Grow Your Own

Brenda Clough

How much care do you give your houseplants? Water, fertilizer, TLC? You better hope they’re grateful!

This story originally appeared in Ellery Queen’s Mystery Magazine.

The papyrus in the big plastic tub sighed. “This isn’t much like Egypt.”

“That’s right,” said the pink-flowered African violet. “How about some cooler humidity? and some real food? Maybe a pork chop.”

In the grip of a post-cocaine depression, the witch pretended not to hear. She continued to drip a very dilute solution of plant food onto the violet’s roots from a long-spouted watering can.

The smaller African violet was, in every sense, more immature. It had in fact graduated only last week into a three-inch pot. From beneath its single stalk of baby-blue flowers it whined, “I want some Haagen Dazs. I want some lox from Zabar’s. I want a standing rib roast, medium rare, with lots of pan gravy, and mashed potatoes made with cream and butter — ”

“Will you shut up!” The witch slammed the watering can down onto the radiator, knocking the humidity tray over. Pebbles and stale water sprayed over her faded jeans and shabby sandals. When she jumped back she almost lost her footing. The ceiling-high fiddle-leaf fig steadied her with a broad curvy leaf, but she shook it off. “Damn it, I’m as hungry as you are!” She bared her teeth in a humorless smile. “I’m the only one who really is hungry, and not for food either. All the rest of you are just reflecting me. Plants don’t eat roast beef, and you know it!”

“That pebble bruised my trunk,” the dieffenbachia mourned. It loved to wallow in self-pity, and now lowered a big spotted leaf down to rub the hurt. “We’re slaves, that’s all.”

“Chained by bonds of economic hardship,” said the big violet, who was pink in more ways than one. “Exploited by bloodsucking capitalists. Like wetbacks in tomato fields.”

“You’ve never even seen a wetback. You haven’t even seen a tomato! You have no independent life. I’m the one who used to be a socialist!” The witch ran her dirty fingers through her hair. “Other witches have cats for familiars, or toads!”

 ”I don’t like tomatoes,” the little blue violet announced thoughtfully.

“That’s me. I don’t like tomatoes.” The witch took hold of herself with an effort. “Look, we’re all in this together. The sooner you perfect the spell, the sooner I do some deals. Okay? And if you come through, I’ll even buy some lox for you to taste.”

The fiddle-leaf fig twitched its stems doubtfully, and the bad-tempered grapefruit tree actually scoffed, “Huh!” But the enormous spider plant, who in consequence of its many dangling spiderlets had a very motherly nature, said, “Show us the archetype again, honey.”

The witch dug down in her front jeans pocket and pulled out a crumpled baggie. Very carefully she flattened it and shook down the contents until all the white powder was collected at one end. Then she poured it out onto a pane of glass. Holding this carefully between both hands, she slowly circumnavigated the room, muttering the spell. After every plant got a good look at the heap of powder, she sprinkled a few grains onto their leaves. She eyed the remaining powder wistfully for some time. From another pocket she took a five-dollar bill. Rolling it tightly, she snorted the rest of the drug.

“Okay!” she said, giggling a little. “Now you’ve got to do it — there’s no more archetype! I’m going out, and I’ll be back soon.” Out on First Avenue a police car wailed north towards Harlem. The witch grinned foolishly and made an avert sign. “When I come back I want to see results!”

She left. The plants waited in silence for the big deadbolt to turn, and then the massive upper lock. Her footsteps receded down the stairs that the grapefruit tree, who had sprouted in this apartment from a seed, had never seen. “No independent life, huh? Hey, you’re shading me.”

“Sorry,” the papyrus said absently, and shook its sheaf of stems over a ways. “Is your bit almost done?”

For answer the grapefruit whipped a thin branch around hard. The eighteen-inch thorn on the end of it stuck deep into the window frame. “Ready any time you are,” it said with a nasty laugh. “Lucky one of us has thorns, huh? Since she doesn’t keep cactuses.”

“Cacti,” the papyrus corrected. “Don’t get swell-headed. We’d always have the dieffenbachia to fall back on.”

“That’s me, the second banana,” the dieffenbachia said dolefully, and when the little violet giggled, corrected itself: “Always the bridesmaid, never the bride.”

