The Garden and the Flower of Hope

"Welcome to the Gallery." She said to me. "This is your life now."

My calmness dissipated. I asked her. "Who are you? And where am I?" Realizing the situation that I'm facing.

She laughed at me and replied. "I'm not one of them, so how would I know?"

Then she just ran out into some kind of berry field, which was around my chest height. “What are you waiting for? Come here!” She screamed at me as she disappearing into the field.

She left the painting that we just came through on the ground. What was on the painting is the spiral staircase seen from someone all the way down the stairs and looking up.

Is this place, her home?

But that’s not important, looking at the painting, I could see what was on top of the staircase.

It was a colorful stained-glass dome that seemed to let sunlight in.

Could it be the way out? Or maybe something even more horrifying lives there?

The backside of the painting was the field that I’m standing on right now. It seemed like this painting can take me here, and take me back to the mansion, if I wanted.

Either way, I should go and investigate the top of the mansion. I couldn’t just stay here forever. This is not my home.

But I’ll stay here for a little while, to catch my breath and to know more about this place.

I followed her into the berry field.

The field was full of thorny bushes. I had to protect my blank painting from being damaged, so I covered it with my arms, and got pricked multiple times along the way.

I would put the painting above my head, but was a little too heavy for me.

Eventually, I caught up to her ”My arms got pricked. Do you have any bandages?” I asked her.

She smirked, and replied. “Where does it hurt?” 

“Right here.” I pointed at one of my arms, only to find that the wounds were all gone, and I was no longer in pain.

“You can’t get hurt in the Garden, silly.” She replied, then laughed at me again.

“What do you mean ‘Silly’?” I asked. “How would I suppose to know?”

She stayed silent. Her face shifted from a happy-go-lucky face to more of a curious one.

“Is it not normal?” She asked.

It seemed like both of us don’t know what going on at all. Huh? Well, I should at least ask her more about this place just in case.

“So, this is your home?” I asked.

“Yeah! It’s called the Garden! I created it all by myself. Isn’t it nice?” She said.

What?

Did she create this whole place by herself?

“Uh… What do you mean by ‘created’?” I asked.

“I painted it, of course!” She replied. “Come on!! We’re almost there!”

We finally made it through the field, and on the other side of this berry field, there was a giant tree.

Underneath the tree, there were some painting supplies, brushes, paints, palettes, all kinds of stuff, and a pile of the same paintings from the corridor.

They were all blank canvases with golden frames.

“Come sit!” She sat down under the tree and told me to do the same.

I sat next to her and added my painting into the pile. I had an idea of how I could get out of here…

If I get her to paint my hometown, I should be able to get out of here, right?

I asked her if that was the case. She said she didn’t know, but she could try.

And so, I began to explain my home town in great detail. My house, my school, the mall, everything that I could think of at that time.

As I was explaining, she began the sketching process. Once that was finished, she started to put the oil paint on the palette.

“Leave me alone for a while.” She said to me.

I walked away, as she started to slather the paints onto the canvas.

I walked along the edge of the berry field, after a while I found a river that impossibly stretched into the field. The berry bushed seemed to grow from the riverbed, and the wind stopped blowing.

As I get further away from her, it seemed like my surroundings are becoming more and more distorted. I supposed it wasn’t this place that’s keeping me calm after all. It was her.

But that didn’t matter to me. As soon as she finished painting my house, I can finally go back home.

I don’t care about her at all, and I don’t even know her name.

Suddenly, I heard the sound of fabric crinkling from the other side of the river. I glanced at the sound and found another butler, it seemed. His face looked like a different person from the one from the corridor.

Knowing that a butler can just stretch across the river, I didn’t even bother communicating with him. I just turned around and booked it out of there.

Looked like the border of this world is corrupted, and things from outside of the canvas were leaking in.

But was that normal?

I mean, nothing is normal at this point, but was that supposed to happen?

I made it back to the tree safely, and observed how the painting was coming along.

But I couldn’t tell how closed the painting was to finished. So I asked her. She told me that the base colors were done now, but it was still nowhere close to finishing yet.

I thanked her in advance for helping me with the painting. 

“Well, thanks for helping me.” I said.

“No worry, I have nothing better to do anyway.” She replied.

“Don’t you want to go home?” I asked.

“This is my home and my life.” She said.

“We can get out together, if you want.” I proposed. “You can come to my world!”

“But I like it here.” She replied.

I didn’t know what to say. Admittedly, this place was really nice, regardless of how confined it was, and how scary the outside was.

“So how long have you been here?” I asked her.

“I can’t remember.” She responded. 

She seemed indifferent, even though we were essentially stuck in paintings.

“Do you even remember your name anymore?” I continued.

“I don’t have one.” She responded. “Oh! I know. How about you give me a name?”

“Why do I have to do that?” I asked back.

“It’s a payment for my painting.” She replied. “Fair?”

