I remained where I was, and that decision—more than the strange red lump itself—shaped the entire morning. My first instinct had been to drop the hose and sprint back inside, pulse pounding at the sight of something glossy, uneven, and unnervingly vibrant crouched at the border of my garden bed. My mind leapt immediately to the worst possibilities: poison, infestation, some invasive organism poised to overrun the yard overnight.
Approaching it felt like stepping into a scene from a thriller. Each footfall tightened the anxiety twisting in my chest. But as I drew closer, the menace I had imagined began to dissolve. The red form didn’t twitch, whisper, or reach. It simply sat there—odd, damp-looking, and intensely colored. I knelt without touching it, studying the folds and sheen as though waiting for a hint of what it wanted from me.
Instinct pushed me to grab my phone. The seconds before
