Alyssa Marie & the Apple Tree

By Matt Mills · Estimated Reading Time: 16 Minutes

Alyssa Marie was four years and three months old when they moved into the house on Tricklewood Lane. Though it was only a modest two-story on a sleepy suburban street, Alyssa Marie thought it looked like a castle. She entered it strutting like a newly-coronated queen. 

She was very excited. In the apartment complex where she had lived before, she always had to share her space with all the noisy older kids who also lived there. The neighbor boys were constantly yelling on the other side of the wall, and whenever she played outside, the girl down the hall would interrupt her private games and take her toys. But here, at last, was a kingdom all her own. 

While her parents struggled to carry boxes out of the U-Haul, Alyssa Marie ran from room to room, letting out little squeals of delight. She couldn’t believe it was all hers, an undisturbed world. She loved it all: she loved the kitchen with the floral wallpaper; she loved the big comfy couch in the living room; she loved the lace curtains that hung over the window next to her bed. But the thing she loved the best was the backyard, and the thing she loved the best about the backyard was the apple tree.

It was a very big apple tree with a strong, old trunk and long, thick branches. The canopy draped half the backyard under a shady umbrella, and when she stood underneath and looked up, she could see sparrows and chickadees and squirrels and all sorts of little bugs up in the tangle. It was not like the trees in the park where all the other children played. This tree was hers alone, and she stood satisfied beneath it in that private plot of earth secluded by the big wooden fence, hidden from the sky by the thick green leaves.

“Tree,” she said on that first day, standing with her fists on her hips and her bare toes in the grass, “I think you and I will be friends.” 

And they were friends. Soon after moving in, her father hung a swing from one of the branches, and on those pleasant days she would sit on the wooden seat and kick her legs in the air. Other times she’d spread out a blanket and lean against the trunk with her stuffed animals, having a tea party in the grass. And sometimes, when she was feeling sleepy, she’d lay back and look up into the leaves and make up stories about what happened there. No one disturbed her: in her castle garden, the queen slept secure.

Then, one warm morning, Alyssa Marie woke up to a sweet smell coming through her window. When she knelt on the end of the bed and parted the lace curtains, she gasped: beautiful white flowers had burst open among the leaves like a floral crown on the head of a maiden. The apple tree had bloomed.

Alyssa Marie put on her red coat and brown boots and rushed into the backyard. She squealed in delight at the petals matting the ground and the cloud of white over her head.

“Tree,” she said, “did you make these flowers for me?”

Why yes, I did. 

Alyssa Marie did not hear the voice with her ears, but it hummed in her head and in her heart. She had never heard a tree speak before, but she was clever for her age and she knew right away that the voice belonged to the apple tree.

“Hello!” she said. “I didn’t know you could talk.”

Of course! it said. All trees can talk. It’s just that few people are patient enough to listen.

“I’m Alyssa Marie,” said Alyssa Marie, remembering her manners. She held up four fingers. “I’m four-and-three-months. How old are you?”

The leaves rustled, like the tree was laughing. 

Oh, quite older than four-and-three-months. Back when I was a sapling, there were no houses or streets or cars or telephone poles. I remember when this town was built. I have lived here for a long time.

Alyssa Marie was amazed. She looked around at the backyard and the window shutters and the wooden fence, and suddenly she could see it all moving in reverse, like when she put a tape in the VCR and pushed rewind. She saw the house being unmade and the driveway being unpaved. She saw the streets roll back and the neighborhoods become cornfields. She saw forests and wildflowers spring up around her and deer and rabbits go hurrying through. To her, her castle was timeless and solid; the thought that it had not existed once made her feel very small.

“It must have been different when you were little.”

Yes, very different.

“Do you miss the way it used to be?”

Oh, sometimes. But all things grow, just like trees. All things bear fruit. I am glad you are living here with me now, Alyssa Marie.

She blushed and smiled. Up in the branches, a robin was chirping, enthroned in its palace of petals. How different the backyard must look from up there, she thought! How much she would be able to see! The tree had watched the whole neighborhood rise up around it, but Alyssa Marie could not even glimpse what her mom was chopping up on the kitchen counter, not even if she stood on her tip-toes. It displeased her that there were so many parts of her own kingdom that she could not reach yet; but, she thought, up in the canopy, her whole world would be clear.

“Tree,” she said, “one day I will be big enough to climb up into your branches and see everything for myself.”

Oh, I’m sure you will, it said. And that day will come sooner than you think.

