The Night the Honeysuckle Bled

Before we bought our fixer-upper on Cypress Lane, we lived in the basement unit of a crumbling Victorian that had been split into three apartments. The landlord, a man named Mr. Delacroix, had a fondness for neglected gardens, and our single window looked out onto a tangle of honeysuckle that had wrapped itself around the fire escape like a green fist. The apartment itself smelled of damp plaster and old pennies, and the walls were thin enough to hear the couple upstairs arguing about things that happened decades ago.

My partner, Elias, had lived there for eight years before I moved in, and he swore the building was harmless. ‘It’s just old,’ he’d say, kissing my forehead. ‘Old houses creak. Old pipes gurgle. You’ll get used to it.’ But I never did. There was a particular draft that moved through the living room, even with the windows sealed, and it always carried the faint scent of burnt sugar, like someone had left a pot on the stove long ago and it had charred into the wallpaper.

The first benign thing happened on a Tuesday evening. Elias was in the kitchenette, making us grilled cheese sandwiches, and I was sitting on the edge of the pull-out sofa, reading a library book about local flora. The television was off, and the only light came from a dented standing lamp. As I turned a page, the air behind me shifted. It wasn’t a draft; it was a pressure change, like someone had stepped into the room and closed the door. Then I felt a warmth on my right shoulder, soft and heavy, like a hand placed there without weight. I turned, expecting Elias, but no one was there. The warm pressure moved up, brushing the hair from my ear, and then I heard it – a breath, not just a sound but a sensation, as if someone had inhaled deeply right beside my head and then let it out slow against my skin. My blood ran cold, and I dropped the book.

When Elias returned with the sandwiches, he took one look at me and set the plates down. ‘You’ve got that look,’ he said. ‘What did you see?’ I told him about the breath, and he didn’t laugh. He sat next to me, his face pale under the forty-watt bulb. ‘I’ve felt that,’ he said quietly. ‘It’s been worse since you moved in. It’s like it’s waking up.’ I asked him what he meant, but he just shook his head. ‘I don’t know. But it’s not angry. It’s curious.’

That night, I couldn’t sleep. I lay in bed, listening to the building settle, and around 2 a.m., I heard a faint sound from the living room – a soft ticking, like a clock, but we had no clock in there. I got up and peered out. The sofa was empty, but the honeysuckle outside the window had darkened, the tubular blossoms seeming to droop, as if they were wilting. On the windowsill, I saw a small, dark amber bottle that I’d never seen before, and it was leaking a viscous, honey-like liquid that dripped down the glass and pooled on the sill. I touched it with my fingertip, and it was warm, and it smelled like burnt sugar. I must have been sleepwalking, I told myself, but my fingers were sticky for hours.

The second benign thing happened three weeks later, on a Sunday morning. I was watering a potted fern that Elias had bought, and as I reached over to the window, I heard my name spoken from behind me – not a whisper, but a clear, low voice that said, ‘Margaret.’ I spun around. There was no one. But the fern’s leaves were trembling, and on the floor beside my foot lay a single white petal, like from a gardenia, though we had no gardenias in the house. I picked it up, and it dissolved into a fine dust that scattered in the light from the window.

I couldn’t shake it. I started reading about the house’s history. Mr. Delacroix was evasive, but I found old tax records at the library. The house had been built in 1902 by a reclusive botanist named Dr. Archibald Vane, who had planted the honeysuckle himself. He had a daughter, Celeste, who had died of a fever in 1911, at the age of nineteen. There was a note in a local newspaper: ‘After Celeste’s death, Dr. Vane withdrew entirely, and his gardens grew wild. He was found dead in 1919, sitting at his desk, with a half-drunk cup of tea and a single honeysuckle blossom in his hand.’

The records showed that our basement unit had once been Dr. Vane’s study. I told Elias, and he grew anxious. ‘I think it’s her,’ I said. ‘Celeste. She’s trying to reach out.’ Elias gripped my arm. ‘No, Margaret. It’s not her. It’s him.’ He confessed that he had seen things too – a shadow that moved in the hallway, a cold spot by the door – but he had been afraid to scare me. ‘The morning I found you at the window, with that bottle, I saw something in the reflection,’ he said. ‘A man in a long coat, with a beard, and he was holding the bottle. He looked… sad.’

That night, I couldn’t ignore it. I placed a notepad and pen on the nightstand and said out loud, ‘If you’re here, show me a sign.’ At midnight, the pen lifted on its own and wrote in a jagged script: ‘The honeysuckle is not for him. It is for her. He buried her beneath it.’ My heart hammered. I ran to the window and looked at the twisted plant. In the moonlight, the roots looked like veins, and the soil around the base seemed disturbed, as if something had been dug up and replaced. I grabbed a flashlight and went outside, ignoring Elias’s shouts. I knelt in the damp earth and began to dig. After a few inches, my fingers hit something brittle – a bone. I uncovered more: a delicate skeleton, tangled in roots, with a locket around its neck. The locket opened to reveal a photograph of a young woman with dark curls, and a date etched inside: ‘Celeste.’

I screamed, and Elias ran out and pulled me away. He called the police, but by the time they arrived, the hole had filled with water from a broken sprinkler, and the bones were gone. The only evidence was the locket, which I had clutched in my hand. The officer noted that the locket was still intact, but when he tried to open it, it wouldn’t budge. The next day, we moved out, and we bought the house on Cypress Lane. But sometimes, when the wind blows through that new house, I smell burnt sugar. And once, I saw the shadow of a man in a long coat, standing in the garden, holding a hoe. He was planting something new.

I’ve never told anyone the full story, but I keep the locket in a wooden box. It’s warm to the touch, and at night, I can feel it pulse. And every so often, I think I hear a girl’s voice, soft and curious, asking, ‘Why did you take me from the roots?’ I don’t answer. I just hold the locket and wait, because I know she’s still there, and now, so is he, and the honeysuckle on Cypress Lane hasn’t bloomed once – not even in spring. It just grows, thick and tangled, and every leaf is veined with a red that looks almost like blood.