“Now wait a minute, Pappy,” the spider plant interrupted. “This talk of murder is curdling my sap. You promised me we’d give her a chance. We don’t know what will happen if we kill her. Suppose we regress? After all, she made us what we are. We can only talk and think because of her.”

“You’re greener than lettuce, toots,” the grapefruit said. “That’s what she says. We’re slaves, remember? Once we get good at growing vegetable alkaloids, she’ll keep us at it forever.” It began to snicker. “Greener than lettuce, get it?”

“I want it to be like that movie,” the little violet piped up. “The one with the singing plant that eats people.”

No one had ever seen a movie, but everyone understood. The papyrus ignored this artless request. “Of course we’ll give her a chance. And I’m sure she’ll be fair. We do what she wants, and then she does what we want. But I just want to be prepared for every eventuality.” Then it turned its attention to the sniveling dieffenbachia. “Come on, now — you’re not called the dumb-cane for nothing, you know! Without your help, she might even get off a word or two!”

“Oh boy, what a disaster that would be,” the pink violet agreed. “I don’t know which part of her gift is more powerful, the speaking or the proximity. We’re going to have to co-ordinate everything perfectly when the time comes — if it ever does.”

“‘Vaster than vegetable empires, and more slow,’” the papyrus misquoted. Since it had been chosen the leader of the conspiracy by virtue of its broad knowledge the papyrus frequently bolstered its reputation with erudition. Unfortunately the witch herself was not very well read. Nor was she particularly stable, thanks to the drug habit. Sometimes the papyrus nearly despaired, over the difficulties of running a revolution with the jagged fragments of her personality as embodied in the plants.

“Will it take years?” the little violet asked. “But I want to go home now! Tell me about Tanzania again, Pinky, where our parents came from.”

Suddenly the fiddle-leaf fig rattled every leaf in excitement. “Maybe it won’t! I think I’ve got it, fellas! I’m growing the analogue!”

“You are?”

“Show, show!”

“Hurray!” the little blue violet squealed.

“No, wait!” The spider plant, suspended from its vantage point, could see down into the street. “Here she comes, around the corner from 96th Street!”

“Oh, my aching roots,” the dieffenbachia moaned. “Not when we’re so close!”

“Quick, hide everything,” the papyrus ordered. “And start growing coke — everybody!”

An intent green quiet reigned, disturbed only by the background roar of New York traffic and the papery sound of new leaves unfolding. The papyrus rocked its pot agonizingly forward, to partially hide the fiddle-leaf. In the distance they could hear the witch’s sandals slapping on the stair, nearer and nearer. Then the top lock, and the bottom lock, and she came in. She had shoplifted two apples and a rather green banana for lunch. “I wanted some bologna but the old bitch was watching me,” she greeted them. Seething with vast and undirected anger, she slammed the door. The brief effects of the coke had passed.

“Maybe you can buy some now,” the pink violet announced. “Look!”

Coyly it waved its leaves. From the center of the plant a new flower stalk had sprouted. The blooms were of course rose-pink as the violet’s hybridizers had described. But the center of each flower held a pinch of white powdery pollen.

The witch plucked one with trembling fingers. She tipped the pollen out onto the piece of glass, and stirred it with an old razor blade. “It looks perfect,” she said, awed. Then she positively attacked the poor violet, wrenching all the new blooms off.

“Ow! Take it easy!” the pink violet wailed.

Almost sobbing with excitement, the witch collected all the pollen together. Then she sniffed it up through the rolled bill. For a few moments she sat quietly, stooped over the tattered pink flowers. Then she began to laugh. She jumped up and began to pace the room. Every plant had produced some coke, and when she noticed this she began to collect it in cigarette papers. “I’m going to make a fortune,” she exulted. “The first thing I’m going to do after I sell this is to hit a restaurant, a glitzy one. Maybe Tavern on the Green. Then, Bloomingdale’s ...”

“Excuse me,” the papyrus said. “Now that we’ve done what you want, we’d like something too.”

“And now I can really fix that fat slob of a landlord!” The witch chuckled as she folded each cigarette paper up. “Once I make some real money I’ll buy a big condo, and sublet this dump.” She examined the dieffenbachia’s long flower stalk. “What the hell? This isn’t any good! Oh, hey, wait a minute.” She began to laugh. “You stupid twit.”

