THE GARDEN, PART 3: the pivot — TEXT VERSION
[Intro music up, it fades.]
Welcome back to… THE GARDEN.
THE GARDEN is a malleable fiction told in four parts. It is something between a game and a story- details on how to participate in the unfolding of THE GARDEN will be outlined at the end of the chapter, which can also be found on the webpage for THE GARDEN hosted on the CJTR website.
A Note From The Writer:
When I began this project, I approached it how I approach many of my other creative ideas- with the attitude of experiment. It’s an approach I like for a lot of reasons, one of which is the unique opportunity to grow one’s self-awareness.
In this case, I am becoming more and more aware of my voice and style as a writer, in some ways for the very first time. They are not entirely new realizations, but they have become clear to me in a way they were not before I started this project.
All of this is to say: I am learning in real time that I really enjoy writing horror, which became evident to me in the previous episode.
So, with that said, I would like to apologize to anyone who may have felt surprised or had a negative reaction to the tone I have been exploring so far. I would also like to declare for clarity & content warning’s sake that this piece is indeed being written as an experimental form of horror.
Now, for the story.
Last week, we followed the STUDENT as they rallied themselves and chose a path to follow into THE GARDEN. We ended with them encountering an unexpected presence- we’ll now rejoin them as they decide how to respond to the stimulus.
[theme music up. it fades.]
Part 3: THE PIVOT
[the now-familiar sound of the tape recorder clicks on.]
Hi. Good morning.
I’m back at the ravineside where I was the last time I was writing to you, vacillating between Fear and Desire… although I’ve left and been elsewhere in the time since then.
I went… I went to the cabin.
After I wrote you, I laid in my sling feeling like I only had one of two choices: to go and introduce myself to the cabin and whoever was there directly, or turn away and leave it utterly behind.
I didn’t particularly like either option. I stretched out my hands and closed my eyes, and imagined that I could hold both Fear and Desire at the same time.
I first turned to look at Fear. It had been startled by the appearance of the cabin, and had immediately urged me to hide. I thought back to the bridge I’d discovered crossing the river. I’d felt a similar urge to flee away from it as well. And the stone tunnel, too- if I hadn’t already been in mid-transit, would I have shied away from it in the same way, unnerved by its presence? I very likely would have, if I’m completely honest.
I reflected on the pattern- I was feeling some sort of repulsion to this other, human presence that seemed to have established itself here somehow. The vanishing trail markers and the stone campfires at the riverbed hadn’t piqued me in the same way… there was a transient quality to them that seemed different, they were artifacts of a temporary passing rather than permanent structures.
But these other things… they implied… a residence. A rooting.
Someone, it seemed, had made a home here.
The thought filled me with dread. The possibility of it hadn’t occurred to me, hadn’t come up at all in any of the research and investigation I’d put in while trying to learn more about what THE GARDEN… was. What kind of relationship would such a person have with this place? I certainly wasn’t looking to get caught on the short end of someone’s sense of ownership. And what kind of person would even be capable of establishing themselves here? How did they manage to do it? I could only imagine someone operating somewhere outside of the limits of my understanding.
From there, I turned my attention to Desire. It was so curious, so hungry. Part of my whole obsession with this place, of finding it and documenting my experience in it, was to alleviate this sense of… alienation I felt. Like being born out-of-phase with everyone, never really able to settle in or connect properly. A profound loneliness, I guess you could call it. When I’d discovered the possibility of THE GARDEN, I remembered feeling my heart lift and expand with possibility. Not only were there others who shared my experience somehow, but they had also discovered a way to congregate, separate-but-together. A space shared through a flattened sense of time, linked together in a greater continuity.
But, to discover this? A present presence? Delicate plumes of smoke curling up from a stout little chimney, even as I sat and considered it? I felt it ignite something in me almost beyond my control, my heart jackhammering so hard I could hear it. I wanted to know more about whoever it was that was at that cabin. I wanted to draw closer to them, to know what they knew. For… for them to know what I know.
When I held Fear and Desire both equally in my vision, I saw that they were each asking for the same thing. They both needed to know more- Fear demanded it for safety and sanity’s sake, and Desire sought it out for connection and understanding.
So. We all three came into agreement, Fear, Desire and I- I would approach the cabin to satisfy my curiosity and soothe my wariness, but I would stay at arm’s length. I struggled to fall asleep with the slow drip of dreaded anticipation I felt.
