The Garden

by Amy Sparling

  I snort. “No. That website is stupid.”

  “Is everything okay?” he asks, falling into step with me.

  “Why would I answer you? We’re not friends, remember?” I look over at him and see the hurt in his eyes. It feels good to know I caused that pain. He’s certainly caused me enough of it.

  “I’m sorry,” he says. “I really am. But I’m not sure what to do. I like you, Sophia.”

  His voice hitches on that last bit. He swallows. “If we weren’t at this stupid school, I’d be around you all the time. I’d ask you out. I’d do whatever it takes to get your attention.”

  My heart lodges in my throat. No one has ever talked to me like that before. “Why are you telling me this?” I say, my voice so quiet I barely hear it.

  “Because it’s true.” Declan lets out a frustrated sigh and meets my gaze. “I really like you. But Chad Stokes could ruin my life.”

  “So maybe you should stay away from me,” I say, swallowing the lump in my throat.

  “I don’t want to.”

  “I don’t want you to, either, but I also don’t want that dude ruining your life. What does he have over you, anyway?”

  “It’s not about me,” he says, glancing around as if he’s afraid someone will overhear. But the nearest students are a good two minutes ahead of us on the sidewalk. “It’s about you, actually.”

  “What does that mean?”

  He shrugs. “He hates you. Like… as much as you can hate someone.”

  “But why? I don’t even know him.”

  A cool breeze carries the scent of Declan’s cologne toward me. I look over at him, feeling the attraction grow no matter how much I don’t want it to.

  “He made it seem like you do.”

  I frown. “Do you have a picture of him?”

  Declan takes out his phone and looks up Chad Stokes on Night Watch. I stare at his photo for a minute, the boring face seeming vaguely familiar the longer I look at it.

  And then it hits me.

  I remember.

  “Oh… no…”

  “What?” Declan says.

  I curse under my breath. “Yeah, I know him. And I know why he hates me.”

  Curiosity swims in Declan’s ocean blue eyes but he doesn’t ask me to clarify. Maybe he’s scared to.

  “His dad does business in California,” I explain. “He used to show up at parties when we were sixteen and try to hook up with girls, but none of my friends wanted him. He was just so…desperate. It was gross.”

  “He hates you because you rejected him?” Declan asks.

  “Nope. He hates me because I caught him slipping a roofie into my friend’s drink. He turned into a total crybaby. He swore he had never done that before and it was his first time. He apologized and cried and offered me anything I wanted to keep my mouth shut, so I lied and told him I wouldn’t say anything. But then I went straight to the police and he was arrested.”

  “No way.” Declan’s eyebrows disappear underneath his hair.

  I nod. “His daddy had to pay a crap ton of money to cover the whole thing up and get his record sealed. Shelfbrooke totally would have kicked him out of this school if they knew.”

  “Wow.”

  “I guess he heard I was coming here and wanted to make sure I didn’t tell anyone about his shady past, but the joke is on him because I didn’t even know he went here. I just wanted to get through senior year without any drama.”

  Declan’s hand lightly brushes against mine, our fingers interlocking for a brief moment. “I’m sorry.”

  “You should go.” I pull my hand away from his, not because I want to, but because I can’t stand the idea of Chad Stokes doing anything to hurt him or his job in the gardens. “Maybe we can hang out later,” I say. “Like… secretly?”

  He smiles. “I’d really like that.”

  “Cool. And maybe you could tell me more about that necklace.”

  He reaches up and grabs the pendant around his neck. “What about it?”

  “Is there anything else with that symbol on it?” I ask.

  His eyes widen. “No,” he says, a little rude. “Whatever rumor you’ve heard, it’s not true.”

  “Okay, well now I’m intrigued,” I say with a smile. “What rumors are we talking about?”

  He eyes me suspiciously. “Have you heard one?”

  “No.” And it’s not a lie, because I haven’t heard anything.

  He doesn’t look like he believes me. “You’ve been reading those history books on the school. You want to know about the secret door, don’t you?”

