Winter Garden Novels & Stories

Sutburg was filled with flowers in spring, petals flying toward us in the wind, pink, white, and many other colors. Some flowers landed on my shoulder, and I thought to myself that I had made it through winter. And finally, my spring was here.

The thirteenth winter is the coldest we've had. Not cold enough for snow — this is Portugal, not Paris — but cold enough that the garden goes dormant earlier than usual, cold enough that Oak refuses to set foot outside without his sweater, cold enough that Celeste and I spend more time by the fire than we have in years. I don't mind.

"He said it to both of us. Together. Standing in the kitchen." She looked around the kitchen. The two cups on the counter. The south garden, bare and patient in the January light. "Yes," she said. "That sounds right." January. The second year settling into its ordinary rhythm. The foundation working. The hellebores coming in February. The wedding in March or April, depending on the garden. Damien and Niamh building the thing. The manor holding all of it. The way it always had. The way it always would.

Samantha POV The winter sun hung low in the sky, pale and gentle, casting soft golden light across the snow covered garden. Icicles dripped from the branches of the ancient oaks, and the frost on the rose bushes sparkled like crushed diamonds. It was cold, but the glass walls of the winter garden held the warmth inside, trapping the heat from the small fire burning in the central brazier. I sat on a cushioned bench, a cup of steaming tea cradled in my hands, and watched the world outside turn white and quiet.

I looked at the villa at the cottage at the rows of vines waiting for the spring. "The winter is a season " I said, leaning against the stone archway. "It is the one " Stephen replied, blowing on his hands to warm them. "It is when the strength is built. Without the winter the spring has nothing to push against." I watched a hawk circling above the ridge its wings steady against the wind. I was no longer the woman who ran from the past. I was the woman who had walked into the part of the cellar and found the light. The winter was our time of growth a time that would sustain us long after the wine was bottled and the world had moved on. Here in the silence of the valley the only thing that ma

Right before I died, I still fantasized that Dad might come to save me. Uncle Arnold's wife, Ethel Gallagher, shrank her neck and glanced at the howling snowstorm outside the window. "Trevor, this snow looks serious. The news has already issued a yellow alert. Has Julian dressed warmly enough?" Dad swallowed a piece of steak, then raised his glass and took a satisfied sip. "I gave him a windbreaker, and he's got thermal underwear underneath. That's more than enough. A man's gotta be able to handle the cold.

It was something unnamed, fragile, built on the unsteady ground of a bond neither of them had wanted and both were now too stubborn or too scared to reject. Winter paused by the dry fountain, running her fingers over the cracked stone basin. Moss grew thick in the crevices, emerald against grey. She wondered if anyone had ever considered repairing it, or if the whole garden was meant to be a monument to decay, left to rot in genteel privacy. A sharp gust of wind made her shiver, pulling her thin shawl tighter. She should head back inside soon. The air had teeth now, promising the rain would come sooner rather than...

Adelaide's suspicious gaze darts over to me, and I offer an awkward smile. “I get.. really dry throat in the winter.” I lie, and rush towards the kitchen. I sigh heavily as I pull a bottle of water out of the fridge. The window in front of me gives a beautiful view of the mini garden. Most of the flowers have been frozen over, and the small pond in the middle of the garden has been turned into an icy patch. Only a few colourful petals are visible, but as the snow gets heavier, they'll all be frozen as well. I took a sip from the glass where I had poured the water, my eyes fixed on the beautiful scenery in front of me. I am busy watching snowflakes dance and twirl down from the sky when my ey

I nodded in acknowledgment, maintaining the silence in walked in on. I walked over to Raya, carefully taking my steps, standing two steps behind her to her left. In front of us was a fountain with sculptures of fishes, spewing out water from their mouths in different directions, but following a pattern. And there were different species of flowers behind and around the fountain. It was a mystery to me how the garden was lush and green, despite being located in the perpetual winter snow of Winterhill. That was a mystery I really hadn't cared to find out, yet.

"But it's a beginning." "Yes," he said quietly. "That's all I'm asking for." We stood in the garden as the October afternoon deepened around us, the cold settling in the patient way that late autumn cold does — unhurried, thorough, in no rush. The roses had gone to their winter state, stripped back to their bare bones, thorned and minimal, keeping what they needed underground where the frost couldn't reach it. They looked, as they always did at this time of year, less like living things than like the idea of living things.