The next morning I woke, rinsed my kettle in the ravine, smothered my fire, and gathered my things to go. I felt my stomach twist with anxiousness- I tried to focus on the feeling of my feet on the earth as I walked back along the way I’d arrived. There was a place I’d noticed as I’d come in where the water had run quite shallow with lots of larger rocks that looked crossable — I spotted it after a short way. It was fun, hopping across the rocks, if a little stressful- my body saw the task as a game to play, but I was worried about missing my footing and getting water in my boots.
I kept walking along the ravine until I came back to the spot where I’d first approached it the day before. If I closed my eyes, I could picture the view I’d seen as I’d come up from the tunnel on the little hillside, including the ravine, and the cabin. I did my best to place where I was now on that mental picture, and from make a rough triangulation of where I thought the cabin might be.
When I felt at least reasonably hopeful that I was placing everything accurately, I broke away from the ravine and into the trees. I began to feel very anxious, worried that I’d grossly over- or under- estimated where I was going, but I kept noticing flattened areas in the grass and breaks in the branches here and there. It wasn’t a trail by any stretch, but it was regular enough to follow loosely. And it helped me feel a bit more confident.
I came upon some small clearings here and there, but eventually after a while, I saw a much bigger one. I could see that it had been made in part by cutting down the trees that had been in the area- there were some stumps that were left around the edges of the space, and I could see where some others had been dug up.
And there, at one end, was the cabin.
The cabin itself was small and simple, and beautifully crafted with an eye for detail. It was rectangular, with a door and a window on the side facing me. It was roofed with broad, wooden shingles and a squat little chimney peeked up from behind. The walls were built from whole logs, scraped free of bark and revealing the luminous, honey-brown wood underneath. The cracks had been filled with a dark mud that looked almost black and gave the walls a striped appearance. A neat row of tools had been hung up along one side- a spade and a a broom and an axe, and a surprising variety of saws, amongst other things. The front door was built from flat, wooden slabs and featured a doorhandle carved in the shape of something, though it was a little too far to tell what, exactly. The simple window beside the door was only partially shuttered, but the darkness on the inside hid any detail I might have seen. The smoke I’d seen the day before was mostly gone- there was the barest hint of a hazy shimmer over the top of the chimney that implied something in the fireplace was still kicking off heat, but not actively burning. Things were quiet- it didn’t appear that anyone was around.
The cabin seemed to be in good repair. It was hard to tell how long it had been standing, but regardless it looked like someone cared for it. The roof wasn’t missing any shingles, the chimney stood straight and solid, even the little porch area in front of the door had been swept clean. There was a little covered stand over to the side- it had some split logs for burning. It was nearly empty.
I loitered at the edge of the clearing- there was more for me to learn if I could only get a little closer, but I felt Fear try to keep me at arms’ length. Instead, I looked furtively around me to check that I was alone, and impulsively walked up to the front door.
I surprised myself with how bold I was, all things considered. I peeked in through the partially shuttered window. There was a bare table and a chair with a well-worn blanket draped over it, but everything beyond that was too dark to make out, even when I opened the shutter to let in more light. I returned the shutter to where it was.
I looked at the door. I thought about opening it- I didn’t want to trespass… I just wanted… to see. It felt innocent, but I knew it was intrusive.
My hand hovered over the door handle. It had indeed been carved, in the shape of a serpent eating its tail. It was rendered with a loving hand, smooth and symmetrical, with finely detailed features and a beautiful pattern to the woodgrain brought out by the way it had been carved out of the block.
I took it in my hand- it fit beautifully against my palm, and my thumb came to rest perfectly across the top of the snakes head. I could feel a small, worn-in patch there, gone satiny with use. It was warm, like holding someone’s hand, and I felt… I felt…
I felt an entire world splitting off from me in that moment. I sensed threads of potential futures spin out around me, potential futures that would be unleashed on me, the person I would irrevocably become, if only I would open the door. I realized suddenly that I had my hand on the lid of something I wasn’t quite sure I’d bargained for.
I took my hand off the doorhandle. I pivoted away from the cabin and fell back into the trees.
I thought about my next steps. I felt a little gunshy now, but I still wanted felt compelled to discover more- if there was someone around, it felt like the surest and safest way to find out would be a stakeout. I creeped myself out by the idea- it was one thing to observe a natural phenomenon or a cosmic entity or an unaware animal, even, but this felt like… surveillance.
