Page 167 of Discordant Cultivation

“This property was my family’s,” Vale said, his voice carrying a softness that Kieran rarely heard. “It was left to me when my parents passed. They pushed music constantly—demanded perfection, technical mastery, emotional control. But their real passion was always this. Growing beautiful things.”

“Do you miss them?” Kieran asked absentmindedly, still processing the sheer amount of color around him.

“Not really. They’re in the soil all around us,” Vale continued, his hand finding the small of Kieran’s back.

Kieran opened his mouth to ask—ashes? bodies? how did they die?—but the questions died before reaching his tongue.Something about the way Vale spoke suggested those details didn’t matter, or perhaps mattered too much to examine directly.

He does everything with purpose. Even the things I don’t understand. Even this.

The greenhouse felt like a secret world. Here, surrounded by his parents’ legacy of cultivation, Vale seemed at peace, like a constant tension fell away that existed even inside the house.

Kieran wondered if the roses knew they were beautiful, if the Monstera understood it had been growing for a quarter century toward some invisible ceiling it would eventually reach. Or if they simply existed, responding to light and water and soil without questioning the purpose of their own expansion.

Maybe that’s what I am now. Just responding to Vale’s cultivation without understanding the purpose.

But standing in this warm, fragrant space filled with living things that had been carefully tended for decades, Kieran found he didn’t mind the comparison as much as he probably should.

“How d-do you maintain all of this?” Kieran asked as he took in the sheer scope of plant life surrounding them. “When we’re t-together all the time?”

Vale’s expression shifted slightly, something that might have been guilt crossing his features before settling back into that familiar calm. “I’ve been overworking my gardener. Mrs. Martinez comes three times a week now instead of once. She’s not particularly pleased about the increased hours, but the compensation makes up for it.”

Overworking someone. Because of me. Because taking care of me takes all his time.

He felt the guilt in his throat first, a poison constricting the tendons in his neck as it spread throughout his body. He was a burden—the same burden he’d been in every foster home, the kid whose medical needs required too much attention, too muchmonitoring, too much care that could have been directed toward children who didn’t seize at inconvenient times.

Just like before. Always too much work. Always requiring more than anyone wants to give.

Tears started building behind his eyes as he wrapped his arms around himself, turning away from Vale, because he couldn’t bear to see the eventual disappointment or frustration on his face. His gaze landed on a tiny seedling pushing through dark soil at the base of a vibrant red rose bush, its leaves barely developed, insignificant compared to the established beauty towering beside it.

That’s me. Trying to grow in someone else’s shadow.

“I’m s-sorry,” Kieran whispered, the words catching in his throat. “I’m sorry you have to—that I t-take up so much of your time. That you have to n-neglect things because of me.”

The rhythm came from the back of his skull, a cadence forming in his mind the way lyrics always did when emotions became too overwhelming to process normally:

I’m a fucking flower in a cemetery,

Roots wrapped around the bones buried deep…

The image was too perfect, too devastating—him trying to bloom in soil enriched by death to create something that might look like beauty.I’m not worth this. Not worth the neglect of his family’s legacy, not worth ten thousand people’s attention, not worth the time he’s invested in trying to make me into something.

Vale’s arms wrapped around him from behind, warm and secure despite Kieran’s attempt to retreat. “Why are you crying, sweetheart? Talk to me.”

But Kieran couldn’t articulate it, couldn’t explain the specific combination of guilt and inadequacy and self-loathing that made him want to reach down and rip up that seedling He wanted to put it out of its misery before it wasted energy trying to grow in a space where it would always be overshadowed and always be insufficient.

It’s going to die anyway. In the shadow of that rose bush. Better to end it now than let it struggle.

His fingers twitched toward the tiny plant, the urge to destroy something as small and pathetic as himself almost overwhelming.

“What do you see?” Vale asked softly, his chin resting on Kieran’s shoulder as they both looked down.

“A t-tiny weed,” Kieran whispered, voice thick with tears. “Something that will either r-ruin your beautiful garden or d-die trying to grow here.”

Vale’s arms tightened around him briefly, then released. “Come here. Crouch down with me. Look closer.”

I don’t want to look closer. I don’t want to see how insignificant it is.

But Kieran followed Vale’s gentle guidance, kneeling on the warm greenhouse floor beside the rose bush. This close, he could see the seedling’s delicate leaves more clearly, the way they’d just begun to unfurl from the soil.