Page 12 of Until the Last Leaf Falls

“You give to the trees,” Orren had told him. “Memories, emotions, thoughts, and feelings they can share amongst themselves. And sometimes, when they’re in agreement, trees give back.”

Were his trees telling him he was an idiot?

It wouldn’t surprise him. Orren had said he’d have to leave when the trees were bare and Niles had accepted it without question. He hadn’t asked under which conditions Orren would be prepared or allowed to stay. Maybe it was time to remedy that.

Morning came with a brisk wind that danced around the courtyard, intent on pulling leaves from branches. The trees shivered and bent towards Orren, who sat in the glade, back against the birch, knees drawn tight to his chest, and with his eyes closed.

His posture radiated pain and he didn’t look up when Niles approached.

“Orren? Is something wrong?”

“One of the mother trees... I can’t hear it anymore,” he said. “The connection used to be strong. Now there’s just... static.”

Niles sat beside him, close enough that their shoulders touched. “What does that mean?”

“Most likely that a tree I’ve talked to since I was human… is gone.” He turned his face into Niles’s shoulder, and Niles felt the dampness of tears through his shirt. “We shared so many memories over the years that I’m tasked to spread far and wide. I’m not supposed to grieve for a single tree, a single voice. But I do. Every time.”

Niles stayed silent. He just put his arms around Orren and held on. The wind swirled around them and a gust came from nowhere, yanking on Niles’s collar until he hissed at the sting. “That felt like an angry slap,” he said, without meaning to.

His words brought Orren out of his trance

“It was a reminder,” Orren said, his voice more vibration than sound. “The wind knows the cycle of the seasons the way the earth and the trees do.”

“And my trees are behind the times.”

“They are, but you have much to learn and I want to share what I know before I must leave.”

An opening as if he had engineered it. Niles raised his head. “Why must you leave?”

“For everything, there’s a season,” Orren quoted. “Autumn is short on days, yet long on memories. When autumn ends…”

“If I asked you, would you stay?” Niles blurted before he lost his nerve.

Orren’s fingertips traced his cheekbone in a barely-there caress. “I would stay,” he said, “and be glad for it. But it takes more than you asking.” He straightened and then pushed to his feet. “Shall we continue?”

Niles had a million questions, but Orren didn’t seem inclined to answer any of those. So he took Orren’s hand and towed him to the entrance of the library. “Teach me what I need to know.”

For the next week, the books Niles read became older and odder. The language went from old-fashioned to something Chaucer would have been comfortable with. Orren was a patient teacher, and an even more patient translator while Niles’s library acquired books and dictionaries on old English and arcane spelling. Niles didn’t mind. Research was familiar and comfortable, even if he researched topics his university professors wouldn’t have recognised.

Every day they sat in the glade with the trees. “It feels as if the trees are as eager for me to learn as I am,” Niles said one afternoon.

“Of course they are,” Orren answered. “Trees share everything. It saddened them that you’d made a home for them, but they couldn’t share their joy with you.”

“They see me as an honorary tree?”

“You’re part of their family. By now, maples in Japan, birches in Finland, baobab in the Serengeti, and the mother trees in the Amazon rainforest will have heard of you.”

Ice dropped into Niles’s stomach. “That’s not as comforting as you think it is, having my bumbling laid out for all the world to see.”

“Why do you feel you’re bumbling?”

“Because I planted a glade without knowing what I was doing. I sat among the trees and talked to them because it comforted me, not realising they needed the comfort too, and so much more. And I shudder to think I neglected them.”

“You did nothing of the sort. Had you neglected your trees, I wouldn’t be here. The birch worked for two years, guided by the memories in your building to reach the nearest tree outside. Then the tale spread of trees in a courtyard that nevertheless learned and spoke. When you planted the ginkgo tree, you gave me a path to you.”

“I meant to ask about that.”

“The tree of memories, and a pathway for all memory keepers. I watched you for two autumns before deciding to show myself.”