I decided instead to walk out and around a little bit, see if there was anything else nearby that had been built or left behind by… whoever it was that had been at the cabin. It was maybe a bit of a stretch to assume that all of these little domestic alterations had come from the same source… but it definitely opened up the possibility that there was more here to discover than I had originally assumed.
I kept threading my way through the trees. I decided to cover the area nearby in a rough search pattern, walking along loose arcs radiating out from the clearing in roughly in the same direction I’d been going when I’d found it. There was something quite pleasant about it, despite everything- the sun was bright in the hard, blue sky and the air was crisp and cool. I was uneasy, but well-rested.
I wasn’t sure what I would find, if anything, so I kept my eyes sharp for anything that piqued me. It was… a bit exhausting, actually. I had to go quite slowly- I didn’t want to miss anything, and I also couldn’t shake the wariness I felt. I noticed that I was picking up and placing my feet as softly as possible, trying to avoid making any sound.
I’d made several arcs back and forth when I began to notice a strange, sweet smell in a particular area. At first it had been quite faint, faint enough that that I wasn’t sure if I wasn’t just playing tricks on myself, or smelling something on my own breath maybe. But then it got stronger- something sick and cloying and sticky, somehow. It made my stomach turn every time the wind shifted. After a few more arcs, I noticed that there seemed to be another clearing nearby in the same area… or at the very least there was some visible shift. The light was coming in differently, but it was hard to qualify. I cut away from my search pattern and walked closer to it.
As I approached, the growth around me began to change- there were still the tall, straight trunks of the trees, but they were fewer in number. The bushes, though, started to cover the ground underneath them quite thickly. They were fruiting prolifically- or at least they had been… all the berries they’d produced during the growing season had fallen. The grass I was walking on was thick with them, and I began leaving gory, purple footprints behind me as I inadvertently crushed them under my boots. Now, I’d noticed some other fruiting bushes here and there as I’d walked into THE GARDEN, but not anything like this.
The smell grew stronger. I tied my scarf up and around my nose and mouth, and just tried my best to breathe shallowly and not think about it too much.
The area I thought might be a clearing, wasn’t. At least, not exactly. There were trees growing there, yes, but they weren’t the same as the tall, mature trees in the rest of the area. These were much smaller, with trunks that only went up a few feet before splitting into thick branches sprawling all over like tentacles, some lined with long thorny spikes. They were growing in perfect, concentric circles- planted that way, it would seem.
The source of the smell became apparent- the ground was littered with fruit, an entire harvest’s worth piled underneath the trees. It reeked, slimy with rot. There was a mix- some of the fruit was red and plumlike, some of it a sour yellow colour. There was a plummy one near me that seemed to have fallen onlyy recently- it was still whole, and its flesh hadn’t started to disintegrate just yet.
I picked it up gingerly. it was heavy for its size, and the skin felt thin and fragile. I set it on a small rock nearby, and I got my knife out from its sheath on my belt.
I cut into the fruit, holding it with the edges of my fingertips and slowly pressing the knife edge in. It burst with a dark red liquid, transparent and syrupy. I tried to not let any of it get on my hands, but it was messy business.
I felt the knife blade scrape on something- like a pit, but much harder. I twisted the knife and carefully pried the fruit open, pulling the soft, veined flesh away from the center.
It was… a stone. It was about half an inch in diameter, dark in colour with little spots of transparent crystal embedded into it. I dug it out from the destroyed remains of the fruit, set it aside, and rinsed it off with a bit of water from my waterskin. I got up and found a yellow fruit that was similarly intact and did the same thing, yielding six little pebbles of varying colours. I sat and turned my foot over- I poked the tip of my knife into a half-squashed berry that had been caught in the tread of my boot and smeared it open- in amongst all the bruisey purple there were the tiniest little stone fragments, like grains of sand.
I gathered the little stones up in my hand and placed them in my shirt breast pocket.
I walked a little bit further into the trees, though I didn’t particularly like it- I had to pick my way through all the rot on the ground to avoid the worst of it, and the smell was unbearable. If I stood still very quietly it was too easy to imagine that I could hear the slip and churn of organic matter decomposing… but I was curious to see what was at the center of this horrible, rotting mandala of a grove.