✷

That year, Alyssa Marie often played with the tree. At her stuffed animal tea parties, she would sip her tea—which was only water—and tell her guests, of which the apple tree was the most distinguished, all about her mom and dad, and the curtains in her bedroom, and how much better it was here than in their old apartment with the annoying neighbor boys next door. She showed the tree her favorite toys and picture books, pointing to the words she couldn’t read yet. When the tea parties were over, she would kick her legs on the swing and stare upward, dreaming of the day she’d be big enough to scale those great limbs.

As the seasons changed, the games she could play with the tree kept changing, too. When the white petals faded, they were replaced with lumpy green apples, not at all like the juicy red fruit her mother bought from the grocery store. They fell all over the lawn and rotted, and her father made her help him throw them in a big trash bin. It was gross, but she liked seeing them splatter. Her father would chuck them as hard as he could and the apple guts would go everywhere and she would tumble with laughter into the grass.

After the apples fell, the leaves fell, too: they turned flame-red and covered the whole backyard like a thick carpet. Her father raked them into piles for her to jump in, and the smell was wet and earthy. When she was finished, there would be crunched-up leaves and bits of stem stuck in her pants and her mother made her take a warm bath and she would sit in the water and remember what it was like to sink into that shifting, leafy ocean.

“Tree,” she said one day, “you sure do an awful lot.”

Well, there’s a lot to be done. I must grow and create, and there are many creatures to feed and shelter. 

“You sound like my parents. They are very busy, too. My mother is a nurse and my father works in an office.” She leaned back in the swing and stared up into that distant canopy where the remaining red leaves were coming loose. “I really don’t understand all that goes on up there, tree.”

You will, one day. When I was a seed, I had no trunk, no branches, no leaves. But I had the cool earth and water, and I sprouted roots. That is the first thing, Alyssa Marie, to grow roots. 

Alyssa Marie kicked glumly at a fallen leaf with her shoe. “I wish I was big now.”

The tree laughed. There is a season for everything. Now, go and play: I have worked very hard this year, and I must rest.

✷

Then it was winter, and her whole kingdom was covered with snow. The last leaves fell, and the apple tree’s limbs were cold and naked against the blue sky. When Alyssa Marie looked out her window at the thin, barren branches she felt sad and a little afraid. At night, the moon behind the tree made ugly shadows on her wall, and she hid from them under the covers.

That season was a long one. Alyssa Marie stayed cooped up inside her castle walls, having tea parties with her stuffed animals on her bedroom floor and coloring in her coloring books. Occasionally, she built snowmen in the front yard, but she avoided the back because it made her too sad. She did not like the feeling that her own walls had been breached by the chill wind, and she worried the winter would never end. 

Finally, the snow turned to water and floated back up into the air again, and the grass lifted its head from the dirt. Alyssa Marie pressed her nose to the window. Up in the apple tree, she could see the first green buds of life. Soon, everything would be right again.

But then, one morning, as she was eating cereal with her parents, she heard her father say, “Did you see this, Caroline? The trees are getting sick.”

Alyssa Marie’s ears pricked. Her father was reading the local paper, and he put it down on the table so that her mother could see where he was pointing.

“Look, it’s some kind of disease. They’ve already cut down all the trees over on Elmdale.”

“That’s terrible! Do you think it will spread here?”

Her father closed the paper. “Let’s hope not.”

This was far worse than the snow. The winter had been an invasion, certainly, but only a temporary one: this was a cannonball that threatened to leave a blasted hole in her fortress that would never be repaired. She could not imagine the world of the backyard, that secret place that was hers and no one else’s, without the majestic arms of the apple tree enclosing her. She cried and cried.

Three days later, some men from the county arrived at Tricklewood Lane. Alyssa Marie watched them from her window as they investigated the base of the trunk, one peeling off pieces of bark while the other watched, taking off his muddy gloves and resting them on her wooden swing. When they were finished, she listened from the hallway as they stood at the back door and explained to her mother that the tree would have to be cut down.

“Are you sure?” said her mother. “There’s nothing we can do?”

“I’m afraid not, ma’am,” said the one with the muddy gloves. “We have to move quickly or it will spread to the whole street.” He took out a clipboard. “Does next Thursday work for you?”

When they were gone, Alyssa Marie hurried into the backyard with tears streaming down her face, her feet running across the chilly grass.

“Tree, what will we do? They’re going to cut you down!”

I’m sick, Alyssa Marie, said the tree. If they don’t cut me down, I will die anyway, and so will all the other trees on Tricklewood Lane.

“But it’s not fair!” she wailed.

I’m very sorry.

