Somewhere in the rainy, yet charming British Isles  there lay a quaint cottage, settled deep in the vivacious, youthful countryside. The cottage had been built with red and brown bricks, now dusty and faded from age, and there were glazed over windows on either sides of the front door. It contained four cozy rooms and a chimney peeped out from the top of the pointed roof , lazy wisps of smoke often trailing out from it into the  blue reaches of the sky. The cottage was truly an enchanting sight to behold, but what really would catch your eye at first glance was the glorious garden that flourished all around it. Daffodils, daisies, and violets all bounced joyfully in the light breeze, and the sunflowers waved their petals invitingly. Foxglove, poppies and primrose  lined the dirt path that led to the house, stately inspecting every visitor that came along. Intertwined daintily around the windowsills were roses, vibrant red in color, giving off a sweet, sticky perfume. Greenery filled in among the few spaces where there was not some variety of flower growing, overall creating the feeling that you had just walked into a land from a fairytale.

Now this garden had a garden tender who loved the garden very much. She worked in amongst the flowers every day, carefully planting each one in its pre-destined spot. The flowers also loved the gardener and thought that they were the luckiest garden on earth to have such a caretaker. She looked to be about 20 years old with carrot orange hair,suntanned skin, and always wore a straw hat. As she worked, she would often hum, and the resident bees would buzz along in harmony. The garden knew the ways of the tender very well as she had been caring for them for a little over a year now. They knew that when she got in her car early in the morning, she would arrive back tired, but never tired enough to not get down on her hands and knees to pull out weeds that had sprung up among the flowers. She loved to talk to the flowers as she worked, for a flower is a wonderful thing to talk to when you have just met a boy and are quite taken with him, or perhaps when you have had a bad day and you need a good rant to let it all out. The caretender always planted the flowers in a neat, orderly fashion, but not so neat that it appeared as if there were uniform rows of blossoms standing at rigid attention. Both the garden and the tender were quite pleasantly content, although the gardener sometimes donned a dreamy, and slightly wistful look on her face.

One glorious, summer day, the dog-daisies looked up from their afternoon stretch to lay eyes upon their garden tender accompanied by a tall, well-built young man. Word spread quickly, and soon every flower was gazing intently upon the man who was making their caretaker giggle and smile, dimples flashing, face aglow. He held the door open for her and they entered the cottage. Sounds of laughter rang out from the house, and the flowers all discussed what this strange meeting could mean. A little later he left, and the tender came out and started watering the plants, a smile persistently creeping onto her face. It made the flowers happy to see her this way, so when the man came again, they were quite pleased.

Over the next few months the young man frequented the cottage every week and every time he left, the gardener would sing merrily, dancing through the flowers. The garden noticed an underlying change in her as well, for instead of planting new flowers in their specified, orderly spots, she would take a fist full of seeds and place them randomly through the garden. Petunias sprung up among dahlias, and delphiniums could be found adjacent to sweet peas; the whole garden was a beautiful, chaotic mess.  As for the flowers, they didn’t mind too much, as they could see their gardner was constantly glowing with joy.

There eventually came a time when the man entered the house, their gardener in his arms, clothed in a brilliant white, and didn’t leave that night. The garden came to realize that he was here to stay, and they had a great celebration, flapping their petals  exuberantly in the breeze.

The garden got along very well with the new addition to everyday life. Often the young man would come out and help their gardener pull out weeds or pick off vile caterpillars that were munching on the leaves of the indignant flowers. The flowers were well tended too, and the garden flourished.

On a particularly breezy autumn afternoon, the ever dwindling roses made an acute observation. As their gardner stretched, her fingertips pointed up to the heavens, they noticed that her tummy seemed to have grown! The daisies tisked and said that she had better lay off the cake, but a wise old foxglove stated that that was not likely the case, but that she was probably expecting. Excited cries broke out amongst the flowers, but a young poppy had a confused look on its face, expecting what? It had no sooner voiced this question aloud when tons of voices called out at once, a baby! The next time their tender came out, they all peered out her stomach, and sure enough, there was a bump!

Over the next few weeks it steadily grew bigger, and as it did, their gardener was doing less work, and her husband helping out more. However she refused to quit her tending completely, and still came out periodically, if not just to sit and talk with the flowers. When she did work, she often grunted in pain after bending over for a while, and had to take rests often, but she was always beaming with joyful anticipation. A crib was carried down the flowered path and into the house, and the occupants of the cottage regularly had baby blue paint blotches splattered across their skin. Everyone in and around the house was waiting eagerly for the soon to be addition the family.

