"I don't want a plant."
"Too bad."
The pot appears over the fence. Not placed. Shoved. Two hands push a terracotta vessel as big as a basketball up andover the six-foot cedar planks with a grunt of effort. The vine inside is already moving. Green tendrils spiral outward from a thick central stalk, leaves unfurling in real time like small fists opening. The pot teeters on the fence top, rocks once, twice?—
It falls.
My body moves before my brain authorizes the action. Shears dropped. Three strides. Hands up. The pot lands in my palms with a solid thump that sends vibrations up through my forearms and into my shoulders. Soil crumbles over my fingers. A tendril wraps around my right wrist.
I hold it at arm's length. The vine pulses. Actually pulses, the stalk thickening and thinning in a rhythm that mirrors a heartbeat. Two leaves brush my thumb with a texture like damp velvet.
"See? She likes you!"
"It's touching me."
"That means she's bonding. Verdant Cascades are very affectionate."
The tendril tightens on my wrist. Another one reaches for my elbow.
"It's climbing my arm."
"She's just saying hello! Don't be rude."
I peel the tendrils off with my free hand. They resist. One makes a sound. A tiny, high-pitched whine, like a puppy being denied a treat.
The pot goes into the quarantine zone. Every yard needs a quarantine zone. Mine is a three-by-three concrete pad behind the garage, bordered on all sides by a gravel buffer, equipped with drainage, and designated specifically for the containment and assessment of unknown biological materials. I built it my first week here. People said it was paranoid. Those people don't live next to a florist with enchanted inventory.
I set the pot dead center on the concrete. Step back. The vine reaches for me. I step back further. It strains, tendrils stretching six inches beyond the pot's rim, leaves fanning open like desperate hands.
"You stay."
The vine droops.
"That is not going to work on me."
It droops further. One leaf curls inward, protective.
I go inside. Lock the back door. Wash my hands twice, inspecting for sap residue, spores, magical contamination. Clean. I dry my hands on the designated hand towel, which hangs from the designated hook, and breathe.
The daisy in my walkway is nine inches.
The crash wakesme at 3:47 a.m.
Not just one crash. A staccato clatter, like dozens of wooden legs on concrete, spreading across a hard surface in every direction. My feet hit the floor. Boots on. I don't bother with the lights. Muscle memory carries me down the hallway, through the kitchen, to the back door. The motion sensor floods on.
The quarantine pad is empty. Overturned pot. Spilled dirt. No vine.
The front yard.
I round the corner of the house and stop.
Pink.
Bright, hideous, neon pink. Dozens of them. Plastic flamingos, the cheap gas-station kind with wire legs and painted eyes, standing in my lawn in no discernible pattern. They cover the grass like a pox. Forty. Maybe fifty.
One turns its head and looks at me.
Its painted eye blinks.
