The Daisy Cutter

A young boy observes a man's daily ritual of cutting back a stand of daisies and becomes increasingly intruiged by the reasons behnid it...

     I saw him again yesterday ambling through the woods as the sun touched the tops of the trees, the rusted shears swinging in his hand.
     I first saw him three months ago whilst playing on the fringes of the wood; he was crouched on the edge of a small stand of birch, his face a grim mask of concentration and his hands hanging loosely between his legs as he stared at the ground. He was a big man, rangy with heavy features and a shaggy sloping brow; the kind of man who looked more useful with his hands rather than his mind. As I crept closer, the twigs beneath my trainers crackled and startled him. He straightened quickly and brushing his hands upon his jeans, strode off in the direction of the road not looking back.

     He returned a week later; I had noticed a car partially obscured by the brush and decided to investigate. Sure enough I caught sight of the camo-jacketed man picking his way through the tree line. He took a circuitous route through the woods ensuring that he left behind the beaten track. It took him sometime to reach the same spot but when he did, he crouched again and began pulling at something in the earth. So earnest and forthright were his movements that I dared not approach, I watched him again from my hidden position and moved not a muscle. This time he produced a plastic bag from his pocket and began stuffing handfuls of something unseen hurriedly into it. It was difficult to see exactly what it was, but it certainly seemed that what ever he was taking from the ground was being pushed hastily into that bag. He remained there for a few minutes, his hands scouring the earth, before rising again and staring about. For a second his eyes fell and locked onto my concealed position, my heart skipped a beat as those eyes narrowed slightly. I was a statue, frozen through fear and necessity. Finally, he moved off, trampling over the rough ground and away. An oppressive silence filled the wood and it was a long time before my limbs acquired the strength to move themselves again.
Gingerly I made my way to the spot and stared at the ground. Nothing. Whatever had been taken from the soil had been removed completely. I pressed my fingers into the soft earth and felt its cool dampness on my skin.
     A bird took sudden flight, cawing raucously, shattering the surrounding quiescence and shredding my nerves. I took off running towards home, my heart slamming painfully in my chest, my mouth dry and my eyes tearing. I did not stop running until I reached home.
Over a cup of steaming tea, I vowed to return the following day.

     Cold fractured light filtered through the twisted branches as I tramped back up the slope towards the quiet stand of birch, my eyes furtive. As I approached the area I saw something lying on the ground, something pale and glowing faintly in the waning light. Casting about to ensure the strange man wasn�t around I hurried over to stare at the ground.
     Daisies. A thick, dazzling white carpet of fully grown daisies, waving slightly back and forth in the breeze, heads straining towards a sky that peeked down upon them through the interwoven tree canopy. I bent and ran a hand through them, feeling their snowy petals tickling the sides of my fingers. It wasn�t the fact that these flowers had sprung up in just one day that struck me as strange, nor the fact that they stood in a perfect oval at the foot of the silvery birch. It was the fact that it was mid-December and everything else had perished in the cracked and frosty ground.
     Carefully, I plucked one and held it up to the pallid sky; it was perfectly formed, its sun-gold centre casting the petals lowers aspects in a pale yellow. I turned it over in my fingers curious, almost spellbound. So involved was I with its symmetrical simplicity that I almost missed the soft crunch of footsteps and the swishing and crackling of branches. My heart skipped and the harsh chill of the ground coursed up through my trainers and turned my innards to ice.
     He had returned.
     He was early.
     Twisting away, my feet churned up the ground, scraping across the daisies and beheading a few. I flung myself headlong through the whipping branches, slithering back down the slope and causing white, speckled twisters of frost at my heels. I had no idea what it was about the man�s approach that had stimulated such a flight of fear but whatever it was gripped me completely. I ran all the way home.
     Once safely ensconced in the warmth of my bedroom, I deposited the daisy I had picked into a jar above my desk and returned to the fold of family life. I think my hasty and disruptive retreat must have alerted the man to an unwanted presence because he didn�t return to that spot for at least three weeks.
     During his period of absence, I had time to erect a hidden shelter in a knot of thicket from which to observe his actions. I began to watch the road that wound round the back of my house for sign of his car and realised that if hurried, I could make it to the copse before him. He attended most days and began before long, to bring shears with him with which to trim back the daisies� fastidious growth. On occasion he would cast what I recognised to be weed-killer on the ground; it was then that it struck me, he wasn�t collecting or harvesting daisies, he was attempting to destroy them. It was a revelation that piqued my curiosity further and I knew that I had to investigate further.

