The Balcony Gardener loved April.
Spring had arrived again, and with it came a quiet accumulation of ideas for the new season’s balcony garden.
April did not require announcement. It arrived the way Paris prefers to change—quietly, as if nothing at all had happened, though the light had shifted, though the air had softened, though something in the chest loosened without explanation.
From her balcony, the city moved as it always did: a bus sighing to a stop, a woman carrying tulips wrapped in paper, the distant clink of cups from a café already full. A window opened across the way. Someone shook out a cloth. Geraniums leaned from a railing with renewed vigor.
The Balcony Gardener stood at the small table by the window, a cup of mandarin tea releasing its citrus warmth into the morning.
Teddy lay nearby, not asleep but considering sleep, his preferred posture for all meaningful observation.
On the table: seeds.
Too many seeds.
Not for this balcony. Not for any balcony.
Snow peas. Green beans. Melon. Corn. Amaranth. Lettuce. Cabbage. Broccoli. Chard. Bok choy. A few Brussels sprouts, as if added by a more practical version of herself who occasionally intervened.
It was, objectively, an overreach.
The Balcony Gardener hesitated, then reached for a folded letter resting beside the seed packets.”
“There are a lot of seeds. They won’t all fit in your garden.”
Madame Dupont did not simply appear—she arrived.
Today she wore a narrow emerald coat embroidered with small, improbable birds, a hat tilted at an angle that suggested both defiance and long practice, and gloves the color of apricots. A length of silk trailed from her shoulder for no practical reason whatsoever.
She leaned, elegantly, over the dividing rail between their two balconies.
“They might,” said The Balcony Gardener.
“On a balcony?” Madame Dupont gestured, not without precision.
The Balcony Gardener hesitated, then reached for a folded letter resting beside the seed packets.
“A friend wrote to me,” she said.
Madame Dupont’s expression shifted—interest, properly contained.
“She has land,” The Balcony Gardener continued. “A great deal of it. She began in February—tomatoes, peppers, squash, basil. In March, potatoes—Yukon Gold in one planter, sweet potatoes in another, covered in straw to protect them.”
Madame Dupont listened, very still.
“She will plant these tomorrow,” The Balcony Gardener said, gesturing lightly to the seeds. “Snow peas, beans, melon, corn, amaranth, lettuces, brassicas… and then, on April 10, carrots, beets, radish, parsnips.”
Madame Dupont’s eyes moved slowly from the letter to the balcony.
“How much space does she have?” she asked.
“A little over 10,000 square feet.”
Madame Dupont did not react immediately.
“And you,” she said after a moment, “have… this.”
“Yes.”
A pause.
“She prefers variety,” The Balcony Gardener added quietly. “Not too much of any one thing.”
Madame Dupont inclined her head once.
“Of course she does.”
Up here, something else had begun to take hold.”
Below them, Paris went on.
A man argued gently into his phone. Someone laughed. A bicycle passed with a basket full of daffodils.
Up here, something else had begun to take hold.
Her gaze moved from the first small tray of soil to the rows of seeds, then to the folded letter . . . and finally, to the cup.
“Mandarin tea?” she asked.
“Yes.”
Madame Dupont nodded slowly and went on to say—
“And you are quite certain,” she said, “that you are not also drawing inspiration from . . . other sources?”
The Balcony Gardener said nothing.
Madame Dupont adjusted her glove.
“I do recall,” she continued, “leaving you a small infusion. As a kindness.”
“It was very good,” said The Balcony Gardener.
“Yes,” said Madame Dupont. “It can be.”
Her eyes returned to the pots.
“I did mention,” she added lightly, “that it was not intended to be . . . expansive.”
“I recall no such limitation.”
“No,” said Madame Dupont. “One rarely does.”
Madame Dupont regarded her for a moment longer, her head tilting just slightly, as though aligning a thought before offering it.
“My dear,” she said, very gently, “it may be that this is a morning for . . . reconsideration.”
The Balcony Gardener said nothing.
“A short rest, perhaps,” Madame Dupont continued, “before any further agricultural commitments are made.”
Teddy, from beneath the chair, opened one eye in quiet agreement.
The balcony, as ever, held its shape.”
“One sometimes finds,” Madame Dupont added, “that what appears entirely feasible before noon becomes . . . more proportionate after.”
She let her gaze drift, delicately, over the assembled seeds.
“Tomatoes, for instance,” she said.
“Strawberries.”
“Herbs.”
A small pause.
“Things with a known and agreeable relationship to balconies.”
The Balcony Gardener followed her gaze.
The seeds did not rearrange themselves.
They remained, calmly, but improbable.
“I am not suggesting abandonment,” Madame Dupont said, with a softness that made the suggestion unmistakable. “Only . . . sequence.”
The Balcony Gardener considered this.
The balcony, as ever, held its shape.
Teddy settled again.
“Perhaps,” she said at last.
Madame Dupont inclined her head, satisfied.
“Yes,” she said. “Perhaps is an excellent beginning.”
The tea had cooled.
The Balcony Gardener folded the letter once more and set it beside the empty packets.
A garden of 10,000 square feet.
A balcony.
A cup of tea.
It was, she knew now, a kind of gentle overlap.
Borrowed scale.
Borrowed ambition.
Possibly borrowed perception.
April, it seemed, did not require certainty.”
Her gaze returned, more carefully this time, to the small arrangement of pots along the railing. The space had not changed. It had never offered more than it could hold.
She reached for a smaller selection of seeds and set the rest aside.
Tomatoes.
Strawberries.
Herbs.
Madame Dupont stood watching, impossibly dressed, quietly satisfied.
Teddy settled fully now.
April, it seemed, did not require certainty.
Only the willingness to begin—even if the plans briefly belonged to another landscape—even if the space, in the end, spoke for itself, and even if one’s neighbor, who had once provided the tea, had understood all along exactly how the matter would resolve.
Editor’s Note: Read more of the Parisienne horticulturist’s adventures here and in The Balcony Gardener Volume 1.