After a short way, I saw it- there was a small, open space in the center of the innermost ring of trees. There was less decay on the ground here- the trees still had most of their fruit and leaves still on the branches, and the grass seemed a little greener as well.
In the middle of this space there was a medallion of bare earth worn into the ground, about ten paces in diameter. It was packed smooth and even, with a perfectly circular edge. It was ringed with an impressive growth of fungus- bright white mushrooms, wide and round. Each one looked like its own little character- a whole community of witnesses presiding over a palace of rot. There was a mark upon the ground in the middle- an angular symbol, blackened with charcoal. it consisted of a long upright line, with two angled brackets wrapping around it like an ‘X’. It looked like a barb on a wire fenceline- a powerful warding symbol.
I immediately got the hint. I allowed myself a few more moments to look at it with silence and respect, committing it to memory before turning around and walking back out the way I’d come. And I was certainly more than happy to leave the smell behind, though it felt like it was stuck in my nostrils, making me feel sick all over again anytime I breathed too quickly or sharply.
I’ll pause here for a moment- I need… I think I need a moment before I continue. I’ll be back shortly, with the rest.
[tape recorder clicks off]
INTERMISSION/AD BREAK
[theme music up, it fades.]
Welcome back to THE GARDEN.
[tape recorder clicks back on.]
Hi.
I’m back now, from my… moment.
A big breath.
I’d been telling you about the horrible grove I’d discovered while searching near the cabin, and the mysterious symbol I saw at the center of it.
I returned roughly to the spot where I’d been in my search, and continued on looping arc pattern. I altered it a bit so I could avoid passing through the orchard again cover a bit more ground, but I didn’t see anything else. The sun began to dip as the day wore on, so I turned to go back to the clearing with the cabin.
The question of whether or not to stakeout the cabin had weighed on my mind throughout the afternoon, and seeing that mark at the center of the grove hadn’t done anything to make me feel more comfortable with it. But when I got back to the edge of the clearing, I noticed the shimmer above the chimney was gone- whatever fire that had been burning in there had now gone completely out.
I looked at the cabin. I could feel myself making a face out of concentration. With night falling, it seemed like this would be the most likely time to spot whoever was here. If they’d been out during the day, then surely they’d be back soon, if they weren’t already. And if they were, I might be able to spot them if they came out to do something like get more wood for their now-extinguised fire. At the very least, I’d be able to see if they re-lit it. And I’d come all this way, it seemed wasteful to not at least try. I shrugged off my pack and dug out a safety line, as well as my climbing straps and toepicks.
I decided to set myself up in a tree a little ways back from the edge of the clearing- it was harder to get a clear sightline to the cabin, but that was both a benefit & a drawback. I’d picked one that was not quite as lofty as the others, with branches that started a little bit lower to the ground.
I made myself a quick hip harness from one end of the safety line, and coiled the rest and tucked it into my belt. I clipped into my toepicks and wrapped the straps around the tree, buckling them to the ends that went around my body across my back. There were a couple of hand loops to hold onto while climbing, but I could otherwise rest by leaning backwards, letting the straps support my weight.
I shimmied the straps a little ways up the tree, then stepped one foot up by kicking the toepick straight into the trunk. The frame of the pick ran all the way underneath my boot, so once it was set into the tree correctly I could settle some of my weight onto it. I brought my other foot up to do the same, then shimmied the strap a little further up to repeat the motion. I climbed until I reached the first branches, about twenty feet or so above the ground- I unstrapped one strap, passed it over the branches and re-strapped it around the trunk, then repeated the same for the other one. I leaned back into them as I carefully slid my pack from my shoulders and dug out my sling.
The branches of the tree were spaced in loose layers of three, although the overall pattern was a spiral with each branch a little higher up than the previous one in its layer. I climbed up to the second layer of branches, a few feet further up, and tossed the free end of the safety line around the trunk to tie it off- falling would still be a dangerous experience best avoided, but at least the line would hopefully prevent it from being outright catastrophic. I shuffled over to one of the branches and sat astride it, facing outward. I unstrapped myself from the trunk and felt a sudden kick of adrenaline- I took a deep breath to keep my composure, reminded myself of my safety line, and kept my focus on my hands.
I took the line from one end of my sling and tied it off around the branch I was sat on, leaning forward a little bit so the sling would sit far enough out that it would hang free from the trunk. I gathered up the line from the other end of the sling and I restrapped myself to the tree, feeling my body soften in relief. I turned myself back around and shuffled over to the next branch over, repeating the whole thing to tie off the other end.