     This time, I took up some of my father�s gardening tools, the red handled trowel and three-pronged rake. I waited as I had done previously hunched, cross-legged in my little thicket-shelter clad in my brother�s old Army cadet fatigues. The Daisy Cutter arrived as evening pervaded the woodland and sunk the trees into sullen gloom. He cut, snipped, tore and hacked at the flowerbed, his breathing brusque and his movements snappy and urgent, eager to complete the task.
     He left.
     I waited, my heart thumping out a steady cadence in my ribcage.
     Unmoving, I waited for twenty minutes, until my knotted limbs were almost rigid with cramp. I limped over to the daisy patch, casting about and cocking my head bird-like listening.
I scratched away the black soil, sweat beading and freezing on my upper lip, my breath coiling away in the coldness. The light was failing badly and I had to squint to see past my hands. I plunged the trowel into the ground and levered up more of the stuff, casting it aside almost in frenzy. I used the rake, hauling clumps of soggy earth aside and sweeping it back with my left hand. The prongs of the rake snagged on a tree root and I pulled at it, it came free of the earth easily and flopped back against the ground. I shifted slightly and a shaft of sallow moonlight illuminated what I had unearthed.
     The hand was grey-livid against the blackness of the churned soil. Slender fingers outstretched and searching, grime encrusted fingernails gleaming faintly, the skin stretched across taut tendons. I scrabbled back from the grave, my tongue clogging the back of my throat and strangling the cry. My head felt as though it would burst, my heart was thumping pulses of blood and hormones into my brain overloading my senses. My eyes watered and my mouth parched.
     Something burst from the trees, a dark shape lumbering towards me, rangy and awkward, cursing and bellowing. A collision of whirling blackness and blasphemous snarlings.
I hurled the rake at the shape and scrambled away, thrashing through the undergrowth, ploughing back down the hillside through the thickest vegetation.
     I ran and I ran and I ran until I reached home.
     I did not look back.


And now the News at 6 o�clock with Heather Langdon:
��The funeral of murdered schoolgirl Josie Polaski took place today, five days after the 11 year old�s body was discovered in woodland on the outskirts of Dartmoor. She had been missing for almost three months after failing to return home from a school play on September the 15th.
In connection with this case, Devon and Cornwall Police have also stepped up the search for missing 14 year old Luke Parmenter, who first alerted the authorities to the grave on Sunday. He has been missing for 48 hours and police are becoming increasingly concerned for his safety��

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Author's Note

This is a new addition to the Writer's Cafe and was inspired by Seth Lakeman's 'The Ballard of Josie'.

Reviews

[Shadkim]

Woah! That was pretty cool. I liked your description of the man, making it obvious that he was a more physcial then mental being. And the use of daisies - one way to represent death (pushin' daisies) - was very creative. I didn't realize I was so concerned for the narrator until the news clip at the end. Things don't look good for him, but I'd still join the search party :) Very cool :D

[eccath]

You had my heart racing at the end! I didn;t realize I was feeling comassion for the character until the ending! Very well written!

[Jarrett]

Very descriptive and captivating; you simply had me hooked, needing to know how it ended. Very well written.

[Mel Stevens]

I like the story, the pace is set very well. You don't give away too much of the ending, giving the reader time to wonder. Good job.

[Chaos X 3]

Hmm... That was a really good story. It leaves me wondering what will grow upon his resting place. I am loving the way you end your stories with a lil blurbs of News stories. Awesome job.

-Dawn Marie

[Dave Lounsbury]

Great job as usual. You painted very clear image. The descriptions of the setting was really good, I could see the forest vividly.
Thanks for the read request, it's been awhile.
-Dave

[Carla (trying to make e..]

You know I love it.
I agree with Sammypookins....how do you have time to write new stuff?
I seem to be in a slump. I guess 14 degree weather 6 days in a row is depressing me....
But your stories always entertain me.
thanks,
Carla

[Fantasyfairy]

Wow, it's all I can think of to say. This piece kept me intriqued all the way from beginning to end. The way you wrote it was what struck me the most. It sounded almost like poetry. Your description is beautiful. The twist at the end really sent shivers down my spine. I like the added news report at the end too, ir really added to the mystery. XX

[An Ordinary Woman]

Well, I have a good case of goose bumps now. I sure hadn't expected the ended but I've read you enough times to know something was going to happen.

I never ever try and second guess you though cause you get me every time.
Excellent writing as always.

[Sammypookins]

Nice twisted little story. Tales of the unexpected would be proud. Great writing and at a time when most are just trying to get their stuff in order you pump out a new one. and it's a doozy! Atmospheric and slow burning got my attention and kept it. Loved it. Son of a gun. Sam x