***

The sky was a muggy gray, the air crisp and biting. Snow flakes were lurking in the clouds, threatening to come swirling down at any given moment. New flowers occupied the garden; winter rose, lavender, and fairy primrose all huddled together, courageously braving the ferocity of winter. Ice tendrils snaked their way across the window panes, a candle from the inside illuminating its spidery scrawl. The garden tender was scarce to be seen now and was generally only spotted going to and from the house bundled up in a plethora of furs. It was alright though, because the winter flowers were hardy and did not need much tending too. The mood of the cottage dwellers battled the winter depression fiercely, however, with Christmas on the horizon, and a new family member upon the horizon after that. The only downside to the season was that the mistletoe and the holly were often complaining about how people were always getting them mixed up, and were doing so when a scream echoed from the cottage. The flower’s heads flew up and they all looked nervously at the house, wondering what was the matter. The screams continued and then turned into wailing, the deep sorrow in its tones striking your very heart, causing a shiver or two. Then came the hysterical sobs, and the voice of the young man trying his best to sooth the tender, but also sounding shaky and dejected.

The next day their gardener and her man exited the house, her face shadowed in a cloak, and came back a little while later. And for a week or two, there was not much more movement or sound from the cottage, but the man occasionally left and came back with groceries, his face looking haggard and somber. The flowers wondered fearfully what had happened, but got no clues until one day, their precious keeper finally made her way outside. She was dressed only in a thin, white shift and her face was a ghostly pallor, creating a shocking contrast against her orange hair. What shocked the flowers the most, however, was that she was extremely skinny, there was no bump, and no baby to show for it.  As they realized this they cried out in dismay, finally understanding what had happened. Their tender stumbled through the garden, shivering in the cold. The garden looked at her with concern, longing to voice words of comfort. The tender looked at them for while, and then, to their great horror, she let out a scream of frustration and started ripping plants out from their roots. The flowers let out shouts of fright as dirt was upturned and they were strewn across the frozen ground. She carried on for several minutes until the garden had turned into a brown pile of mush, the holly crumpled beside the snowdrops, and the fairy primrose lay at an awkward angle, half-buried under black soil. The destruction only stopped when the young man came running up the path, picked her up, and carried her inside. And the garden was silent.

The next day, the man cleared the remains of the garden out of the area, and for a long while, all that remained was dirt. Winter eventually crept away, and it began to warm up. The birds were once again chirping in the now budding trees. March was coming to an end and the gardener was stirring along with the rest of the countryside. She was once more leaving the house and coming back tired. Her face, however, was still riddled with sadness.
One day, she tentatively re-entered the garden. She looked around blankly before bending down and planting a single seed into the ground, and then watering it. After doing this, she left, but came back the next day with more seeds. Uniform rows of flowers began to spring up mid-april, and green began to fill back in in the empty spaces. Eventually, the daisies were stretching once more, petals open and heads turned towards the warmth of the sun. The flowers were all back, creating a peaceful, beautiful atmosphere again, even if it was quite a bit more orderly. And as the garden was repaired, so was the gardener’s heart. She was once again smiling as she worked amongst the damp soil and blossoming flowers. The flowers came to love their tender again, and joy came to settle in the area once more.

During the next autumn, the flowers noticed that her stomach had grown again, and gazed thoughtfully at their tender to see what her feelings about it were. She appeared to be excited, but also understandably nervous. The household occupants were preparing for its coming once again, except for this time they were covered in pink paint. The flowers tried their best to add their effort into the preparations by looking the best they could, growing straight and tall and proudly displaying their petals as often as they could.

It was a harsh winter, but spring thaw came early, and the flowers were blooming again by early March. By this time, everyone was waiting in eager anticipation for the arrival of the baby. It seemed to the flowers that her tummy was hiding a watermelon it had gotten so big!

It was on a lovely spring day whilst the bees were humming their merry tunes that there came from the cottage great shouts. The flowers were instantly worried, hoping fervently that past events hadn’t repeated themselves. But these doubts were quickly put at ease as they saw the man hold open the door for their gardener, and once she had gotten through, pick her up and run down the path with her to the car yelling, “It’s coming! It’s coming!” with a frantic look on his face. The flowers waved goodbye, knowing that next time they came back, there would be another person with them.

Two days passed, and as the roses were just settling down for their afternoon nap, they spotted their garden tender coming down the path, her arms tightly holding a bundle. The flowers all cheered joyfully and craned their stems to try to get a better look. The couple looked tired, but blissfully in love with what the gardener was carrying. They entered the cottage, and a little while later the flower’s garden tender came out and showed them her baby girl. The flowers glowed with pride and gleefully chattered on and on about how beautiful she was.

Their tender sat amongst the flowers, cradling her baby, mainly gazing at her with loving eyes, but also looking at the flowers around her with an affectionate expression. “Thank you,” she whispered, “I couldn’t have done it without you all.” The flowers beamed back at her, and at that moment there wasn’t a more beautiful sight in all of the British Isles.