Empty eyes met his own, and for the first time Chris realized just how void of life his foster mom looked. Caroline Mcarthy was a frail looking woman, with a gaunt face. Had a gust of wind blown through the dull living room, Chris was sure she would have been swept up along with it. She held a china teacup between her boney fingers, their tips as  blue as her lips. Had she not been blinking every few seconds, one might have mistaken her for a corpse. 

Her wife sat next to her, an imposing force that seemed to only be emphasized by the wisp of a woman that sat beside her. Althea Mcarthy was the kind of woman who turned heads as she marched into a room, swinging her red locks over her shoulder. Her cold blue eyes seemed to appraise him, and a primal instinct in Chris told him she was not one to be messed with. 

Chris attempted a smile, an attempt to break through the icy atmosphere in the air. Althea’s face stayed unreadable, not even the twitch of a smile visible, as she spoke.

“Before we begin, I would like to lay some rules. One”

She held up a single finger, waggling it in front of her for effect, The nail was coated red, the only bright thing the room. “You do not go into Caroline’s flower garden. A child like you could stomp his way through all her work, not to mention track mud around the house” Indignance rose in Chris as he opened his mouth to say that he was in fact fourteen, but the second finger was being raised and his attempt at protest was ignored.

“Two, no loud noises in the house. No speakers or any such things. You want music, put on your headphones.”

Chris simply nodded. He had been in many foster homes at this point, and he had learned that every household had their rules. Follow them and you would be fine. A strained relationship with foster parents could make for an unpleasant stay. 

He had just raised his own teacup to his lips when Caroline jolt up and across the coffee table.Her hand clutched his arm in a vice like grip. Her ice cold fingers digging into his skin caused goosebumps to erupt along his body. Her inky strands of hair hung over him as she looked down at him. All the frailness had snapped out of her in an instant as she parted her cracked lips. Her voice came out raspy, an ear scratching sound that enveloped Chris. 

“Three, do not open the purple door..”

Her eyes searched his and for a second Chris saw some sort of emotional undertone in her dark eyes. Fear. But just as quickly as she had snapped, she sagged, moving back to her seat on the could. She clutched her teacup with white knuckles, hands trembling while the china clinked against the saucer, but face once again a blank dead eyed canvas.

Chris clutched his arm, red finger marks on his olive skin throbbing along with his racing heartbeat. Althea got up, stretching her lips into a wide smile that didn’t quite reach her eyes.

“Let’s get you to your room”

Chris followed her quickly out of the living room, the clinking of the shaking china teacup  bouncing off the walls of the hallway behind him.

……………………………………………………………………

His room was strange, though its contents were standard. A bed with grey sheets, a desk sat next to his wardrobe and a window that looked into the backyard. The afternoon sun reflected off the wet grass and he saw the hedge that hid the flower garden. He stared out the window, seeing Althea walking to the hedge, axe in hand. She looked over in his direction and for some reason Chris ducked. She had said there was a flower garden back there, right? One might wonder what place an axe had in a flower garden, but then again he knew nothing of gardening.

Getting up from his place crouched under his window, he surveyed his room. The only true oddities were the walls and floor of the room. Spotless and smooth, the room was was coloured black from its walls to the floor, a marble like surface, which was icy. The cold seeping through Chris’s socks as he shuffled to his bed.  His duffle bag which contained all his worldly possessions sat in the wardrobe, zipped up nice and tight. Something told Chris that having his bag ready for a quick getaway was the wise thing to do.

He peeked out into the hallway, checking to make sure it was clear, before tip toeing out. It had pictures, but in each photo Althea was holding hands with some woman Chris didn’t recognize. She seemed to exude happiness, this picture perfect lady with her twinkling eyes and love handles. Her hair was a familiar black. Inky.