Filled with blazing anger, Alyssa Marie wiped the tears from her face with a sniff and once again stood with her fists on her hips and her bare toes in the grass.

“I will save you,” she said. “I will find a way!”

Alyssa Marie tried everything she could think of. She covered the trunk with Band-Aids. She gave the tree Jell-O and showed it picture books like her mother did when she had the flu. She smuggled cold medicine into the backyard from the bathroom cabinet, and when she could not best the child-proof cap, she left it at the base of the trunk like an offering. But nothing worked. 

I am not like you, Alyssa Marie, the tree said softly. Your medicine will not heal me. My sickness is down deep in my roots.

Then Alyssa Marie remembered her mother’s bookshelf, filled with the gardening books her grandmother had given them. She took them all out and spread them across her bedroom floor, flipping through the close-ups of tree bark and diagrams of leaf cells until she found a full-page map of a root pattern. She took the book to her mother.

“Mom,” she said, “why do trees have roots?”

Her mother, who was getting ready for a night shift and was already wearing her scrubs, gave her a hug and sat her on her lap. “Are you worried about the apple tree?”

Alyssa Marie nodded. Her mother wrapped her arms around her and pressed her cheek to the top of her head, and Alyssa Marie snuggled against her. 

“Well,” her mother said, “roots hold a tree steady and keep it safe. It’s also how they grow. Trees use their roots to drink water out of the ground, just like you drink milkshakes with a straw.”

“But how?” said Alyssa Marie. “Trees don’t have mouths.”

“No, they use something called osmosis. You’ll learn about it in school one day. It’s like drinking through your skin.” 

Then her mother pressed her palm into her own, and Alyssa Marie could feel her mother’s heartbeat beneath her fingers, very warm and strong, and at that moment, she understood. 

That night, she lay awake in bed, feeling the echo of her mother’s pulse in her hand. With each ghost-throb, she pictured the disease coursing like dark water through the roots of her beloved apple tree, a stain seeping beneath the earth. Then she thought of milkshakes, but instead of a straw, she imagined slurping up the last dregs with an outstretched finger or toe, absorbing it like a sponge through her skin, each sip in rhythmic time with her own thrumming heart. As she drifted off the sleep, a wild plan began to form in her mind.

The following afternoon, Alyssa Marie got her little yellow beach shovel and dug a hole beneath her swing. She dug and dug, making a little pile of fresh earth atop the grass, until at last she uncovered one of the apple tree’s roots. Like an archeologist she had seen in a PBS special, she dusted it off. Then she took off her shoes and, wiggling her bare toes, rested her feet against the root.

Alyssa Marie, said the tree. What are you doing?

“Oz Moses,” she said. And she closed her eyes.

For the rest of the day, she sat in the grass with her feet in the hole, squeezing her eyes shut, concentrating as hard as she could. Like plugging into a wall outlet, she imagined herself connected to the tree, sensing its roots as if they were her own, that vast network of branches that cradled her house and the whole backyard in its unseen hands. She could feel them. Through them, she could feel the fire of the disease raging in the veins of the apple tree. She shuddered and squeezed her eyes shut harder.

Alyssa Marie, you are going to hurt yourself.

But she just sat and sat and sat. She sat for hours with her feet in the dirt. She imagined that they were sponges or vacuum cleaners, siphoning all the bad things from each and every root deep within the ground, out and up into her own body. She took the curse onto herself, soaking it up, absorbing it. Her feet fell asleep and her legs cramped, but she did not stop. Like a garden hose working in reverse, she drained the evil out of her precious tree. Sweat broke out on her forehead. Her mother called her for dinner, but she would not budge.

Alyssa Marie, said the voice of the tree, very kind and soft. You must go inside. You must eat.

She did not open her eyes. She focused and she focused and she focused. Then, at last, when the sun went down and the stars came out to peer at her in curiosity, she fell asleep from sheer exhaustion. Her father carried her inside and tucked her into bed. 

The next morning, Alyssa Marie woke up with a sore throat and a terrible fever. Her parents were very alarmed. But, to their immense relief, the doctor assured them that it was only a bad cold. Alyssa Marie lay in bed, a tired, triumphant queen, and she smiled at them.

“Don’t worry,” she said. “It worked.”

Sure enough, she was already feeling better by Thursday when the men from the county came. They were surprised to find that the apple tree was strong and healthy.

“This is the tree?” said a new man, an older man with a gray beard. “This tree isn’t sick.”

One of the original two, the one with the muddy gloves, was flustered. “But…but I saw the rot myself!”