I turned back around and took climbing straps in hand, but I didn’t restrap myself to the tree. Instead, I left them in large loops around the trunk, gathered them up in my hands as I shuffled back in between the two branches and used them to myself butt-first into the hammock. I transferred my weight gingerly- if something was going to give, I didn’t want to find out after I’d already let go. The branches shifted a little bit with my bodyweight but they seemed otherwise solid, as did my knots. I had a little moment to myself over that- I mean, you know I’m no real arborist, but I think you would have been proud of my work. It was very… tidy. I felt secure in them, which was nice.
Once I let the sling take my full weight I dropped the straps and let them fall against the tree trunk. I retracted the toepicks into their frames and slipped on some bootcovers I kept folded in a little pocket on the inside of my sling. I took off my pack and clipped it to the sling line.
I brought my feet up and into the sling and snuggled in, peeking my head up to peer back towards the clearing.
The cabin was almost in my sightline, but not quite. I carefully turned myself around in my sling to get a better angle from the other side- it helped put most of it into view, but I still had to stretch my neck out a bit if I wanted to see the front door.
I dug into my pack and got out something to eat, then laid back into the sling. I kept my eyes on the cabin as I ate, but there wasn’t any movement. Dusk was quite settled in at that point- I endeavoured to keep watch until it became too dark to see, but it really didn’t take that long. And I didn’t see anything- the chimney remained dormant, and there was no light or movement to suggest anything other than a vacant building.
Once night had truly fallen, I relaxed back into my sling. I tucked myself into my sleeping wrap and opened my awareness to all sounds of the trees and bushes and creatures around me. I told myself that I was keeping my ear out for any unusual sounds- I promised myself that the instant I heard anything out of place, I’d shoot up and look to see what was there… but the movement of the tree rocked my swing ever so gently, and all the sounds around me threaded together into a beautiful nocturne. I closed my eyes. I tried not to fall asleep.
I fell asleep.
I woke up, the next morning.
At first I’d forgotten where I was, or at least where I’d strung up my sling. I felt the knots in my hip harness dig in where I’d been sleeping on them all night, then I remembered. I took a careful look out over the edge of my sling- it seemed like a much longer way down than it had before.
I laid there, trying to figure out how long it would take for me to climb out of the tree so I could go to the bathroom when I had a sudden thought of the cabin. I shot my head out to look at it.
The strange symbol I’d seen in the middle of the grove of had suddenly appeared, larger than life, taking up the entire panel of the front door. It was dark with charcoal, or had possibly been burned into the door directly, it was hard to tell. The little wood stand by the cabin had been refilled with split logs, and there was a fluffy burst of smoke coming from the chimney in a steady stream. I could smell it, actually- homey and familiar. The shutter over the window had been wedged shut, and the doorhandle seemed to have been removed entirely.
I felt something in me suddenly just drain out, completely. I’m not sure what it was, but I felt awful after. Sunken. Ashamed, too. I’d been caught out, and warded off. I’d only wanted to get to know this presence better, but I felt that I’d deserved the rejection.
I. .. I dunno. I’d gotten carried away with myself, I supposed, as I tend to do. Come on too strong, or not in the right way. It was like trying build a route using conflicting maps- there was an earnest part of me that meant well and did their best with what they thought they knew, but… it seemed to always miss the mark.
I felt… I felt that familiar, despairing, alien loneliness wrap its tender arms around me, just a little bit. Even here, in THE GARDEN, it refused to be left behind.
I began the awkward process of restrapping myself to the trunk, untying the sling, and extricating myself from the tree. Once I was down, I shucked off my toepicks and quickly gathered everything back into its place in my pack. I took off through the trees back towards the ravine- I all but turned my tail and ran.
I didn’t rest until I was back at the place by the ravine where I’d spent the night after emerging from the tunnel. I was out of breath and miserable. I allowed myself the luxury of laying and wallowing in my own emotional miasma. I was ravenous, too, which didn’t help. I got up after a short while and built a fire, took my kettle down to the ravine and put on water to boil. I took some deep breaths. Like when I’d been tying the sling, I tried to keep my focus on my hands as they built the fire, gathered water, prepared a meal. It helped keep the intensity of my internal thought combustion at a manageable level- I’d been so affected by my experience with the cabin.
