifted. I basked in the glow of every touch. You had laid a bouquet of plucked flowers in your lap, and you played idly with the stems.

“What happened to your hair?” you asked without looking up. I had almost forgotten what I had done to my curls in that fountain. It felt like ages ago. I reached up and felt it falling to my shoulders.

“I cut it,” I answered, blushing. This got your attention. You looked up with a curious twist in your brows.

“Why?” you asked simply.

I opened my mouth to reply, but found that I had no words. My vision blurred as something grew through my skin. I sat in silence for a moment, dimly recognizing that they were thorns - sprouting from my temple, my ankles and my knees. Finally, I pushed a reply through my scratchy throat.

“I thought you forgot about me,” I murmured. You nodded gently as if you understood everything that was going through my head.

You reached out and cupped my chin in one hand, tipping my face until I met your gaze. With the other hand, you raised the marigolds from your lap, and I saw that your work with the stems had not been idle. You had fashioned them into a crown, full and golden and beautiful, and you placed it on my head, where it rested as perfectly as if it were made for me. Then, I realized - it was. The tears spilled out of my eyes, but it was not sorrow that rested in my chest, rather a warm sensation that enveloped me as your hands drifted down and rested in the clovers on either side of my neck.

“I’m never gonna leave you,” you said, wiping away the tears that ran down my face as daisies and bluebells blossomed between your fingers. “I love you. And I would do anything for you.”

“Anything?” My voice was little more than a whisper. Your face was inches from mine.

“Anything at all,” you promised, and suddenly, I was made of light. As my eyes drifted closed, all I could feel was your lips on mine. When we parted, my entire body was once again tingling. I looked at you in utter amazement. You started to smile back, but a slight gasp of pain caught in your throat. We both looked down to see the thorns from my ankles stretching out to wrap around yours as well. Red dripped down onto the grass.

“I’m sorry,” I muttered as I tried to unwind them.

“It’s okay,” you said, pulling your feet free. “It’s just you.”

You had found me by the fountain and made me as alive as yourself, and I finally believed it when you looked back at me and said, “You’re beautiful.”

That was truly the most perfect memory I have.

Now, I’m lying near the fountain. I’ve finally discovered the source of the pain in my chest whenever you’re gone. The flowers in my hair and the vines covering my legs have withered away, but there’s a willow tree growing through my heart. It’s been there since the beginning, but now that I’ve seen your sunshine and watered it with my tears, it’s grown surprisingly quickly. I can’t move anymore, but I can still see the sky between the leaves overhead.

I remember falling asleep by your side one day, but when I woke up, you were gone. I’ve lost count of the sunsets that have passed since you left me. I can’t cry anymore, and I forgot how to breathe now that you’re not here to remind me. I think my hair has started to grow back, despite the death of its leaves. Sometimes I wish I had never cut it; other times, I wish I had the strength to move so that I could cut it again.

Day after day, I think about you, though the sadness only makes the roots in my chest spread faster. I remember the taste of your kiss, and I imagine you coming back and lying down next to me in the shade of my willow tree. I would ask you if you remembered that day, and you would smile and say, “Bittersweet”, and my heart would heal. Perhaps that’s why you left me - because your heart hadn’t healed. Perhaps you thought you were ready to forget your human girl. Perhaps you found out you were wrong. Perhaps it was pain, and not apathy, that chased you away from me.

I wonder if you’re okay.