Boots in a Flowerbed

2. Another Park

He wields the shears with confidence, clipping off unruly ends of branches, very gently. Someone else might show much less mercy, forcing the bushes into stiff submission, making their sides straight and dense as walls. Not him, though. His eyes are used to more ragged beauty, to twisted and knurled shrubs that cling to sandy soil and sheer rock for dear life. He doesn't want to turn the bushes into columns or boxes or cones or giant balls, to deny them all resemblance of life. Clip go the shears and a dried branch falls to the ground. Clip they go again, and then they falter. He sees the shadow.

Of course the clothes are different each time, but he knows the figure inside them. He knows the leisurely step and the carriage of the head, and his mouth goes dry. Quickly he gathers the cuttings and stuffs them into the basket that sits patiently at his feet, moves to the next one. His hands are trembling a little, and in a moment he'll berate himself for it. But not now. Now he wants to get away.

He's not told anyone about this. Not of the boots in his flowerbed, nearly a month ago. Not of the man whom he's seen almost every day ever since. When his little team finished working in that little park by Luellor Avenue and moved to the next one, he thought that would be it. He had been so relieved to be rid of the figure that always seemed to find him, invariably hovering somewhere in the vicinity, while he worked. But less than a week later, when he'd been spreading fertilizer to a cluster a rose bushes, he'd caught a glimpse of a familiar shape in the corner of his eye. And he could swear that the man had smiled in delight.

This is the fifth park now, and here the man is again. It's difficult to ignore him, but the dark boy is doing his best. He hasn't once looked directly at his stalker, yet he'd know the man anywhere. Not the face; he's not at all sure if he'd know the face. But the figure, the posture, the way of walking, those he'd recognize any time. The man is rather young. Well dressed and groomed. With the air of supreme self-confidence. The boy doesn't know why the man makes him so nervous. Is it because the man has done nothing? Is it because he doesn't know what this is all about? Is it because he doesn't know?

The blonde man is walking, or rather ambling, along the sandy path. His hands are in his pockets, that much the boy can see without raising his head, and he slows down but does not stop. Nobody would notice anything odd. They'd see an idle gentleman taking a morning stroll through a park where a young, dark-haired gardener is busy at work. But the boy remembers deep brown eyes, and he swallows. He will not turn his head.

At last the bushes look like they should. He snatches the last of the trash from the ground, glad to be going away. Then he has to walk past the man, and he turns to go. The shears, so carelessly he's shoved them into his basket, they slip over the side and fall with a heavy thump. He starts, heart leaping, sees the crown of a pale ash-blonde head. The man has crouched to pick up the shears, straightens himself, turns them around so that he can offer them to the boy with the handles first.

He's tall.

"Thank you." The boy doesn't look up.

"You're welcome."

He crams the shears once more into the basket and flees, that resonant voice still ringing in his ears.