  My heart stops. “Do you have the key?”

  He rolls his eyes. “You’re the smartest girl I know. I can’t believe you’re falling for these stupid lies.”

  “What lies?” I say. “The secret door is real.”

  “No, it isn’t. Every few weeks, someone hears some stupid rumor and they come to me wanting the Moss family crest to be the answer to the rumors. There is no door, Sophia.”

  I start to object, to tell him that there is a door, that I’ve seen it, but we’re at Kellylynch Hall now.

  “Just drop it,” he says softly. “There is no door. There is no key. We can be friends but not if you only want me for something that doesn’t exist.”

  Chapter Fifteen

  Now that I know the key is a real thing, the garden consumes me. Declan so much as admitted it when he said there is no key. He was clearly lying. But it’s hard to get more information from him because I’m trying to stay away from him.

  Not because we’re enemies, but because we’re friends. I also did some digging on this Chad Stokes guy and he’s bad news. His dad is the person who gets involved in political scandals and suddenly the politician everyone was mad at disappears. If he can do that to a high profile person, I shudder to think of what he’d do to Declan, a regular high school kid with no famous family. He could ruin his life.

  So I stay away.

  Declan and I exchange small smiles in class, but only if no one is looking. Sometimes we say hello if we pass each other on campus. But every time he tries to talk to me, I say no. I whisper, “I don’t want you in trouble.”

  It is totally my luck that the one time I did something not selfish by reporting Chad two years ago, my good deed came back to ruin my high school experience. But I can’t fret over it now. All I truly care about is finding that key and getting into the garden. Even my crush on Declan takes a backseat while I obsess over trying to find it.

  Two weeks pass. I sit through class each day, desperate for the bell to ring so I can walk back out to the garden and look for the key. I’ve started thinking that maybe the key is hidden somewhere near the garden door. If the door is hidden, then maybe the key is, too. It only makes sense.

  But as the days drag on and I still haven’t found anything, I start getting worried that maybe the key is hidden somewhere else. These gardens are huge. Maybe it’s hanging on a hook on a wall that’s been covered with decades of vine growth. It’s only three months until graduation. I’ll never find it at this rate.

  And then I’ll never get to bring Belle to the garden. She’ll never start to overcome her anxieties.

  It’ll all be because I can’t find this hidden key.

  Frustrated with another day of wandering around the garden until the sun sets, I start to make my way back to the dorm. I’ve been here so often that I know these pathways now. I can get to the hidden door five different ways. Even in the dark, I can make my way back without needing a flashlight.

  Yet I can’t find the key.

  Disappointment floods through me as I slowly walk back to the dorm. It’s just after seven, and I wish the sun didn’t set so early so I’d have more time to search. I thought about bringing a flashlight, but I don’t want to draw attention to myself. I’ve learned that the students don’t tend to wander very far into the gardens, probably because they’re afraid they’ll get lost. Once I get deep enough in the maze of beautiful greenery, I don�
�t have to worry about running into anyone. Bringing a flashlight might change that, though. I don’t want to draw any attention to myself or to the hidden garden door.

  I stop by the dining hall and grab dinner to go. I text Belle asking what she wants to eat, but she doesn’t reply. After a few minutes of waiting around, I decide to grab her the same thing I’m getting myself, which is pasta alfredo with garlic bread and a side salad.

  My hands are full as I make my way down the hallway to our dorm, so I kick at the bottom of the door with my foot instead of knocking. “Belle? It’s me.”

  I wait a few seconds, but she doesn’t answer the door. “Belle?”

  Maybe she’s in the shower, which would explain why she never answered my text. I set the bags of food on the floor and reach for my key. As soon as the door opens, Belle calls out my name.

  “Finally!” she says. “Oh my God, it hurts so much. I’m so glad you’re home.”

  “What’s going on?” I say, rushing inside, the food forgotten on the floor. The dorm room is a mess. Belle is sprawled on the floor near her bed, hunched over her ankle. A stepladder is also on the floor, tipped sideways, as well as a container that used to hold thumbtacks. Now the thumbtacks are scattered all over the floor, like tiny little landmines.

