the shining path (the magnus archives | original characters, the spiral)

[fiachairecht]

the shining path. the magnus archives, original characters + the spiral. statement of maureen ambarsan regarding the rather unconventional garden behind her flat, and - not so outside it, as the case may be. 1.8k words, rated t. for WinterSpades in pilesofnonsense's statement exchange 2019.

Statement of Maureen Ambarsan regarding the rather unconventional garden behind her flat. And — not so outside it, as the case may be. Original statement given March 3rd, 2010. Audio recording by Jonathan Sims, head archivist of the Magnus Institute, London. Statement begins.

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It started with — I think it must have started with the garden.

We didn't think too much about the problems with it, at first. It didn't matter that the back door didn't open all the way because of the overgrowth, or that all the furniture was broken except for the one ancient window in the far corner. We never thought to wonder why we were the only people who ventured out there. Only living things, come to think of it — I never saw even a bird out there, even though Callum used to sketch all the ones he saw in the grass.

He was the only one with a bedroom that overlooked the garden. Maybe — maybe that's why I'm the one telling you all this since he — he can't. And none of our other flatmates stayed long enough to understand that something was wrong. Lucky them?

We were too delighted that we had a garden at all, space being what it is in the city centre. That, and there were always bigger issues to consider, like the month we spent with the boiler out, or that time the washer broke, or the -

Look, it wasn't all bad. Just ... the flat was old, is all, and Edinburgh landlords are Edinburgh landlords. We liked our lives, free of university with just enough half-jobs between us to make us think we could really make a go of it as writers.

But you wouldn't recognise the flat, if you went there now. I wouldn't recognise it, and that's why I can't go back. No, no, the developers didn't get to it. They got to enough of the rest of the city to do anyone's head in, the speed at which they worked ... but no.

Not our flat. Our flat ... well, Kaitlyn — Katie? — Kaitlyn — we cycled through third flatmates pretty quickly at the end there, but I think it was Kaitlyn, the last one, who said it was the garden. The garden that did it in, I mean.

Kaitlyn always seemed to have trouble getting back to our place. I always thought she was just getting lost, having moved from Cramond. Out beyond the bypass, I used to think that was another world. Now, if I'm right about what that window in the garden, Callum's found a whole new definition of other world.

I'm not making sense, am I? It's okay, I didn't think I was making sense to myself either. A lot of things stopped making sense, the more time we spent in the garden — and we ended up spending a lot of time there, because the walls were high enough to block out all the noise from the streets and the trees were thick enough that you thought you were ... well. You still knew you were outside

But, right, the stuff that didn't make sense. At first, it was little stuff, stuff that didn't matter. Like how no matter how tightly shut the windows overlooking the garden were, things still fell out — a pen here, an empty bottle there. Small things, small enough that when we went out to search for them, it didn't matter that we couldn't find them.

We didn't like going too far out into the garden, any of us. Close to the building, it was nice — we had some chairs under the ivy, and it felt safe and not ... falling apart, like it sometimes felt like inside. But the further into the garden we ventured, the odder it felt.

Headaches. Dizziness. Flowers that seemed to move a metre in the time it took you to blink, except they'd always been there, flowers can't move. The whole thing felt sick and malleable, like sticking your finger in gum that someone'd just spat out. Oh, don't look at me like that, you were in primary school once, too.

And besides, that paled in comparison to the face I saw whenever I wasn't looking directly at the window. Every time it was somewhere off to the side of my vision, I could see it. Something human, I think. It had Callum's hair and a mouth full of — no, too full of teeth. Really fucking sharp teeth.

So yeah, we never went too far into the garden, especially when it was just, like, a spoon that we had a million others of. But then it was bigger things. An entire pot plant, once! And Callum and I and whoever our third flatmate was at the time would go out and look, and venture further and further into the yard, and still never find it.

What we did find one day, and then every day after, was rocks — a whole line of them, leading out to that pristine window. At least, it must have been that same window. Except, you know, things are supposed to decay when you leave them out that many months, especially with our weather. But the window just got ... nicer.