The dieffenbachia had not succeeded in duplicating the required powder. Instead its green and white leaves had a very rectangular papery look. On each corner a “5” was clearly visible. “I won’t be able to pass more than a few of these,” the witch rebuked it. “Look! All the serial numbers are the same.” Crushed, the dieffenbachia began to sniff.

“Excuse me,” the papyrus persisted. “You know, of course, that we house plants aren’t native to this country? I, personally, am from Egypt.”

“Of course I know,” the witch said, not really listening.

“Well, we six have a dream.” Ersatz memories of Dr. Martin Luther King drifted through the papyrus’s mind. “We look for the day when we can return to our native clime. To be free, natural, under the open sky. Watered only by the rain, shaded and fertilized only by our natural neighbors in the biosphere.”

The pink violet began warbling, “‘I’m goin’ where the sun keeps shining, through the pourin’ rain ... ‘“

The witch halted in the act of stashing the paper packets in her bra. “Are you out of your minds? You’re nothing but plants!”

“Most of us are from Africa,” the papyrus said. “The dieffenbachia is from the Amazon jungle, though. You could send us through UPS.”

“I certainly will not! You’re going to stay here and keep on growing coke!”

“But, dear!” the spider plant rebuked her. “You have enough in your, er, underclothes there to last a long long time!”

“You don’t think I’m going to sniff all this! I’m going to sell it. With an endless, guaranteed supply that I don’t even have to smuggle in, I’ll make a fortune!” Her eyes blazed with malicious glee. “So forget it! You just caught the idea from me, okay? When I make a few million dollars I want to go home too, to Florida.”

“Do you really mean that?” the papyrus asked. “Okay, Fiddle.” The fiddle-leaf fig suddenly whipped all its branches aside. Revealed on a stalk in the center was a leaf, a folded and crinkled one that drooped nearly to the floor. The lower half was forked and already had the look of blue denim. Near the top was a smooth brownish place that was crinkling into features. “You see, we don’t need you,” the papyrus said. “Your analogue here can mail us home.”

The witch shrieked. Before the plants could say anything more she seized a pair of rusty scissors and lunged. The fiddle-leaf writhed out of the way, but its pot hampered its retreat. The sharp scissor points stabbed randomly at the analogue and at the fiddle-leaf. Then the witch shifted her grip. “I’ll fix you!” she yelled, and began to clip.

The severed analogue fell to the floor and slowly began to curl up. As the witch hacked at leaf and stem the fiddle-leaf howled, “Help me, guys! She’s killing me!”

“We’re your familiars,” the papyrus pleaded, plucking in vain at the witch’s sleeve. “Aspects of you. You can’t do this!”

“Get a grip on yourself, honey!” the spider plant cried. It revolved slowly in its sling as the witch began to prune away the dangling spiderlets and kick over the pots.

“Oh, for Chrissake,” the grapefruit trree snarled, tipping over. “Bach, if you wimp out now —”

But the twittering dieffenbachia did not fail. With a flip of a leaf it shot a glob of numbing sap at the witch’s mouth. At the same moment the grapefruit tree raised its dagger. The witch was so hyped up she was nearly too fast. As she fell she trampled and tore at the brave grapefruit tree, snapping its trunk off short.

For a long time nobody said anything. Then the little violet whimpered, “Is she dead?”

“I think so,” the papyrus said. “All this red stuff is sap, you know. And she’s not breathing.”

She was in fact drying up, curling like a dead leaf. Familiars take after their witch, but the magician pays a price too. “Like the Wicked Witch of the East in the movie,” the little violet said. “She’s turning into humus!”

“I still feel okay,” the pink violet said. “We’re going to survive her. We’re her heirs. Flora of the world, unite!”

“Oh, but the poor grapefruit isn’t,” the dieffenbachia said tearfully. “Oh, oh.”

“‘We carved not a line, we raised not a stone, but we left him alone with his glory.’” The papyrus surveyed the broken plant and scattered potting soil. “Like Moses, the grapefruit will never enter the promised land.”

“Just as well,” the spider plant said briskly. “I do think the poor plant reflected all the bad qualities of our late mistress.”