“Look,” said the bearded man, rapping his hand on the bark. “This tree is clean and healthy.” He shook his head and turned to Alyssa Marie’s mother. “Sorry to trouble you folks.”

✷

That is the story of how Alyssa Marie saved her apple tree.

That spring, the two of them had a wonderful time together. She showed the tree all her mother’s gardening books, and started making a leaf collection in an old scrapbook, and planted little seeds in the dirt beneath the swing. She still had tea parties, but not as many, and now, when she swung high enough in the swing, she found that she could stretch out her toes and touch the lowest leaves.

Then, like a dark cloud, another trial came. This one was the greatest and most tragic. The summer drew to a close, and her parents told her she would start kindergarten in the fall.

She cried and cried. She had saved her kingdom, but now she would have to leave it. The castle drawbridge would lower and she would be escorted out, back into that world of noisy neighbor boys and girls who took her toys without asking. Her secret haven would sleep alone and she would go unprotected.

“Oh apple tree, what will I do?” she said. She sat drooping on her wooden swing, her feet dragging morosely as she swayed back and forth. “I won’t be able to play with you anymore.”

There is a season for everything, my friend. You wanted to get big, didn’t you?

“But not like this. I only wanted to see over the tops of tables and climb into your branches. I only wanted to explore my world. Now I will have to leave it behind forever.”

The leaves whispered with soft laughter. Oh, Alyssa Marie. Don’t be afraid. You helped me when I was in trouble, and now I will help you.

She sniffed. “You will?”

Of course!  The branches swayed, as if they were pointing. Look, there is a knot on my trunk, just beside the fence. Climb up on it.

Alyssa Marie stood and felt around the back of the trunk. Sure enough, there was a knot in the bark as big as her fist. Wrapping her arms around the trunk for balance, she struggled to hoist herself up onto the knot. After several attempts, she managed to stand.

Very good. Now, climb higher.

She was alarmed. “Higher?”

Yes. You are ready now.

Alyssa Marie climbed. Standing with her toes on the knot, she found she could reach the crook where the trunk split off into three large branches, and she pulled herself up into it. Then she shimmied her way along the biggest of them, going higher and higher until, at long last, she entered that secret world. She saw the little bugs and shimmering spiderwebs. She saw a robin’s nest with little speckled eggs. She saw a squirrel blinking at her in surprise. The great branches engulfed her, and she sat at the center of them.

Now, said the tree, you can see everything for yourself.

She could. When she looked down, beyond the canopy, she could see the backyard and her bedroom window and the roof of her house. Above her, stretching on and on, was the blue sky. She began to feel dizzy, and a rush of something magical went through her, like she was not a little girl at all but a tree, old and tall and strong. She felt the chlorophyll going through her like blood and the hard, crusty plates of bark on her skin. She felt her roots go down deep. She felt the earth spinning under her and knew the age of it. But most of all she felt her branches stretching up and up and the warm sun on her head.

This is only the beginning, Alyssa Marie. You are a seed, and you are sprouting. It’s time to poke your head up out of the soil.

“But what about my house? What about my parents? What about you?”

Don’t worry. This is where your heart is buried and where it will be forever, where your roots will hold you steady. But a tree is more than roots. Roots give life to branches and those branches grow. You must grow, Alyssa Marie. You must grow big and tall and strong, and you must bloom with flowers and fruit. But your roots will always be here, in this little patch of green, in the cool under my arms.

✷

That fall, Alyssa Marie went to kindergarten. To her surprise, she loved it. Her teacher was very kind and gave her a little cactus in a pot, which she took home and set on her dresser. Some of the other kids were mean, but many of them were nice. She made friends, and soon there were more children playing in the backyard and swinging on that swing under the shade of the apple tree. 

Once it had been her private kingdom with the gates shut tight; now she began to welcome others into it. She always brought her friends to see the tree. They loved to climb up into the branches, dangling like ripe apples. When she was a teenager she would climb up and hide in the leaves with her phone, talking for hours where no one else could hear her.

Alyssa Marie sprouted branches and leaves. She blossomed into flowers and fruit. She went to college and got a job and got married. But whenever she came home from college, or later when she visited her parents with her own family, she would always go into her childhood bedroom and part the lace curtains. 

There, towering just as old and strong as it always had, was the apple tree. She had grown and bloomed; it had not changed at all.

Alyssa Marie would smile and close the curtains. 

In her feet, she felt her roots go down deep, quiet and cool into the solid earth.

✷

Story by Matt Mills · Photo by Esmee Batchelor

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