‘It’s only a book. It fell off that bookshelf,’ Neena said, picking it up.
My heart thudded. It wasn’t only a book. It was The Terrible Sad History of Little Cherrybliss. And the regulation grey jacket I’d put on carefully just minutes before had fallen off.
As if the book didn’t want to be covered up.
‘Sorrel?’ said Neena.
‘Yeah?’ I gasped, with great effort.
‘Your fingers are going mental.’
She was right. My fingers moved and danced in the air in front of us, as if they were playing a tune on an invisible piano. Almost as if they were speaking to me – and I knew what they wanted.
My fingers want to sow.
They wanted to sprinkle and scatter and shower and shake over. They wanted to dash and drop and dust and drip and dance and dribble. They wanted to send off and send loose and send flying. And they really, really wanted to sprinkle those seeds.
A fully formed thought bubbled up inside my brain as if somebody had planted it there. The Surprising Seeds did not want to be sealed up any longer. They wanted to get out into the world.
And I would be the one to set them free.
The shrill school bell ripped through the air and my fingers stopped twitching.
Hesitantly, I picked up the packet of Surprising Seeds, but it was cold to the touch once more. I stuffed it into my rucksack and exhaled deeply, my head throbbing.
‘Where did you say those seeds came from?’ asked Neena, her eyes shining.
I forced out a weak grin. ‘Our patio.’ My thoughts raced over each other desperately, like busy little worker ants late for their first shift.
I got up shakily and pulled Neena to her feet, a plan forming in my head. ‘I’m coming round after school, aren’t I?’
She nodded. ‘What do you fancy doing?’
‘I’ve got an idea. It’s a bit … weird.’
Neena grinned. ‘I love it already.’
ON THE WALK back to Neena’s house, we put our plan into action.
Neena went first. ‘Mum, how do you go about sowing a seed?’
Mrs Gupta looked up from her mobile with a distracted glance. ‘Sow a seed?’ she repeated slowly, as if we’d just asked for a slice of the moon on a plate.
‘Yeah. I was just, you know, idly wondering. For a friend. In theory.’
Mrs Gupta’s forehead creased in thought. ‘I wouldn’t … actually know. Haven’t ever done that myself.’
‘Is there anywhere in town that might help? You know, a sowing seed sort of shop?’ I asked lightly.
Mrs Gupta looked up at the sky, frowning. ‘You could try a gardening centre. They might be able to help.’
‘Is there one in Little Sterilis?’ asked Neena.
‘I think there was one here when I was a kid. It might have closed down by now. I can’t even remember where it is. Run by a bit of a character, from what I heard. Anyway, you’ll have to find out yourself. I’ve got loads to do when we get home. A report, a couple of cold calls, a huge spreadsheet to put together …’
Mrs Gupta worked in the sales department of Valentini Constructions, something Neena did not like to talk about.
I persisted, knowing we’d need some options if this mythical gardening centre didn’t materialise. ‘What about the supermarket? Does that sell any gardening stuff?’
‘They scrapped the gardening aisle a long time ago. What’s all this about, girls?’
‘Nothing,’ we said together.
*
‘Are you sure this is the right street?’ I asked, an hour later.
‘I think so,’ said Neena, mopping her forehead and squinting at her mobile again. ‘This app thinks we’re standing right in front of it.’
Our plan to find the gardening centre had been going so well. Once we’d got back home, Neena had asked her mum if we could go to the corner shop to get some sweets. Mrs Gupta, staring at some numbers on her laptop, had merely nodded absently, and we’d slipped away before she’d asked us how long we would be.
‘Once she gets like that, she loses track of time anyway,’ Neena had said confidently. But we’d been searching for the best part of an hour and there was still no sign of it.
I was losing patience. Neena said she’d downloaded the right map, but it had led us to a part of Little Sterilis I’d never seen before – a rundown street with a betting shop and a large car park, and little else.
After another ten fruitless minutes of plodding up and down the same road, peering uncertainly into dusty shopfronts, I was about to suggest we go back to Neena’s house to come up with a Plan B.
Then I saw it.
On the other side of the road. Nestled between the multistorey car park and a boarded-up book shop was a narrow alleyway, dark with shadows. It was so choked with weeds and overhanging creeping plants we must have missed it the first million times we’d walked past it.
‘Do you think that’s it?’ I asked.
‘Only one way to find out.’
We crossed the road. At the opening of the alleyway was a faded wooden sign hammered into a plank. Most of the words were covered in a dark green mould. I read what was left.
‘STRANGEWAYS,’ I read aloud. ‘RUN. NOW.’ I gulped. ‘Perhaps this isn’t such a good idea …’
Neena wiped the sign gently with the frayed sleeve of her Grittysnit cardigan. Gradually the rest of the words appeared through the mould. The sign now read:
STRANGEWAYS GARDEN CENTRE
FAMILY-RUN BUSINESS
NOW OPEN
She patted my shoulder triumphantly. ‘This is the place.’
I peered into the murky tunnel, so tangled with stalks and leaves and hanging-down things it was hard to see anything on the other side. A trickle of icy sweat dripped down my neck. But my fingers gave a sudden twitch and burned painfully, reminding me why we were there.
‘Come on then,’ I said, hoping I sounded braver than I felt, and we plunged into the tunnel.
Instantly the sweat on my skin cooled. I pushed something fine and sticky away from my face and tried not to shudder.
A few moments later, we emerged in front of a crumbling red building that was smothered in a creeping twisty plant. The place was so overgrown that even the light was green. It felt like we were on a different planet.
‘Hello? Anyone here?’ called Neena.
Nobody answered, but I had the feeling we weren’t alone. The building seemed to fill up with silence, as if it was waiting for us to say something else. Even the heart-shaped leaves that twisted round its bricks stopped rustling.
‘Hello?’ I tried. My voice echoed around the courtyard and came back to us. ‘Oh … oh … oh …’
Still