Dahlia and the Garden of Light - Chapter 44: Chapter 44

The sun cast pale gold light across the clearing. Bamboo rustled like whispers. The scent of salt and earth hung in the air.
Derek stood barefoot on a patch of flattened grass, fists clenched, shoulders tense. Sweat dampened the back of his shirt.
“Breathe,” Dahlia said gently. “Not just because I told you to—but because you need to. You’re not a soldier. You’re a listener. A guide. You can’t hear animals if your own body is screaming.”
“I am breathing,” Derek muttered, his jaw tight.
“Through your teeth,” she replied with a smirk. “Try again.”
From a few paces away, Mira leaned against a tall cedar, arms crossed, eyes narrowed. Her shadow stretched long in the morning light. She never interrupted, but her silence was loud.
Derek huffed, dropped his stance, and sat cross-legged in the grass. The world around him felt too still. Until it wasn’t.
A rustle in the tall reeds. A small brown mouse scurried forward, pausing a few inches away before climbing into his lap without fear. Derek’s breath hitched.
Dahlia crouched beside him, her voice barely audible. “That’s it,” she whispered. “You didn’t call it. You welcomed it.”
Derek glanced up. “Do you think Mom knows how to do this?”
Dahlia hesitated, then looked toward Mira. Their mother didn’t flinch, but her eyes flickered with something like regret.
“I think she forgot,” Dahlia said softly.
“I never learned,” Mira said finally, her voice sharper than the morning wind. “Not this way.”
“You could,” Derek said, almost shyly. “I could help you.”
Mira blinked. “I don’t talk to mice.”
“But they might talk to you,” Derek replied, grinning.
For a moment, even Mira smiled—barely.
Midday: Repairs and Seeds
The house still creaked in the wind. One window was missing glass, replaced with sea-polished driftwood. Derek was on the roof with a scrap of rusted metal, hammering it down in rhythm with the breeze.
“Don’t fall!” Dahlia called up.
“I won’t,” he shouted back. “Rain would catch me!”
From below, Rain let out a low grunt, unimpressed.
Inside, Mira worked at the remains of a half-dismantled radio. It sparked occasionally, but she murmured to it like it was a wounded bird. She’d already repurposed three wires into perimeter trip alarms and a solar-powered water heater.
Outside in the garden, Dahlia knelt beside the soil, whispering to her seedlings. Tiny sprouts peeked from the ground: sunbursts, moonseed, firelilies—each glowing faintly in the shadows.
“You still make flowers,” Mira said behind her.
Dahlia didn’t look up. “I’m always careful now.”
“Careful would be not planting them at all.”
“Life needs life,” Dahlia said, pressing a seed into the earth. “That’s what Eliot used to say.”
“Eliot isn’t here,” Mira said flatly. “And the whispers haven’t stopped.”
“We’ve run for two years, Mira,” Dahlia said, rising. “Let me root. Just once.”
Mira stared at her, then knelt and touched the soil. The earth was warm, almost pulsing.
“You planted something inside me too, you know,” she murmured.
Dahlia turned. “What?”
“Guilt,” Mira said, then walked away.
Evening: Light on the Ocean
Derek skipped stones at the edge of the tide. Rain, now sleek and broad-shouldered, lay just behind him with one eye open.
“I miss Grandpa William,” Derek said, tossing another stone.
Dahlia sat nearby on a driftwood log, weaving a crown of seaweed, bits of glass, and pearl-pale shells.
“Me too.”
“Do you think he’s still alive?”
Dahlia looked toward the horizon. “If he wasn’t… Eliot would’ve found a way to tell me. A flower I hadn’t planted. A song in the wrong key. Something.”
Derek nodded slowly. “Do you think they’re still looking for us?”
“No,” she said. “They’re guarding the lies we left behind. Pretending we’re still running. That’s the best they can do.”
He smiled faintly. “I hope Theo’s in Madagascar right now pretending to be me.”
“I hope he’s resting for once,” Dahlia said. “He never knew how to stop.”
A fish leapt from the shallows. Derek pointed and gasped, and Rain pounced—but stopped just short of the splash, tail swishing.
“You think I could talk to whales someday?” Derek asked.
“Only if you whisper underwater,” Dahlia said.
He beamed. “I’m gonna try tomorrow.”
Night: A Quiet Fire
The fire crackled inside a circle of beach stones. The scent of sea salt and roasted snail shells hung in the air. Dahlia added a handful of crushed flower petals—lavender and wildrose—and the flames turned violet.
Mira sat with her back to the fire, sharpening a blade with long, deliberate strokes. Derek sat on the sand beside Rain, feeding him bits of charred fish.
“I never thought we’d stop running,” Derek said suddenly.
“We haven’t,” Mira said without turning.
“But we’ve slowed,” Dahlia added.
Silence wrapped around them like fog.
“I don’t hate you,” Mira said suddenly.
Dahlia blinked. “Wow. Thanks.”
“I just… don’t know how to be near you.”
“Because I remind you of what you left?”
Mira paused. “Because you remind me of what I could’ve saved—if I’d stayed.”
Derek tossed a pebble at Dahlia. “Hey. Make the fire green.”
She laughed, reached into her pocket, and sprinkled mint powder into the flames. They flared emerald, lighting up Derek’s face in wonder.
“Teach me that,” he whispered.
“I will,” Dahlia promised.
Rain stretched and yawned. Mira sheathed her blade, then turned to face them.
“There’s a storm forming off the coast,” she said. “We’ll need to secure the garden and check the roof lines.”
Dahlia nodded. “We’ll do it in the morning.”
“I’ll wake you at dawn,” Mira replied, rising. “And Derek—don’t talk to whales until I say it’s safe.”
Derek grinned. “How will you know it’s safe?”
“I won’t,” Mira said. “But I’ll be watching.”