wings | bbc ghosts

9 | keep it all in

Whilst the ghosts were preoccupied with a space documentary, or just doing their own thing, the three alive residents of Button House were working hard in the garden, attempting to achieve a miracle.

Alison and Violet were cutting and trimming down some plants and Mike was doing some heavy lifting of rubble and broken fencing.

"Ow! Stupid plant!" Violet exclaimed as a lower stinging nettle grazed across her exposed ankle. Stressed out, and exhausted too, she took off her gardening gloves to itch her ankle. Then, when she was half satisfied that she could ignore the annoying feeling, she got to work again.

Soon enough, the three of them took a quick coca cola break then resumed the task. Not that she had ever taken part in a lot of gardening in her life so far, but Violet thought it would have been less chaotic. Even without the time crunch hovering over them, there was a lot of upkeep to be managed with this place.

She grabbed the second wheelbarrow to take away the waste as Mike and Alison filled up the other one. They didn't really know what they were doing yet with what they had pulled apart.

"What should we do with all this?" she heard Mike ask.

"Maybe just pile it up over there and deal with it later." Alison suggested halfheartedly.

Violet nodded as she manoeuvred the waste to a corner of the garden area.

'Deal with it later...' she thought. She's used that option many a time in her life and is yet to confront it and give herself some answers. All of those different life experiences that are haunting her during the night are surfacing. Perhaps it will soon explode.

Initially she thought it was because she had moved to a new place and had actually been given a place to stay. But, why when something good happens to her, did she have to be reminded of the bad? The mistreatment, the rejection, the deaths. She misses her nan. She misses her grandad. She wishes her mother never turned out the way she did.

The paranoia of everything with Mike and Alison being too good to be true lingering in her mind because everything has to come crashing down eventually.

Doesn't it?

"Violet! Come over here!" Alison called over to her, waving her hand in a motion to say 'come over here quickly'.

The girl walked back over as quickly as her little legs could, bringing the wheelbarrow over with her as she did. She assumed there was more foliage to get rid of but was surprised to see a statue.

"How are we going to move that?" Mike said, appalled at the additional chore in front of him.

But then soon an idea sparked in his head.
"I think we might have to break it up with a big hammer or something."

"What? We can't do that! Can we?" Alison questioned the idea, unsure at first but almost slightly excited at the idea of it.

"Well it's better than having to try and lift it," Violet pointed out, hoping they were going to break it up because she didn't know how much more she could do in one day.

"Yeah, why not?" Mike agreed.

"Florence!!!" the ever so cheerful Kitty approached them as she saw the uncovered statue.

"Oh no..."

"I can already tell this isn't good news." Mike said, ticked off, he could tell that this was just going to be a repeated situation like earlier.

"Who's Florence, Kitty?"

Violet listened to the background of Florence, horrified at what Kitty was saying. She knew there was more to her story and admittedly was curious about her life. The small insight left Violet feeling sorry for her but happy that at least she had a friend in Florence and she wasn't alone.