My dad liked to garden. We have a huge stretch of flowers under our front window that wrap around the side of the yard and straight into the back. When I was nine we put a fence in the backyard and dad had been mad. The contractor pulled up a whole section of his flower beds to put the fence in. Said fence was never finished because of it. There was an empty hole where the gate should have been.
I always wondered if mom had done that on purpose.
Their relationship hadn't been all bad though, just parts of it. They both would get on each others nerves.There were fights. There were spats. Sometimes some petty shit would go down. But at the end of it, they were happy.
Well, they had seemed happy.
I unwound the hose from the side ofthe house. There was a fat bumble bee scooting it's fuzzy behind around the lilies. I'd save those for last. Save the bees and all that yada yada. Hanna was always going on about bees and the environment and oil spills. She wanted to be some kind of activist, to her it sounded noble. To me it just sounded like chaining yourself to a tree and putting too much effort into a dying cause.
Hanna likes to call me negative. I think I am just being real.
It takes about forty-five minutes to water the entire garden. All the way around the backyard, along the fence line, up next to the deck, and around the side of the house. As I get closer to the back door the light gets darker, the sun being blocked by the side of our two-story, slate gray home. Something catches my eye and I look up.
Right above me, in the second story window, was my sister. She was standing between her parted curtains, looking down at me with a haunting expression. Her hair hung lank around her face and I guessed she had just come out of the shower. I started rolling up the hose, pretending I didn't see her even though her eyes were burning holes into the top of my head.
Leslie didn't take care of the garden.
It had belonged to dad.
The upstairs window rattled and I jerked my head up. Leslie hit the glass pane again.
"Stop it, she will hear that!" I stage whispered up at her, hoping she either could hear me or read my lips. Leslie hit the glass once more and then pointed down to the patch of flowers I had just finished hosing off a few minutes earlier.
They were a mix of tiger lilies, lilies, and some kind of yellow plant I didn't ever learn the name of. The bed was raised a little higher then the ones around it but other then that the patch looked the same as any other in the garden. Happy, chipper, and full of cute little bees.
Except it wasn't the same.
I glanced back at Leslie and she looked me right in the eye.
"I know," she mouthed to me. Then she was gone, the curtains pulling back over the glass so all I saw was a wash of purple fabric.
I clutched the house to my chest, drops of water hiccuped out of the end and left wet patches on my shirt front. Words threaten to come out of my mouth. I wanted to shout at her to come back. I wanted to throw a rock at her window. Maybe I just wanted to cry instead.
Me and Leslie, we knew a truth.
We both knew each other knew, but neither of us ever spoke about it.
I kicked a rock and it skittered and smacked into the side of the deck. "Fuck off," I muttered unde rmy breath, suddenly angered by my sisters antics. Why did she have to be that way? Constantly reminding all of us of shit we wanted to let go.
She was going to get us in trouble.
Or just me.
I was always the one who got it in the end.
YOU ARE READING
Liars Garden
رعبAnnie Henton is nearly to graduating high school but her world isn't as open as someone might think. Her home is filled with secrets and lies that would change everything. Her sister, Leslie, just wants out, and her brother, Chris, is innocently una...