  On her bed, a strand of clear twinkly lights blink and glow, half thumb-tacked to the wall, and half dangling on the bed.

  I slide my foot across the floor, clearing a pathway out of the thumbtacks so I can get to my cousin.

  “Are you okay?”

  She draws in a ragged breath and nods. “It’s my ankle. I think it might be broken.”

  “Oh God.” I drop to my knees and look at her foot. Her skin is pale and swollen, her ankle now the size of a softball.

  “Can you move it?”

  She wiggles her toes. “Kind of. It hurts really bad.”

  I look around. “Let me guess. You were standing on a stepladder on top of your mattress trying to hang twinkly lights on the wall?

  She looks chagrined as she nods. “I just wanted them way up high, so I stood on the stepladder.”

  “A stepladder on a mattress is not a good idea.”

  “Trust me, I know that now.”

  She sighs and looks back at her ankle. “I’ve been here for about two hours. My phone is over there and I didn’t have the energy to get it. I just kept waiting for you to get home.”

  “Belle, I’m so sorry.” I sweep my arms out, trying to round up as many thumbtacks as I can. Before either one of us moves around too much, this floor needs to be cleaned.

  “What’d you leave outside?” she asks.

  “Oh crap, the food.” I rush back and get it, grateful that I’d piled all our food containers into a plastic bag for the walk home. Sometimes I just carry them without a bag, but I’m not sure I’d want to eat food that had been on the floor without the extra layer of protection. “You hungry?”

  She nods, and then winces again.

  After the thumbtacks are cleaned up, I sit on the floor with my cousin and we eat dinner. I try to examine her ankle, even though I’m nowhere near being a doctor, so I don’t know what I’m looking at. The swelling is only getting worse, and now her skin is a little bruised. She’s able to get up with my help, but she can’t put any weight on her foot.

  “Belle…” I say, as I help her sit on her bed. Tears stream down her cheeks. “I think you need a doctor.”

  “No, I’m fine.”

  I give her a look. She blinks and more tears fall from her eyes. I don’t know if they’re from the pain, or her fear of leaving her room. “I don’t want to leave,” she whispers.

  “I’m calling Aunt Kate.”

  “No!” Belle says.

  But it’s too late. Her safety is at risk here, and I’m calling. I press the phone to my ear and it rings. Several moments pass and Aunt Kate doesn’t answer the phone.

  “We have to do something,” I say. “You need a hospital. If it’s broken, you’ll need a cast.”

  She shakes her head. “Let’s just hang out a few days and see what happens. I might get all better.”

  “Or you might get worse,” I say. “Let me call an ambulance.”

  “No way. That’s way too much attention. Everyone will see.”

  “Not if they drive up to our dorms. I’ll ask that they keep the lights off. Maybe no one will see you. It is late, after all.”

  “But if they do see me, it’ll be even more humiliating than if someone saw me normally. And I can’t even do normally right now, Sophia.”

  I heave a sigh. “What if I snuck you out? Just like we’ve talked about. It’s almost dark, anyway. We’ll wait until after curfew and sneak out through the gardens, then walk to your mom’s house.”

  Belle considers this for a long moment. “But I can’t walk.”

  “I’ll help you.”

  She bites her bottom lip.

  “If it’s broken, you need medical care,” I say, hoping that sways her.

  She nods. “Okay. But only after midnight.”

  I reluctantly agree. I try calling Aunt Kate a dozen more times, but she doesn’t answer. This always happens in the evenings because she often forgets to turn her phone off silent mode when she gets back from work.

  Belle and I attempt to watch a funny show while we wait for the clock to hit midnight. I can tell she’s in a lot of pain, though, and I wish she’d just let me call a freaking ambulance. Or an Uber. I ask her multiple times, but the answer is always no.

  Finally, it’s time.