I spent the rest of that morning writing, integrating what I’d experienced in the time since I’d left this spot at the ravine. The cabin, the grove, the symbol. The decay, and infertile seeds and Fear and Desire chasing around themselves into knots.
It occurred to me as I sat beside my little mid-morning fire, eating my porridgey meal that I’d… derailed myself, somehow. I’d gotten myself so distracted and caught up in the prospect of the cabin that I’d sort of lost sight of where I was going, what I was doing. Not that I knew, exactly, where or what that was, but at least I’d had some feeling of alignment about it.
And now I just felt sort of lost. Upended like a cart, with all of its parcels spilled out.
I cast my mind back, way, way back, like following a bright thread back through a labyrinth. back past the cabin, past the tunnel and the groaning tree, past the path with the snake and the riverbed and the field and the crest, past through the shadow and back into the world I’d come from. I was trying to go back to where I’d been when I’d felt that first real pull that told me that this, here, THE GARDEN, was the place to come for the thing I’d been seeking.
I closed my eyes and tried to remember.
I’d already been piqued by the mystery of THE GARDEN- I had come across it while searching for something entirely different, but once I knew of it it had become almost an obsession. But it was something to ponder over or puzzle out theoretically, not investigate so literally.
But then… I’d found something that alluded to a gate. A physical gate. And travellers, too- nothing definitive, but an accounting of some who it was suspected had somehow gone into THE GARDEN and been… sublimated, somehow. No one was really sure of their whereabouts.
I’d so wanted to join them. Join their ranks. Fling myself out onto the bleeding edge of the unknown and see what lives out there. I’d already felt so untethered from the narrow reality of the world I was in, and I’d been so, so, so hungry for… anything. For a sense of broadening, or deepening. I desired complexity. I yearned for chaos.
I took a deep breath in, and out. I’d come here to investigate the heart inside THE GARDEN, the thing that made it beat and thrive and grow. The thing that drove the cycle of change, made the wheel of time and experience roll over, and over, and over and over again.
I sat and watched the fire burn for a long while. I felt scooped out and weary, but I was realigned in a way that I hadn’t been since I’d first seen that little curl of smoke coming from the cabin chimney.
I kept thinking back to the grove, with fruit filled with stones instead of seeds. There was something about it that broke my heart completely open. A tree producing fruit, but for what purpose? Like a path, ending abruptly, travelling nowhere. Pointless. And I thought about the rot- it had been so heinous when I’d seen it. But, how would it look a week from now? A month? How would its smells change? It was likely to be winter here soon so it would be in a frozen stasis for a while, but what about during the next growing season? I wondered how long it would take until the entire mass of flesh had been taken back into the ground, reabsorbed and transformed into a new medium. Would the soil be darker, richer after? What thriving things would it support, that it hadn’t been able to before?
For a moment, I saw in my mind’s eye the whole cycle of the grove- the growth, the blossoming and fruiting, the falling, the rotting. The decomposition of death back into the soil and the sprouting of life from out from it over and over and over again, until eventually, one by one, the trees turned grey and brittle, bringing a sense of silence to the grove that had nothing to do with sound.
I felt a slow burn of thrill and dread light up somewhere deep, deep in my heart.
I let the fire burn itself out. The sun felt warm and lovely, and the air was cool. I doused the coals with water from the ravine- I gazed up at the magnificent cloud of ash and steam that erupted from it. Something about it was so indulgent, compared to how small I’d tried to make my presence before.
I set off along the ravine, away from the direction of the cabin. I knew roughly what I wanted to do next, but I needed the right spot for it. I wasn’t sure exactly what it would look like… but felt certain I would recognize it if it presented itself.
The walk along the ravine was so pleasant. There wasn’t a path as such, but it seemed to run low, leaving a nice flat area along the side with short, scrubby grass. I was moving with a sense of ease that I hadn’t really felt since I’d first come into THE GARDEN- since I’d first departed to search for the gate, actually. Maybe I’d just become saturated on all the bizarre experiences I’d been having. Maybe I was overtired, or over-isolated or dissociative, but I just felt… carefree. I breathed in THE GARDEN with big, big breaths, looking with a soft wonder at every little rock and tree that greeted me with its presence as I walked by. I felt stoned on it, almost. Blissful, in a foolish way.
