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The door scraped across its track, and I stepped lamp-less off of the veranda and toward the winter-thinned plum trees. The sky loomed close, like a cluster of black, shining eyes following my every footfall inside the garden’s recesses.

I heaved the compost bucket to the far edge of the garden and threw its contents into a cold barrel, then hurried away, empty bucket banging my thigh as I hurried toward the house.

The warm pressure of a large hand on my shoulder halted me in my path. I didn’t wonder whose hand. I knew, and braced myself.

A voice at my ear spoke, “Shh. Don’t be afraid.”

I spun around, thrusting Ansei back with the momentum of my turn.

“If you don’t want to frighten me, then don’t sneak up on me alone in the dark.”

He retreated a step and bowed low.

“I’m sorry. I should have called you by your name, but I did not know it.”

This tale has been unlawfully obtained from Royal Road. If you discover it on Amazon, kindly report it.

I averted my gaze. “You had better not call me anything. The house is full of gossips, and I’ve no business with the new gardener.”

His hand reached again for my shoulder as I turned to leave.

“Your name? Please?” His language was unusually courteous, for a man’s discourse. But that might have been customary under such circumstances.

I was of no mind to answer him. It was my tongue that betrayed me.

“Furi—”

“Furi.” He repeated my name with a whisper, but his next words were bold enough.

“Stay a minute. Let me treat you.”

His right palm revealed a bright red apple. His left, a blade. With a flick of the wrist, he divided the fruit.

I had no idea from where he had taken the apple. Madame had no tree and its season was behind us.

“Where did you get it?”

“I worked at an orchard before coming here.”

“You mean you stole it from a merchant in the village!” I swallowed back the fluid the apple had called into my mouth. “Anyway, I’m not hungry.”

He bit loudly into the apple’s crisp skin—a kind of taunt, I thought, as I dashed up the stairs and into the house.

* * *

I discovered the lump later that evening as I undressed for bed. Reaching inside my stiff, canvas apron, I withdrew the second half of Ansei’s apple. He had managed to slip it into my apron, and I hadn’t detected it in the exterior pocket.

I passed the fruit under my nose and inhaled its gentle fragrance, wondering. Was he playing some kind of a game? I frowned at the apple, even while my mouth watered, wanting to eat it. But it also felt heavy with obligation.

What would Ansei expect in exchange for it? I didn’t like to eat stolen goods. And yet, returning the apple was also a risk. I would have to go back to the garden in secret and meet him again. This must be what he had wanted. Perhaps it would be best to eat it and destroy the evidence at once.

Sitting under the deep cedar eaves of the mill, I bit into the illicit apple, and instantly regretted. And yet, the flesh beneath that bitter surface was sweeter than any fruit I had ever tasted. Its complicated flavors stained my throat all the way to my belly.

Something about the apple troubled me. It seemed to me as though the fruit were an oracle—a promise of what was to come, foretelling perfect sweetness, wrapped in a skin of cruel bitterness.