Caroline

Chris took in a shake breath recalling the events of before. This had to have been Caroline. But how? What exactly had happened? There was also another person in the photos, a little girl, blond hair tied into pigtails in each of the pictures. She smiled in each of the pictures, all of them except the one at the end of the hallway. Sitting in a wheelchair, her hair hanging around her face in thick ropes, her eyes burning through the picture. The girl looked angry. Althea had her signature look plastered on her face. Caroline seemed to only be in the beginning stages of her transformation into a shell of a human being. She looked tired. 

He kept walking when he noticed the end of the hallway. An ornate mirror was hung above a table, the knobs on the drawers the same black steel that encircled the mirror. Staring into the reflective surface he notice a hint of purple. Moving to the side, he says it’s lilac frame slightly ajar, creaking as it went. Chris froze unmoving, refusing to look directly at by eyeing it in the mirror. It stayed ajar, this innocent lilac door, as if daring him to move. He looked down at the table, his sweat dripping from his brow onto its surface. He fiddled with one of the drawers, before pulling it open.

A key sat in the drawer, a simple steel thing with a fluffy bunny as it’s keychain. Chris looked up to see the door still ajar. He picked it up, bringing it to eye level when the scratching sound began, coming from behind him. He tried to pay it no mind, but it became louder and louder bouncing it’s way along the walls. He whipped around quickly to see the the fingers retreat back into the darkness and the lilac door to slam shut. 

Chris had enough exploring for the afternoon. He pocketed the keys before shuffling quickly back to his room. As he shuffled, he shot one more look at the door, taking note of the scratch marks on the floor.

Yeah, that situation would have to be checked out later.

…………………………………………………………………….

Dinner was a dull affair, especially with his bizarre encounter in the hallway was fresh in his mind. The key was burning a hole in Chris’s back pocket as he struggled to not dwell too much on the door.  Caroline, with her fingers working away as she embroidered a pattern into the shirt she had laid out on her side of the table. The shirt was far too small for either woman. Althea was busy carving away at a block of wood, the carving knife glint under the harsh kitchen lighting. Chris tried to lighten the mood.

“So, what kind of flowers do you have in the garden?”

He had directed this question to Caroline, but Althea was quick to answer, not giving her wife a word in edgeways. 

“Oh all sorts. Daisies, roses, sunflowers, heck we even have hibiscus. But our personal favorite are the-”

 Caroline slipped it in before Althea could notice.  “Lilacs” 

There was a small pause before Althea continued. This time Chris saw a slight twitch in her expression. Her knuckles whitened as her grip on the knife tightened. “So Chris, what’s  your favorite flower?”

Both their eyes were on him now, and even Caroline looked mildly interested. He responded after taking another gulp of the soup. “Petunias”  Althea gave a disingenuous smile as she stood from the table, dragging the knife lightly across the surface as she went.

“The flower of resentment. How ironic.”

She exited the kitchen, but not quickly enough for Chris not to notice her smile fall away, leaving no trace behind. 

He sat confused, his spoon clinking in his soup, as he pondered over her expression. Maybe now was the time to check that key.

…………………………………………………………………..

  After Dinner, Chris sat on his bed, juicebox in one hand, steel key in the other, contemplating his choices. He could go to bed. Hope that he could get use to the weirdness of the household, or, he could maybe get kicked out and transferred somewhere else. Sure they were odd, but as far as foster parents came he was one of the more fortunate kids. But then there was the door. The key. 

He’d deal with the consequences later.

As he got up to leave, he tried placing the juice box on the bedside table, but he missed it by a few centimeters, the juice box spilling its contents on the ground, the cranberry liquid leaking out onto the black floor. It looked even darker on the black surface, and Chris quickly wiped it up with toilet paper from the bathroom. 

The black floor betrayed no evidence that anything had been spilled, looking as pristine as it was when he walked in. All traces of the juice was gone.

……………………………………………...

Standing in front of the lilac door, he shakily attempted to place the key into the keyhole, wondering about the contents behind it.  With a trembling hand he turned the key.

