Work Text:
Basil’s life was what his more charitable observers would describe as “cottage core as fuck”. The young man had a fairly regular schedule, and what few hobbies he partook of mostly involved growing beautiful things and cataloging them. His life was clearly a lonely one, but to those who had never known him, they would likely assume this was a result of self choice due to his clear social neurosis. Of course, we all know his story differently.
These days, he personally viewed it simply as quiet.
Quiet, and lonely.
He didn’t much like being on his own, and soon, he would have even less companionship than he had imagined possible.
///
To the best of his reckoning it had been a day in the middle of December, though he knew only by the relative chill of the air in his house these days. He hadn’t looked at a calendar since October. He didn’t want to give Anna and Polly another scare like that.
He had long since pulled all of his plants inside, the chilled air and soft sun he was enjoying was anathema to most of his stock, and so into their now tightly roomed house everything had gone. Planter boxes and pots filled with verdant wilderness lined up on squat racks they stored in the garage most of the year.
This was the first year he had done it on his own. He had been proud at the time of his strength and speed, but now a concern gripped him as he moved to the kitchen. He would likely not have any help on hand in the coming years.
As he walked he took a small cutting of an Aloe plant, he had plenty to give, and he quietly wrapped it with yellow ribbon and left it on the meal for Anna that Polly had prepared while he was asleep. Perhaps the ten minutes she left between finishing the meal and taking it to Anna were coincidence, but Basil was glad that he had time to leave his grandma little gifts every day without having to talk or answer questions. Once he had loved nothing more than to answer Polly’s questions on the meanings of his little flowers, but these days it was personal and intimate, his only way of talking with Anna without having to witness her deterioration.
This was not a good line of thought to have this early in the morning. He had been crying in the kitchen for too long, and soon Polly would be back.
He cleaned his face and prepared to tend to his plants, quickly now, before Polly returned from wherever she leaves to.
///
He was standing amongst his plants, in the middle of the temporarily converted living room. Racks were set up somewhat haphazardly such that it resembled an iron and ceramic hedge maze mixed with a splash of green and doses of all the colors of the rainbow. Polly wasn’t very happy with the mess, but he would clean it up soon, he would eventually just need enough room to walk between the racks really, so soon it would only take up a bit less than a third of the room.
For now it was a place of solace outside of his room. No eyes watched him here, none pulled from his past and pasted in a scrap of photographic film, or passing idly, staring from afar. But it wasn’t like the blanket of claustrophobia to which he usually retreated, or worse the vulnerability of outside. Here he was amongst his kin. Standing here in the middle of his maze he was the master of his own world. And he was a skilled and loving ruler.
…
The plants were looking up at him, leaves and fronds sprawling open to receive their vita from humming lamps.
But they were wilting in here. It was slow, but they couldn’t live like this forever. Wasn’t it his job to make sure they survived? Wasn’t it his obligation?
There were a few wilted leaves, a few dead stems, a few brown vines... They were in pain, and he had to help them. To survive till summer he would have to… He moved to sever it.
His off hand brushed underneath the loss, the drain upon the whole…
The positioning was tricky (it shouldn't be), he paused. This shouldn't be this hard, right?
He cut, and soft brown matter crumbled into the flower pot.
Then red.
It was good he kept the shears sharp, that could have hurt much more. He rushed to the bathroom, weaving through the miniature maze to escape notice from the lady in the kitchen.
///
In here, the light never helped. And now that the stinging pain of medicinal alcohol receded, images were swirling in the darkness. An oath under moonlight, two broken faces spouting broken words at adults whose facade’s had snapped and were due to never return, an erosion of what had been to give way for what is.
Then silence. There's nothing to say. Nothing to consider. It's been years, what did Basil have left to think of? How would he word an apology? A plea?
It’s too late for any of that. Time has left him with his consequences. The guilt is gone now. now burns only shame. A flame that cannot be quenched with thinking things through or taking action to better things. There is no path remaining. It's only this. It will only be this. Too much time has passed, he has failed. Everyone is dead, some more so than others. They’re dead in the only ways that matter to Basil.
He did this. He could have stopped this. Sunny did this. Sunny could have stopped this.
They were supposed to fix it together. His chance is gone.
What’s left?
///
Polly had checked on him twice before she had to leave, and he confirmed each time that he was okay. He may have gotten good at lying, she may have stopped caring, but each time she had conceded and allowed him to stay in the bathroom. Only once he was sure she had left did he exit into the quiet house.
He took an old object from the cabinet drawer, a thick two year calendar that had not been updated in a long time despite still being in date. He checked in on his sleeping grandma before he headed out to the backyard. She had his aloe on her night stand, he would take it away later at night when he was sure she wouldn't stirr.
…
He took a seat at an old water damaged rocking chair, long past its best days, not helped with the frigid moist air.
The calendar had been torn up by accident one day, and he could see all the way to June through the shredded papers.
He looked ahead and saw his darkest day, when fate would conspire that the truth of his crime became known, and he would know fair judgment for the first time in his life. His mind rejected it, swelling with false realities to save him, to prolong his time. But he felt it in his chest and behind his eyes, the pressure never faded. A scratching that pulled at the soft meat behind the neck whenever he saw his friends in passing. Reality wasn’t as he demanded, but he couldn’t face it as it was.
To face it was death. It was the end of himself and possibly Sunny.
The forecast on the radio predicted a cold spell this week, he would be shoveling the driveway tomorrow and the days after. Faraway from Faraway, the storm gathered above lonely forested roads, and ice settled into his thighs.
For now, he rocked in the chair. Thinking about gifts for Anna. And waiting for something to happen.