The Entity

Bob Trent had been a gardener since he could hold a trowel. He knew how to coax life from wet chalk and bury the dead without ceremony. His hands had scars like old boot leather. His knuckles were swollen from decades of pulling stubborn thistles that refused to die.

Then the pressure came in early October. On a Tuesday, when the council had cancelled all maintenance. And left the municipal park to rot under grey skies. It didn’t arrive with sound or shape, only an oily weight behind his ribs.

At first, Bob blamed his heart. But then he felt the breath that wasn’t his, drawn deep into his own lungs.

—Robert, it murmured inside his inner ear, low as gravel ground under boots. 

—Time to clear the rot.

—Piss off, Bob muttered, wiping rain from his nose. —Bloody voices. I’m cracking up.

He went back to the privet hedge. Then Barry Granger wandered over, high-vis jacket unzipped, flask of tea in hand. Barry was a know-it-all who had never pruned a shoot clean in his life

—You’re cutting that back too hard, Bob. Ruining it, mate.

—Leave it, Barry.

—Only sayin’. No need to be sour.

Bob watched his own right hand drop the twine. It didn’t feel numb; it felt commandeered. The fingers tightened around the heavy secateurs, knuckles going dead-white.

—Not doing your job, Robert, the voice grated against the roof of his skull. Letting weeds choke the bed.

—What? Bob gasped. 

—No—wait—

His shoulder tensed, rose, and swung. The hardened steel blades sheared straight into the soft hollow of Barry’s throat. A dark, hot spray slapped Bob’s cheeks. Barry dropped onto the mulch with a wet wheeze, twitching once, then still.

Bob tried to scream, but his jaw clamped shut with enough force to crack a molar.

—Deep trench, the voice instructed, steady and calm. —Under the hydrangeas. Good mulch.

Bob’s legs walked him to the shed. His arms selected the heavy border spade. Trapped behind his own wide, stinging eyes, Bob sobbed in silence. While his body carved out the chalky clay in a natural rhythm. Four feet down. Room enough for two, if needed. He rolled Barry into the ditch, packed the wet earth down with the flat of his boot, and raked the surface smooth.

By dusk, the park was empty. A cold autumn drizzle began to fall, washing Barry’s blood off the gravel path.

Bob stood by the shed, exhausted, begging his legs to carry him to the police station. Instead, his boots turned toward the exit gate, heading home.

In his head, the weight shifted, settling nice and comfortable into the marrow of his spine.

—The garden’s half-dead, Robert, it whispered like his best mate. 

Bob’s hand slipped the garden shears into his coat pocket. 

—We’ll start on the house tonight, the voice said.