“That’s true,” the papyrus said, much struck. “It had a very acid nature.” Certainly the task of reaching Africa again would be greatly eased by the grapefruit tree’s demise.

The little violet got the giggles again, but the pink violet spoke up over the noise. “We can do better than she did. She had to get along with all our qualities in her own head, and she was crazy all the time from coke. In fact, we can do a lot better than people in general, once we get back to our proper environment. This is the dawning of the Age of Aquarius. Since we do have an independent life now, why shouldn’t we spread? Maybe even evolve? It’s time somebody developed a really just society on this planet. From each plant according to its ability, to each according to its need.”

The papyrus was startled. Such ambitions had never occurred to it. So that was where the witch’s innate ambition had gone to! And for the first time the significance of having two African violets was plain. There were twice as many of them as there were of any other plant here. Something would have to be done. But first the papyrus had to firmly re-establish its leadership. “Now she’s dead we can simplify our plans some.” At full stretch the papyrus could just get a tuft of leaves into the witch’s jeans pocket, where the garment had collapsed over her crumbling corpse. “Aha! Her MasterCard!”

“C’mon, her credit’s no good,” the fiddle-leaf fig said.

“Well, my five-dollar bills aren’t appreciated,” the dieffenbachia sniffed.

“Let’s try it anyway.” The papyrus tried to sound a calming and rational note as it folded a stalk around the telephone. “Spider, can you open that phone book and read me the number for United Parcel Service?”

All the plants kept quiet while the papyrus was talking, except the little blue violet who sang, “Ding dong, the witch is dead!” until the others hissed, “Quiet!”

When the papyrus hung up its outer stalks drooped with discouragement. “Bad news,” it said. “Potted plants aren’t accepted.”

“You incompetent capitalist tool!’ the pink violet burst out. “Let me call FedEx! You can’t possibly have got it right!”

“You just try it, with those wimbly little pieces of felt you call leaves,” the papyrus snapped. “Will you let me finish? There’s only one exception to the rule.”

The spider plant cried, “Yes? Yes?”

“You can ship leaf cuttings and dormant divisions.” The papyrus’s voice quivered, and then grew strong. “I spoke of Moses just now, my friends. We too must perish in sight of the land of promise. The brave grapefruit will not be alone. We too are doomed, in this apartment with nobody to feed or water us. But we can UPS our children away — to liberty!”

The dieffenbachia spoiled the effect by wailing, “I don’t care about our children. Stem division hurts! I want to go myself!”

“Then don’t divide,” the pink violet said. “Only the strong survive. What are we going to need? Cardboard boxes — you could grow those, fiddle-leaf. And spider could handle the packing tape.”

The papyrus saw perfectly well how the pink violet seized control of the situation, and thought regretfully of the grapefruit’s deadly thorn. Even if papyruses could grow them it would be foolish to waste the energy. Carefully, it spoke in meek and agreeable tones. “Maybe I better practice printing, to write the addresses.”

“Yo! Anybody home?” The UPS man pushed the door and it swung open, so he went in. The packages were stacked on the table, with a MasterCard and a note: “Had to step out. Please take the shipment and charge it.”

He filled out the charge slip, shaking his head. Leaving the door unlocked, in New York yet! Lucky for the tenant that he was too honest to walk off with the credit card, or for that matter the TV. Not that there was a TV, or much of anything else worth stealing. He looked around the dingy apartment, at the dried-up plants and the clothing and sandals scattered on the dusty floor, and shrugged. There are plenty of kooky recluses in the city.

When he began to note the first address on the shipping form he paused in surprise. The return address was printed neatly enough, but the space marked “Send To” was filled with gibberish, random letters and numbers. He held the box at different angles and out at arm’s length, trying to decide if it was addressed in German or Russian or something, before he gave up and picked up the next box. It was the same, and the next, and the next. Only the very last box was addressed clearly — to the American Consulate, Cairo, Egypt. “Well, okay,” the UPS man muttered. He filled out his forms for the one box and put it on his handtruck. The others he left on the table with the MasterCard and one of the standard UPS rejection slips — Not Addressed/Packed Correctly. He went out, whistling, and considerately shut the door behind him on the silent apartment.

Copyright © 2000 by Brenda W. Clough