Never Tell Secrets (18+)

Prologue

ATTENTION RADISH READERS! Please don't leave any spoilers in here or you'll be getting a spanking from Alfie. Or Elliot. Or Keira. Whoever you'd prefer. 😘

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Alfie

I stared down at my desk, at the masses of paperwork. An endless sea of quotas and demands. Everyone wanted to take, no one wanted to give. I let my head fall into my hands. This was the bed I'd made for myself, the noose I had tied around my neck. My ghosts weighed on me, turning in my mind, slithering in my bones.

On weary legs, I stood, forcing myself away from the desk and to the one place that could make me feel better. Outside, on the patio, I soaked in the sun for a moment before walking down the grass slope to the familiar gap in the trees.
Along the way I kicked off my shoes, my socks, relishing the feel of warm grass on my feet. My jacket went too, my waist coat, my tie... all the things that bound me, and with every step I took, I breathed easier.

I stepped through the gap in the trees, finding myself at the top of a grass stairway, each step adorned with a Jasmine-laden flower wheel, tall enough for me to walk through. I did, the tension leaving my body as I breathed in the floral fragrances that reminded me so perfectly of her. I paused on the bottom step, afraid to look up, as if she wouldn't be there, but of course she was. She was always there. She always would be.

She knelt on the ground, the yellow folds of her sundress pooling around her, her hands deep in the earth as she bedded a new Bleeding Heart plant at the base of the moss covered plinth, home to white Lilies. Around her a sea of blue, pink and yellow. Delicate petals from the blossoming cherry tree floated on the spring breeze, coming to rest around her.

She tended to our Evergarden with care, keeping it warm and home for me when I needed it. She used a soil covered hand to brush her hair out of her face, the thousand shades of red glinting in the sunlight, a firelight halo falling to the small of her back. Her deep blues found me and my chest felt like it was about to burst.

Then, she smiled. As always, it caught me off guard how happy she was to see me.

"Alfie!" My name, my name on her beautiful lips. She stood, her dress swaying around thighs I could spend my life buried between. "Alfie, where have you been? I've been waiting forever for you." She smiled again. I couldn't speak, only stared at this angel I'd been blessed with. 

"Come on then." She held her hands out, beckoning me to join her in the haven she'd made for me. She giggled, the sound a siren song that pulled me off that final step and into our Evergarden.

The bare skin of my foot connected with the Honeysuckle path and suddenly the day grew dark around us. Confused, I looked down, watching in horror as the Honeysuckle turned to rot under my feet, poison spreading out from me in black tendrils, destroying the earth.

"No!" Her voice broke, I looked up at her scream. Her eyes were wide with despair, "Alfie, stop! What are you doing?" I didn't mean to. I wanted to answer but the words wouldn't come. I couldn't move. I just froze there, immobilized as the flowers died, the trees withered, the Bleeding Hearts grew and grew and from their petals sprouted thorns, long and spiked.
The ground erupted in vines like barbed wire. They sprang from the trees, closing us in. She screamed again as barbed vines twisted around her ankles, breaking her skin.

"How could you do this?" she cried as she struggled against the barbs circling her arms. The more she struggled the more they cut her, splitting her flesh.. "Look what you did, Alfie!" Blood poured down her arms. Screams stuck in my throat. I couldn't move, couldn't talk. I couldn't step back and undo it, I couldn't move forward and save her. I was forced to stand there and watch her wilt.