Season 1 · Episode 17
Garys News
Published 12th September 2026
The empty Fruit Tree was a personal affront to the Square.
Waiting for Gary
At noon, Gary was gone.
He had promised news, requested an audience, and then slipped away before either could be supplied. The empty Fruit Tree was therefore not merely an empty Fruit Tree; it was a personal affront to the Square.
The Jacks had gathered in the Oak. The Smith family had taken up positions around the bird table with the alertness of men expecting an announcement that might somehow involve them. Batman Smith stood on the Fence Post, staring at the empty Fruit Tree.
“He said he had news,” Batman reminded everyone.
“Gary says many things,” Mr Jack Daw replied.
“But he said this one twice.”
That was worrying. Even the Jacks could see it.
Gary did not come. The afternoon drifted on under a mild, clouded sky. Brenda and Colin briefly shared the hedge, with Brenda objecting to the volume of Colin’s optimism and Colin seeming pleased to have acquired an audience. Stirling’s squad appeared along the Vegetable Garden, crossed the path with purposeful speed and vanished beneath the far border.
Batman watched the squirrels go. “Do they know?”
“They always know something,” said Mr Jack Daw.
“What?”
“That is why we are still waiting.”
The waiting became difficult in the middle of the afternoon, when the Smith family poured into the garden in such numbers that Batman was repeatedly forced to answer questions about Gary’s news from birds who had only just arrived. Mildred appeared beneath the bird table, listened for a moment, and returned to examining the ground.
“Mildred,” Batman called. “Have you heard anything?”
“Yes,” she said. “Mostly you.”
The Squirrels Have a Secret
By late afternoon, the squirrel squad had returned in force. They moved around the Oak and the Vegetable Garden with the contained urgency of a secret that had acquired legs. The Jacks tried to follow them without looking as though they were following them. This was not a success.
At a signal too small for most birds to notice, Stirling’s squad slipped under the far hedge. The last grey tail vanished. The garden was left with no explanation at all.
Garys News
Then Gary arrived.
He landed on the Fruit Tree at the exact moment everyone had begun pretending they had not been expecting him. He looked around the Square, saw the assembled audience, and allowed himself a small, satisfied pause.
“My news,” he announced, “is that Nigel remains absent.”
There was a silence.
Batman’s face changed from concern to outrage.
“That is not news,” he said.
“It is if the absence is continuing,” said Gary. “At a certain point, absence becomes a pattern. Patterns are news.”
Mr Jack Daw gave this careful consideration. “Annoyingly, he has a point.”
Gary dipped his head. “I also have suspicions.”
“About Nigel?” Batman asked.
“About everything.”
Before anybody could demand the useful half of that statement, the evening thickened around them. The Smiths and the Jacks filled the garden, noisier than they had any right to be as daylight faded. Gary made several visits to the hedge, the Oak and the Fruit Tree, each one looking entirely accidental. Stirling’s squad had disappeared, leaving no explanation and a great deal of wet-looking soil.
The Second Voice
After dark, the Square quietened at last.
Marjorie called from beyond the Oak.
Her voice came once, then again from a hidden perch, calm enough to make the whole garden listen and firm enough to suggest that listening was the minimum requirement. Much later she called again. The answer did not come, but the darkness seemed to hold the question for her.
A low shape passed over the far end of the garden later that night, making an unfamiliar waterbird sound as it went. No one stopped it. No one asked its name. Lightwood Square had reached the point where even a nocturnal visitor knew better than to become involved.
Marjorie was still calling, intermittent and composed, when the sky began to lighten behind the hedges.
Then, in the blue-grey hour before morning, another female voice answered.
This one did not stay put. It appeared first beyond the Summerhouse, then from farther along the garden, then somewhere near enough to make Batman lift his head from the Fence Post. Marjorie replied at once.
“Marlboro,” he breathed.
Gary was not there to agree, improve, or deny it.
The two voices overlapped briefly, each demanding the final word. Marjorie held the Oak side of the darkness with steady authority. The other presence answered with a younger urgency, then withdrew, then returned.
“That is a family conversation,” whispered one Jack.
“Or an argument,” said another.
“Those are not mutually exclusive,” said Mr Jack Daw.
By the time the first Robins began their morning business, the second voice had gone. Marjorie’s last call faded into the trees, leaving the Square with a new question and no volunteer to ask it.
Morning Returns
Rain returned at dawn, light but insistent. Gary arrived before most of the garden was properly awake, accompanied by a few Smiths, Colin and a look of exceptional innocence. Derek was already on the Oak. Flora, Fauna and Merryweather travelled through the damp hedge like a small procession that had never needed to explain itself. Mildred watched the whole scene from below.
Barry arrived at the bird table with the practical confidence of a bird who had no interest in waiting for introductions.
“Barry,” he said, taking the best available perch. “What are we eating?”
Batman stared at him. “You cannot just arrive in the middle of this.”
“I have,” Barry said.
The Jacks approved of this logic more than they should have.
As the rain eased, the Square’s regular arguments resumed. Derek used the Oak incorrectly. The Smith family made a disturbance of breakfast. The Jacks formed a committee to decide whether Gary’s news had been disappointing or merely incomplete.
Gary sat beside the Fruit Tree, watching the Vegetable Garden.
“Incomplete,” he said.
Near mid-morning, the squirrel squad came back along the hedge line. The Jacks leaned forward. Batman squared his shoulders. Gary looked at Stirling, then away, as if he had noticed nothing at all.
The Square had many questions.
Nobody had Nigel.
DUFF. DUFF. DUFF-DUFF-DUFF.