Trespass on Greener Ground

A climb up a forgotten fire escape leads to a hidden world above the city streets—a secret rooftop garden. But as Leaf and Leo explore the unauthorized sanctuary, they find unsettling proof that its creator knows who they are.

Vertical exploration is a different kind of freedom. Down on the street, you’re trapped by the grid, a rat in a maze designed by city planners. But the moment your feet leave the pavement and find purchase on a fire escape, the rules change. The city unfolds, becomes a landscape of possibility instead of a set of directions. Every rusty rung of this fire escape on the back of the old Ross warehouse is a step into that other Winnipeg, the one that exists six storeys up.

"You sure this thing will hold?" Leo asks from a few feet below me, his voice tight. He's the one who suggested this spot, but he’s never been the one for heights.

"It's held for fifty years, it'll hold for fifty more pounds of you," I grunt, pulling myself up onto the next landing. The metal groans in protest. The air up here is different, smelling of warm tar and diesel fumes from the buses on Sherbrook. I can see the legislative building's dome, golden in the late afternoon sun.

The final ladder leads to the roof. I heave myself over the ledge, my sneakers scraping on the gravelly surface, and then I freeze. This isn’t the barren, tar-papered wasteland I expected.

It’s a garden. A full-on, thriving, impossible garden. Planter boxes made from old pallets are overflowing with tomato plants, heavy with green fruit. Sunflowers, tall and proud, stand guard along one edge. Runner beans climb a trellis of rebar and twine. In the centre of it all is a small, gnarled apple tree growing out of a huge industrial tub. It's an oasis of defiant green in a desert of grey rooftops.

"Holy crap," Leo says, pulling himself up beside me. He’s speechless, just turning in a slow circle. "Who... how?"

"Someone's been busy," I say, my voice full of awe. It’s beautiful. More than beautiful, it’s a statement. A middle finger to the concrete below. We walk through the narrow paths between the planters, careful not to step on any stray strawberry runners. The air smells of damp earth and chlorophyll.

### The Gardener's Almanac

Tucked away behind a row of sunflowers is a small, makeshift shelter—a tarp stretched over a frame of salvaged two-by-fours. Inside, there's a sleeping bag, a crate that serves as a table, and a few empty cans. It’s a home. We’re not just in someone’s garden; we’re in their living room. The feeling of being intruders settles heavily on me.

"We should go," Leo whispers, but neither of us moves.

On the crate is a stack of books and a worn, leather-bound sketchbook. I know I shouldn’t. It’s a violation of this person’s privacy, this beautiful, strange world they’ve built. But I can't stop myself. I pick up the sketchbook.

The pages are filled with pencil drawings. They are astonishingly detailed. There are architectural sketches of downtown buildings, portraits of gargoyles from the tops of forgotten facades, and panoramic views of the city skyline. The artist is a master of light and shadow.

But there’s other stuff, too. Interspersed with the realistic drawings are pages filled with strange symbols, almost like a personal alphabet. And there are sketches of the stencilled art we found in the alley behind the Bay. The clockwork hummingbird. The circuit board fox. They’re here, rendered in perfect detail, as if the artist was practicing the designs.

"Leaf, look at this." Leo points to a page. It's a map. A hand-drawn map of the downtown area, but instead of street names, it's marked with the strange symbols. Several locations are circled in red ink. One of them is the alley we were in last week. Another is this very rooftop.

"This is Vector," I breathe. "This has to be the artist from the alley. They live here."

We flip through more pages, a growing sense of unease mixing with my admiration for the art. We're learning too much. This feels dangerous, like we’re reading a diary. I’m about to close the book, to put it back and leave this place to its mystery, when I see the last page.

It's not a finished drawing, just a rough, quick sketch. But it’s unmistakable. The perspective is from above, looking down into a long, narrow space. A canyon of brick. There are two figures in the drawing, small and hunched over, one of them holding a camera. They are deep in the alley, near a row of green dumpsters.

My blood runs cold. I recognize the composition. I recognize the figures. It’s us. It’s a sketch of me and Leo in the alley, drawn from the perspective of someone on a fire escape, six storeys up.