The absence of light

Philip was conscientious, and when he’d made the decision to garden, he was diligent about it.

His garden faced north, but he made it work, he dug in the things he was supposed to dig in, installed a compost bin, complained when Jess threw veg scraps away rather than put them in there, he forked his compost over, tended it, when he turned it over and there was a writhing mass of worms he checked a textbook; it said this was good, he derived deep satisfaction from this.

But a lot of plants died, he’d check in the morning and there was nothing there. His pansies, his ox-eye daisies, his callaloo. Checked and tended. Nothing left.

“Probably slugs” said Jess, and Philip’s heart sank, he knew she was right.

Philip was conscientious, and when he made the decision to destroy the slugs in his garden, he was diligent about it.

Some books said salt, others waxed lyrical about copper wiring. Philip bought a sack of salt, and some lengths of copper wire. “Just get pellets” said Jess, but that didn’t sit well, too easy, and a nagging feeling that the people who wrote the gardening columns he read might frown at that.

So Philip sank little traps of cut-down plastic bottles full of beer in the corner of his beds, went out at dawn and twilight with gloves, a bucket and a pair of scissors, and slaughtered them. He built a pond for frogs, a little stack of old wood for hedgehogs, made a home for anything that might help. He checked his traps in the morning, felt a small shudder of joy to see the jellified mass in their bottoms. Looked skywards and innocent as he tipped the contents over next-door’s fence.

The plants began to recover. His perpetual spinach was luxuriant, his broad beans rocketed skywards. He began to dream of the meals he saw in the lifestyle pages.

“This?” he would say nonchalantly to guests “just grabbed some stuff from the garden, simplicity itself.”

One night he and Jess watched a few episodes of something she’d bought in a box-set. It was well-made, Philip could tell, there was something glossy about the quality of the film, something snappy about the dialogue. They drank an inexpensive but carefully chosen and surprisingly good wine. He slept, dreamlessly. Jess had to work in the morning. Not Philip, though, a well-earned day off for him, maybe do some gardening.

He was woken by a scream, hard, high and piercing, stumbled out of bed, stubbed his toe on the door jam and hopped, cursing , at the head of the stairs. Another scream. He half walked, half-skidded down the stairs. Jess was stood in the centre of the kitchen, slowly looking from one window to the other. The lights were on, he checked his watch. Half-seven. There was no natural light. The kitchen lights blazed in their recesses.
“Bit dark” said Philip “stormy out?” then he remember it was a scream that had got him out of bed “what’s the matter? Sorry, I mean, are you all right?”. Jess pointed

Every window in the kitchen, the conservatory, even the newly installed skylight in the study, was black, an utter absence of light.

“But it’s morning” said Philip, he waved his wrist. Jess still pointed. He stepped closer, blinking, to the window.

There was an utter absence of light, because the window was covered on slugs, jammed end to end, not a sliver of light between them, their feet pulsating gently on the double-glazing. He checked the conservatory, the same, a million contracting and expanding feet. He ran upstairs, the same in the bedroom, the box room. A few were coming in through the open bathroom window, he pulled it shut, chopping a few in half. One slug, sent spiralling by the action landed perfectly on the wall and started to climb. Philip stared at it. He ran downstairs. Opened a book

“There’s something in here” he said “I’m sure there is”. Jess sat down at the kitchen table. It was early, but she’s opened the wine anyway.