He turned the key. He tried to turn the key. One more time

Wait a second. 

Chris looked at the key in disbelief, realizing that he was mistaken. It didn’t open the lilac door. Huh. Upon a few turns of the handle, he realized that the door wasn't locked. The suspense around the door and the key he had assumed would open it was lessened. Maybe there was no mystery to be found beyond the door. Perhaps they were just an odd couple. He twisted the handle pushing the door open.

As the hallway light illuminated the room, he saw what seemed to be mannequins, their bodies adorned with frilly skirts. He couldn’t see very clearly, but it seemed as though they didn’t have their heads. In the middle of the room sat Caroline, brushing the hair on what looked like one of the mannequin heads. She turned to him, barely blinking as she went back to her brushing.  

Of course, she’s probably into fashion or something. She probably specializes in kids clothing.

Chris fumbled around for the light switch, finding it, then turning back to the room.

It took his eyes to fully register what he was seeing. And once he did, the ear splitting scream that erupted from him sent them into a panic. Bodies of children, all girls, stacked in corners, their limbs sat relaxed on the bed and arm chairs, bolted up and ran around the room in a panic. They flailed their arms, crashing into each other, their headless forms lost and frightened. Another voice, low and guttural mixed in with his scream, and then a third. He looked down to see Caroline with her mouth agape and the head staring at him, it’s blond locks swayin, it’s mouth ajar as it screamed at him in anger. Chris bolted, not knowing where to go, abandoning the room and running out the back door. Into the garden he fled, past the hedge and into the flower patch. He stomped through the flowers, eyes searching wildly for something, before focusing on a shed. A locked shed. He jammed the key into the door, thrusting it open, hoping for a shovel or something to fight off the things, but the sight he saw was even sadder. 

In the middle of the room sat the body of a girl, her dress interwoven with flowers, a motionless statue surrounded by stuffed animals. It twitched it’s fingers in his direction, but it couldn’t move. He stumbled backwards into the garden, just as the moon peeked through the clouds. He looked around and saw them.

 The flower pots.

Each holding a different flower swaying in the breeze. The pots were all sorts of colors, not even the smell of flowers was able to mask their stench. The roots of the flowers encircled their sockets. Rotting heads. Each and everyone of them, the openings in their faces sealed with roots. A dull moan could be heard from one of them. Then another. And another. The chorus of moans followed Chris as he burst back into the house, threw his armoire open and yanking his duffle bag out. He was about to turn when he felt the knife go into his leg. 

He screamed out in pain, rolling on the floor as his blood spilled onto the black surface, glistening around him. It leaked out of him, looking darker on the black surface, as the carving knife pierced his leg. 

She stood over him, hair tied back and axe in the other hand. She unlodged the knife from his leg, sighing as she did.

Althea

“You know, you have got to be the most disobedient kid we have ever had. I told Caroline, we should just stick with little girls, but she insisted we get a boy.” She swung the axe as she gesticulated “It’s what Natasha wants, she said. Regardless,” She smiled down at his squirming form. “ I believe you’ve met our little angel. Poor baby. Shattered every bone in her body except for that pretty head of hers”

She took at practicing swing. “So I suggested we get her new one. But oh no, nothing is good enough for Caroline and Natasha. This one’s to big, that ones too small!” Chris had never seen her so unhinged, her eyes wild as she laughed sardonically. For once she seemed genuine.

“Next thing I know she says she wants a boy. A boy! Can you imagine. But I can’t say no, not to those two. Pity though, you were almost bearable.”

She positioned the axe over  his neck and Chris’s eyes widened with terror. She chuckled at his reaction. “Don’t worry. The floor is black and hydrogen peroxide will clean this up in a jiffy. Can’t be having stains every time I gotta cut up one of you. Also I’ll remember. Pentinas right? Flower of resentment? I’ve got you” Her axe lifted over her shoulder, it’s blade glistening. 

“Have fun in the Garden”