“Um… I guess so.” I said, then I thought about her name for quite a long while.

“How about Hanako?” I said.

She smiled. It seemed like she’s interested in that name. “What does it mean?” She replied.

“Well, Hana just means flower.” I said. “Because this garden doesn’t seem to have any flowers yet."

“Oh Yeah! I forgot about that!” She got up and ran back into the berry field. Moments later, she came back with the painting of the Gallery that we left on the other side of the field.

She put the backside of the painting on her painting easel and began to paint a small flower field down into the lower portion of the canvas.

Suddenly, some of the thorny berry bushes in front of us slowly disappeared down into the ground, creating a pathway from the tree to the grassy field.

Then, in its place, countless sprouts emerged from the ground. They quickly developed flower buds, which bloom almost immediately after.

When everything stopped, the result is a small garden of lilac trees, full of purple lilacs. It looked just like what she just painted. 

“So, I’m Hanako, eh?” She said to me.

“Yeah…” I replied. “But how could you do that exactly?”

“Well… I’m an artist, that’s all.” She responded. 

“Do you have a name? I can give you one if you want.” She asked me.

“I already have a name, actually. My name is Daisuke.” I said.

“Daisuke? What does it mean?” She asked.

“I don’t know either.” I said.

“That’s a bummer!” She said as she put the Garden painting on the ground.

“Well, I’m pretty hungry now. Do you want some food?” She asked me.

“Sure! Where are we going?” I asked. “Can’t you just paint us some food?”

“If I did that, it will taste like oil.” She gave me that look again, as if I suppose to know what’s happening here.

“We have to go to the mansion for food, in the scary dining room” She continued.

“Scary? That doesn’t sound good…” I said, but I haven’t eaten anything since lunch, so I’m pretty hungry myself. Wait, how long had it been since I got here? I honestly couldn’t tell.

“Starving doesn’t sound good.” She said, then she hopped into the painting.

I really didn’t want to go back there, but I had no choice, so I quickly followed her.

We made it back to the dreaded spiral staircase and descended the stairs together.

After a while, we reached another corridor that looked identical to the one above, then we walked along that corridor for a little more, and found a door with “Dining Room” written next to it.

She opened the door. Inside, was a long dining table in the middle of the room that seemed to stretch out endlessly as usual. The table is full of fancy dishes that I’ve never seen before. They are all piping hot too.

The table and the food seemed to go on forever. How long is this table? And who prepared all of this food.

“Hey!! Let’s eat before they got here.” She yelled at me. She was already seated in one of the chairs and was shoving food into her mouth like she hadn’t eaten in days. 

I assumed that “they” were the butlers, so I sat on the chair next to her, and asked her for a recommendation, as I didn’t know what most of these dishes were.

“Here, try this.” She handed me a plate of circular slices of meat, similar to ham.

“What’s this?” I asked.

“It’s called galantine.” She replied. “And it’s cold just like you as well!” She laughed.

I didn’t care at that point. I was so hungry that I just ate that galantine or whatever.

Right as I was about to finish the plate, the dining room door swung open, and someone walked in.

It wasn’t a butler, but she was a woman, dressed up in a maid dress. She reached out with her arm that stretched out impossibly long, but right before she could catch me, Hanako pulled me back down into the painting.

The maid’s arm came through with us, but the part that emerged from the painting appeared to have some kind of plants wrapped around it. The plant quickly bloomed a bizarre looking black flower, that seemed to cause pain to the maid, and she pulled her arm back almost immediately.

“Today was really exhausting. Huh?” She said as she put the painting back on the painting easel, and began to paint the sky to be black.

And it’s nightfall instantly. A full moon rose up. The flowers and the berries started to glow and illuminated a subtle light, not too bright that we couldn’t sleep, but not too dark that we couldn’t see either.

“I’m gonna sleep now, good night!” She said as she lied down under the tree.

“Uh… Where is the toilet?” I needed to pee, so I asked her.

“It’s next to the dining room. Good luck!” She said.

I popped my head through the painting, into the dining room. It didn’t seem like anyone was here, so I came through the painting, and slowly opened the door.

There was no one here either.

I quickly walked deeper down the corridor, until eventually, I reached the restroom. It wasn’t next to the dining room at all. It was pretty far away actually. I guess her perception of distance is distorted?

I used the toilet, and ran back to the dining room, still, there was no one here at all. Where are they all go? Are they sleeping at the same time as her?

I opened the dining room door, hopped back into the painting, and lied down for while. I was thinking about how crazy today had been. I wanted this whole thing to end. I missed my parents too. I hoped she finished my painting soon so I could finally go ho…

What…?

I saw some dark figures in the corner of my eyes, so I got up and looked to see what it was. There were maids and butlers standing on the grassy field, across the flowers and the berries, and it was a lot of them too. At least 50 of them were standing there, not doing or saying anything.

H… How did they get here?