I walked for quite a while, although I honestly couldn’t tell you how accurate my memory of the moment was. I could have walked one kilometer. Or ten. What might have been hours felt like minutes. Felt like eternity.
Ultimately, though, it doesn’t matter. Because there came a point when I stopped.
I’d come to a right place.
It was just off from where I’d been walking a little way- there was a small rise out of the ravine before the land continued on in a large, flat stretch. It was wooded here and there, but there was plenty of empty, grassy space.
There was a ring towards the edge of a nearby field, very close to a small grouping of trees with thin, papery bark. It was made of little white bubbles, broken in places here and there by their irregular placement.
Fungus. Like the medallion at the grove.
I went and sat at the edge of it. I put my attention on each little mushroom in turn- they were such wonderful little things. I wondered what it was, deep in the soil, that had fed them until they were all able to spring up out of the grass to commune with one another, separate members of the same body, gathered around in a circle. I wrote, and wrote, and wrote, everything I’ve shared with you here, and the sun shifted the shadows across and over, lengthened them until they seemed unreal.
As dusk settled on me again, I dug out my knife. It wasn’t the best tool for the task, but it was what I had.
I removed my pack and my boots and took the knife in my hand. I stepped, lightly and carefully, over the fungus ring. I placed the bare soles of my feet in the long, green-golden grass, then knelt onto my knees. I bowed myself all the way down in reverence and thanks. I kissed the earth and breathed it in, warm and dark. I held the knife in my palm, and flipped it open.
I pressed the blade into the earth. I pried chunks of it away, cut into them to break them apart. I dug my hands into the dirt and crumbled it between my fingers until the area inside the circle was covered in a layer of loosened soil.
I stood in the center. I pocketed my knife.
I reached into my breast pocket and pulled out the seven little stones I’d taken from the fruit in the grove. I rolled them over in my palm- there wasn’t anything particularly extraordinary about them, but they had a smoothness and uniformity to them that was very pleasing.
I stood in the center of the circle. I rememberednand the large stones set into the hillside that had beckoned me up and forward when I’d first come into THE GARDEN, welcoming me into the fullness of it. I pressed the pebbles into the earth- loosely following the same Pleides shape they’d reminded me of.
Which brings me here, to the present moment. I’m just sat outside the circle again, looking at my foot prints and the little divots left by my fingers. I haven’t yet completed whatever this… ritual is, but once I do, I’m not sure what will come of it. So I wanted to finish this, a least- as much as I’m able to.
A beat, a breath.
This is where I have been led, and this is from where I must depart.
I’ll… I’m not sure what happens next. If there’s a way for me to reach out for you, I’ll find it.
I wish you could hear me say this to you for real and in person,
but this will do. It will have to do.
I hope you thrive, and grow, and feel the sun cherish you as it shines on your face. There was… there was so much more that I was hoping for, but it’s so beside the point, now. I hope there’s peace to be found for both of us.
I miss you. and I love you.
[There’s a breath, like she’s about to say more. She doesn’t.]
Goodbye. Goodnight.
[Tape recorder clicks off.]
[Tape recorder clicks back on.]
[we hear the STUDENT sing a short hymn- there are no words, just a simple, chanting melody. it repeats and repeats. sometimes it is sung on voice, sometimes it is whispered, sometimes it is hummed. There are points were it wobbles, points with it shines with brightness and strength and clarity.
Eventually, we hear the tone of it change- it becomes muffled, quieter. Like the STUDENTS face is covered by something.
it keeps repeating, fading, becoming weaker.
it stops. silence runs on the tape.
The tape recorder clicks off.]
Hi. This is V- I’m the writer.
For those of you who are listening to the story as it unfolds, I now offer you the opportunity to respond to THE STUDENT as part of the DIVINE COLLECTIVE. I have opened three digital portals- two in the form of social media accounts, and one in the form of an email address. The social media accounts will each have a post to correlate with this installment of the story- If you have some response that you would like the STUDENT to receive as they depart from THE GARDEN, please place it with that post. Or, you may message the email address directly.
The portals are as follows:
thegarden.cjtr on instagram
thegarden_cjtr on twitter
Your responses may be as direct or as abstract as you choose- be bold, be tender, be weird. just don’t be disrespectful or abusive. I will gather the collective’s input for 48 hours after broadcast, then I will integrate it.
Once again, thank you for listening.
See you next time as we resolve this iteration of THE GARDEN.
[theme music comes up, it fades.
