My garden is not made of lilies and roses, though it has many thorns. It is guarded and wild and noone knows it but me. It is my secret place and I'm the only one who owns the key. Yes, nobody knows about its existence and worse, noone believes in it. Except me. For a while though, I forgot it was there. Like Alice, I was lost in a maze and couldn't find my way back. It took me a while to return, but I'm here now. In the safest place in the world.

I feel warm and free here. At last I feel. My heart is stammering in my chest, my lips curved in a smile, my hands shaking from relief. I am home. My eyes caress the valley and mounds, the ridges and hollows, the ever changing greens with familiarity and awe. Nothing has changed. I still belong here. And I'm still welcomed to return as often as I wish. My secret garden was waiting for me.

My beautiful best kept secret, my solitary haven with its torturous paths and ominous silences. The only place in the whole universe where I can be myself without fear, without being judged. It had been a long time since I had returned and I missed being here. And I was missed.

There's a lot of work needing to be done. Some mending only I can do. There's a dam at the very heart of my garden, a dam full of cracks. How long would it have held out, if I hadn't returned to restore it? I don't want to find out. I hope I never will. Its breaking would destroy the whole place and me with it I fear.

My garden looks strong and organised from afar. Like a "jardin à la française"* with its symmetrical and perfect beauty that looks like it was created by a mathematician rather than an artist or Nature. Before I came here, everything that threatened to disrupt its order and quietness, each wild grass, was ruthlessly destroyed. But with me, some wilderness returned. I pulled down the walls erected to protect its fragile equilibrium, brick by brick. I watered the neglected alley leading to its heart with my tears when I found out how deserted it was. And I let the winds of change reshape the rest of it. I didn't want to change my garden too much though. For all its flaws, I still loved what I had found the first time I came. I just wanted to give it enough strength to grow the way it needed to. Very soon, cornflowers took the place of all the orchids. The paths became clearer if still sinuous. There's a brightness now that wasn't there before even if some darkness remains.

My garden still holds many secrets from me, it will take me a lifetime to learn them all. There are still hidden places I discover each time I come. Some are so dark and frightening, it can scare you off. They're like caverns at the centre of the earth, you have to be willing to travel deep in obscurity to find their concealed beauties. But once there, you'll find precious gems noone has ever seen. Complicated and fragile crystalline formations that cast so much light it brings tears to your eyes. It took me a long time to find the strength to go that deep, to gather the faith necessary for the journey, but I had always known there was beauty awaiting me. I always believed.

I wished I could stay longer but there's a storm brewing. I don't want to leave the peace I find and bring here but staying would be too dangerous. Maybe with me gone, the storm will not harm my secret. It's hard to leave for the trees turn into brambles to stop me. The thorns claw at me, trying to keep me inside, unwilling to let me go knowing my heart's true wishes. But stubbornly I resist, fighting for a way out, struggling... until suddenly the limbs holding my arms finally release me. The thorns have drawn blood, it drips from my body to the ground nourishing it and scarring it. I have little time, forked lightning are already flashing the sky but I cast a last glance to my garden. I've been hurt here before but I have to let it know I don't mind the blood. For all the pain I felt in this forsaken place, it's still better than any joy I was allowed to in the outside. I vow to come back. One day. Soon, I promise. We will both wait for that moment. No matter how distant. And when I return I will once again lose myself in the green depths I so long for.

THE END

*Jardin à la française = Formal garden

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