Page 9 of Meet Me After Life

Lavender throws up her branches, distressed and helpless to change. ‘I let him see my inner-most roots!’ This feels like a lot of personal information to be sharing with someone you’ve just met.

‘Look, Lavender. I get it. I’ve dated a few ogres… kissed more than a couple frogs.’ I chuff before biting back a gag at the memory of all that tongue. ‘But someone said something really clever to me once. Would you like to hear it?’ Lavender makes no indication either way. I choose to continue. ‘They said, “Don’t go chasing rivers, stick to the waterfalls that you’re used to.”’

Lavender is looking at me like she’d like to say, I can’t fucking run, you dolt. Never mind the words are actually just lyrics, since no one ever talks to me long enough to offer any advice at all. The only wisdom I’ve ever gleaned is from music and books.

‘Look, I know you’ve lived here far longer than I have, but we’re going to be seeing a lot of each other from now on, so we may as well try and get along, right?’

Lavender wipes at the sap trailing down her bark, with an elegant twiggy finger. ‘Who are you, anyway?’ She sniffs, looking me over. ‘I suppose you’re a colleague of Walkers.’

‘Walker? No, I’ve just moved in. I’m Miller,’ I supply, hand outstretched.

Lavender looks at me with raised brows. ‘Oh! Right.’ She makes a strange expression before schooling herself back to a half-put-together sort of look. Sap is still very slowly dripping down her trunk, despite her efforts. She places her sticky hand in mine, managing a small nod. ‘I’ll lay off the walls,’ she adds haughtily, but her bark is tinged pink, embarrassed by her outburst.

My heart strains a little. I nod once. Looking out over the rest of Bantom Forest. It’s early in the afternoon. My North Star will begin its trek across the sky soon. Not that I’ll be able to see it very well from here. But I’m sure the sunset is pretty over those peach and lilac treetops.

‘Are you a fan of coffee?’ I ask Lavender.

‘Only if it’s spiked,’ she says.

I smile. ‘Do you mind if I join you for sunset?’

Lavender looks taken by surprise but quickly masters herself. ‘If you must,’ she says, primly picking at the sap between her twigs.

Mind made-up, I head back inside to get dressed. I’ll have to start walking now if I want to make it to town and back before dark.

Chapter Four

The Haunted House

‘You’ve’ – hiccup – ‘never been on Door before?!’ Lavender asks, aghast, and perhaps slightly drunk – if the sway of her branches and slurred speech is anything to go by.

The sun mimics the side profile of a cracked egg cooking over an open fire. Her yolk’s ready to drop beneath the horizon and paint the flipped coin of the planet’s surface in all the pretty colours. Almost as glorious as the North Star.

‘No?’ I supply. She gasps.

‘YoU HAvE To MaKe AN AccOunt, ToO!’ I wish I were as drunk as her woody arse. Actually, I wish I was drunk at all. Even just a teensy bit. What’s the alcohol percentage on this thing? I’ve drunk enough that I shouldn’t feel my face by now. Frowning, my eyes skim the back of the bottle until Lavender’s mane of lilac leaves whips me in the eye. Shooting a sharp look in her direction, I brush a wayward leaf from my shoulder. She doesn’t care. She’s busy deftly tapping into her phone the final touches to her new online dating account.

‘No, thank you,’ I say, very demure. To add to my long list of reasons why I’m still single, I can add wants to meet organically.

It feels inherently wrong for me – the whole online dating bit. Not that I’d judge anyone else’s choices. Just, to me, it’s all very clinical. Very detached. Very robotic. I want to meet someone and see them, feel them, know that they’re real, standing in front of me. I want to be swept off my feet in a whirlwind romance, like the ones in the books I read. I want someone to save me while they encourage me to save myself. I want… something that does not exist. So, you know, all that.

And also, I’m very unphotogenic.

We go on a while longer, Lavender, getting evermore drunk. And me, staying entirely too sober for the turn in conversation.

‘So, it’s just you living here?’ she asks, with a strange inflection in her voice, but I guess that’s the grog.

‘Yep.’

‘No family?’ she prompts.

‘Nope.’

‘No pets?’ she clarifies.

‘Double nope.’

She hums and nods, before tacking on, ‘And obviously no boyfriend.’