And the rocks didn't move, after we found them. Callum and I did, though, eventually. I don't remember what we'd been looking for, but I do remember the moment we decided it was time. We followed the rocks, in their strange loop around and around the garden, getting closer and closer to the window. Allan was out there with us the day we followed the path, but I don't think he was walking with us.

He picked up a rock, I think. I don't even remember if it was one from the spiral path or not. But I remember him, all the way across the garden, holding the rock, and his face — he was saying something about how nice it'd look in the kitchen, but his mouth was so wide, his face was so long, and the more I looked at him the more I was convinced he had ... not extra fingers, like, but extra bones in his fingers.

He moved out the next day. I mean, he must have, because I don't remember seeing him after that. We didn't even get any of his leftover post, which is funny, because you know the Royal Mail. I don't — I never looked in the third room after that. I mean, I didn't usually, we were always good about respecting each others' spaces, but that room ... after Allan moved out, I tried to forget that door was even there.

Callum found our next flatmate, the girlfriend of one of his coworkers. It was one of the last useful things he did before he became too obsessed with those stupid rocks, and everything else in the garden. Sketching the rocks, the window, the birds I could neither see nor hear. Me, I was too worried about how every time I walked in the front door, I thought I recognised the place a little less.

I went through all the reasons I was just imagining it. Misplaced things. Tiredness. Callum letting the cleaning slip because of his dreich drawings, the constant cycle of third flatmates with decorations of their own. I was spending too much time at my girlfriend's place. The flat was the same wreck I'd loved since I first set foot in it, I was just, I dunno, losing patience with how long it took the landlord to send anyone over to fix things.

I tried adding more and more of my own touches to the flat. Moved some books into the hall. Hung up some scarves. Filched a shipping pallet from the shop downstairs and turned it into kitchen shelving unit. Those things moved around too, though. Callum or whoever else was living with us or—

I don't want to say it, but I have to, don't I? It was the man from the window. The one whose face I could only see when I wasn't trying. Callum barely left his room, and the third flatmates were more and more distant from us, they wouldn't care, right? But there was something else behind that window, and someone wanted the places to look exactly the same.

I kept making the excuses, though. That was the very first flat where I paid rent on my own, it was mine. I was the only one putting any work into it by the end, even though I'd long given up on getting our deposit back. I thought I would do whatever it took to stay there.

And maybe the excuses would have worked for longer, except I came home early one day and when I walked into the kitchen it wasn't the kitchen at all, but the garden, and Callum was walking through the window, sketchbook in hand.

I left the kitchen immediately, of course. And suddenly that conviction that I needed to stay was just ... gone. It was just a flat, and I cared as much about it as I'd cared about the halls at uni.

I don't know if that makes me sound more or less terrible when I say I cleaned out my room before I left the flat? Most of my stuff lived at my girlfriend's by then, but I still had some books and shirts that I liked, and I knew I would never see the flat again.

Yeah, I said what I said. See the flat again. Maybe even the building. Not just never go back. That garden was always too overgrown for anyone's good. I'm not stupid enough to think it would stop with the kitchen. And that's why I cleaned out my room — that shit was mine, I wasn't about to let some skinny bastard with too many teeth have it. Even if that skinny bastard used to have my best friend's face.

Jessa and I live in Morningside now. The students and the face in the window can have the city centre. I hope Katie — Kaitlyn — our last old flatmate ended up somewhere good as well.

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Statement ends.

Well. Quite the story there, from Ms Ambarsan. I almost would have liked to see the garden myself, for all she talked it up, but Edinburgh Council records show no trace of a building at 33 Bell's Wynd.

The Wynd itself is a narrow close running between the Royal Mile and Tron Square. It frankly doesn't look big enough for any of the flats there to have a garden like the one Ms Ambarsan described, even if the building exists. Existed.

I am reminded rather uncomfortably of Case 0122204, describing an incident of similarly inexplicable phenomena in Old Fishmarket Close. There is rather too little distance between the two streets for my liking.

Perhaps a trip for one of my assistants is in order. I wonder what Sasha has in her diary for next week?

End recording.