The Sunken Garden

In the autumn of 1987, when I was fifteen, my parents put me on an Amtrak train from Philadelphia to Portland, Oregon, to attend my brother Julian’s wedding. My mother said it would make up for missing my sophomore year field trip to the Liberty Bell because we’d moved again, and my father muttered something about how I might like the West Coast so much I’d decide to stay. Whatever the reason, I was thrilled.

Julian and his fiancée, Elena, lived in a converted Victorian in the Sellwood neighborhood, just two blocks from the Willamette River. I arrived the day before their small civil ceremony. They were both radiant, eager to play tour guide, and Elena even joked that a week wouldn’t be enough time to show me everything, hinting they might keep me longer. Julian, however, had not mentioned that Elena had been diagnosed with a severe dissociative disorder, and she’d stopped taking her medication three days after I arrived.

At first, it was subtle. Elena would pause mid-sentence, staring at the wall as if listening to something. She’d laugh at things no one said. Then, on the night before the wedding, she insisted on showing me the garden behind their house. It was overgrown, with a crumbling stone fountain at its center, long dried up. She knelt by the fountain’s edge, tracing the cracked basin.

‘Do you hear it?’ she whispered, her eyes wide. ‘The water. It’s always been here. They buried it when they built the fountain, but it’s still down there.’ I heard nothing but the wind. Julian pulled me aside, his face pale. ‘She’s off her meds,’ he said. ‘She’s been having episodes. I’m sorry, I didn’t know it would get this bad. But the wedding is tomorrow, and she’s set on it. Please, just go along with whatever she says.’

I agreed, but that night I woke to the sound of digging. Through the window, I saw Elena in the garden with a shovel, her robe ghostly in the moonlight. She was uprooting the fountain’s flagstones, heaving them aside, her arms caked with mud. I ran out. ‘Elena, what are you doing?’ She looked at me, her face streaked with dirt, a wild grin on her lips. ‘Found it,’ she said. ‘The old well. They capped it to hide the sound, but it’s singing to me. Come listen.’ She pulled me to the hole she’d dug. There, beneath the stones, was a circle of darkness—an ancient well, filled with stagnant water that glinted like a black mirror. A low hum emanated from it, a sound that seemed to vibrate in my bones. I felt a pull, a primal urge to lean in, to listen closer. Julian appeared behind us, frantic. ‘Get inside!’ he shouted. He dragged me away, but Elena stayed, humming along with the well.

The wedding was a disaster. Elena stood at the altar, but her eyes were vacant, and she kept muttering about the ‘sleepers below.’ The justice of the peace looked horrified. Julian gave her a reassuring squeeze, but she didn’t seem to notice. That night, after the guests left, I found her in the garden again, now standing on the edge of the well, peering down. ‘They’re almost awake,’ she said. ‘I’ve been feeding them. They want a new sleeper.’ I backed away, but Elena turned and smiled. ‘You’re the one. You have to come down. It’s the only way to keep the water from rising.’

I ran to my room and locked the door. Through the walls, I heard Julian’s muffled pleas, then Elena’s eerie lullabies. The next morning, Julian was gone. Elena sat at the kitchen table, serene, humming the same tune. ‘He heard them too,’ she said. ‘He went to join them. But they’re still hungry.’ I called the police, but when they arrived, the well was filled with cement, fresh and smooth. Elena claimed Julian had run off with another woman. The police believed her. I didn’t.

I stayed for the remaining days, but every night I felt the floorboards vibrate with that hum. On my last night, I crept to the garden. The cement over the well was cracked, and from the fissures, a sweet, putrid smell seeped out. I saw a hand—bone-white, glittering with moisture—reach through the crack, and a voice echoed from below, ‘We have enough now. Go back, little brother. Leave us be.’ I fled to the train station and never returned.

Years later, I received a package with no return address. Inside was a single photograph: the garden, now pristine, the well uncapped, and a fountain shimmering with clear water. In the center of the photo, two figures stood—Julian and Elena, their faces peaceful, their eyes dark, empty wells. And in the background, a third shadow, blurry, rising from the water. On the back, in Elena’s handwriting: ‘They thank you for the sleeper.’ I stopped opening packages from the West Coast after that.