Evening came slow over Crimson’s Orchard.
The trees were heavy with fruit, pale red with veins that shimmered almost violet in the dusk. The air was sweet, the kind that clings to your throat and leaves a taste behind.
Vera parked her wagon near the edge of the grove. No one came this far anymore, not after the county closed the road past the 30-mile mark. The dust settled around her boots as she stepped down, pulling her shawl tight against the chill.
She walked between the rows, her fingers brushing the low branches. Every few steps, she paused, listening. The orchard was alive with whispers: wind moving through leaves, faint shifting in the soil.
At the center of the grove stood an old wooden table, half sunk into the ground. Jars and clippings covered it, neatly arranged. Beneath it, a small pit. The soil inside was darker than it should have been, rich, damp, breathing.
Vera knelt, humming something soft. The tune was old, her mother’s, perhaps her grandmother’s before that. From the satchel at her side, she drew out a folded bundle wrapped in blue linen. She didn’t look inside. She never did.
The offering was gentle, almost reverent. A motion practiced a hundred times. The ground accepted it without sound.
As the last of the twilight faded, a faint shimmer rolled through the orchard. The apples above her glowed faintly, like lanterns behind a veil. And from the soil, new stems began to rise, small blue shoots unfurling their first petals.
Vera stood, brushed her hands clean, and smiled.
“Good to grow,” she whispered.
Then she turned back toward Evansville, where her shop waited, and another bouquet would soon bloom, the perfect shade of Blauw.
Swanson’s Flower Shop
- Chapter I: Shades of Blauw
- Chapter I (continued): Shades of Blauw
- Chapter I (final): Shades of Blauw
- Chapter II: Shades of Brzoskwinia
- Chapter III: Shades of Natura
- Chapter IV: Shades of Violaceous
- Chapter V: Shades of La Couleur Bleue
- Chapter VI: Shades of Brun
- Chapter VII: Shades of Noire
- Epilogue: The Geddes Report