  Belle dresses in a pair of loose-fitting sweatpants because it’s all that will pull over her swollen ankle, and a black hoodie. I put a fuzzy sock on her bad foot and together we stand up. She wraps her arm around my shoulders and I wrap mine around her, and we shuffle out of our dorm room. We’re down the hall and to the doors before Belle says anything.

  “Whoa.” Her eyes go wide as I try to shuffle to the side and open the door while still holding onto her. “I’ve been in so much pain, I barely noticed being in the hallway.”

  I smile. “Maybe this ankle pain is what will help you overcome your anxiety.”

  To my surprise, she smiles back. “Maybe.”

  We step outside and Belle gasps as the crisp night air hits us.

  “It’s beautiful,” she says, gazing up at the starry night sky. “I haven’t been outside in so long.”

  “This way,” I say, turning sharply left. We have a short walk in the open and then we can duck behind a long, overgrown hedge that leads straight to the gardens. No one ever comes back here and it’s the perfect place to sneak around.

  Belle’s tears continue to fall as we hobble our way to the hedge.

  “Are you hurting really bad?” I ask.

  “Yes, but that’s not why I’m crying. I’m just really, really glad I’m finally outside.”

  I smile, but she probably can’t see it in the darkness. “I’m glad, too.”

  We make it to the first bench on the inner edge of the gardens and then we sit down to rest. Belle can’t stop looking around, even though the dim street lamps and the half-moon in the sky makes it a little hard to see. I’m keeping us on the outer rim of the gardens, which is the most popular walkway, and has the highest probability that we’ll run into some other students who are also staying out past curfew, but I don’t tell her that. I don’t want to worry her, but there’s no way we could walk into the center of the gardens. It would take too long. She needs a doctor now. Luckily, just across campus, we’ll only have a short two block walk until we’re at her mom’s apartment complex. Then she can take us to the hospital.

  “Ready?” I say, after we’ve rested on the bench a while. Belle nods. She stands up on her good foot and then reaches out for me.

  “Tell me about the garden you’re going to take me to someday. The hidden garden.”

  “Well, we’ll have to wait until your ankle is healed first,” I say. It’s true, but the extra time is also needed so I can find
the key. Belle doesn’t know about that part yet.

  “But then you’ll take me to it?” she asks, her voice hopeful.

  “Yeah, of course.”

  “So where is it?”

  “It’s hidden deep inside these gardens,” I say as we walk along the worn path. “It takes about fifteen minutes to walk to it from here.”

  “Isn’t this place a labyrinth?”

  “Yes, but I know the way. It’s hidden behind a secret door that no one else knows about.”

  “Then how do you know about it?”

  “I found it on accident. Well… sometimes I think the bird wanted me to find it. Like maybe that little bird just knew what I needed. A secret place. Somewhere to escape this cruel world.”

  “I can’t wait to see it.”

  “You will,” I assure her. “All we have to do is make it there, and then go into the hidden door. It’ll be beautiful. It’s breathtaking. You’ll love it.”

  “I don’t think it’s possible to have anxiety in a garden like that,” she says.

  “Do you have anxiety right now?” I ask.

  “Well… yes?” she says with a chuckle. “But… it’s okay. I’m okay… I’m ... doing this,” she says, struggling for words between her labored steps. “And if I can do this, then I can go to the secret garden with you. Maybe we can have lunch there. Do our homework there.”

  “We will,” I say, feeling guilty for not revealing that none of this can happen until I find the key.

  “I can’t wait.”

  “This way.” I turn us to the left where the paths change and we need to switch directions.

  As we turn, I notice something in the corner of my vision. I look back and see Declan. Standing there in his gardening uniform, his dark eyes peering right at mine, having heard everything I just said about the garden he insists doesn’t exist. I turn away and keep walking, hoping he doesn’t say anything that will ruin Belle’s night.

  Chapter Sixteen

  He doesn’t say anything. After we’ve walked for a few harrowing seconds, I glance back to see if he’s still there. It’s fairly dark out here and maybe I only imagined it. At least I hope so. But as I turn around to sneak a glance, I see Declan still standing there.