A Grimm Tale for the times we live in

Here is a story about a king, a queen, a beautiful garden, and an evil virus

Once upon a time, there was a king and queen who lived in a castle surrounded by a beautiful garden. When they were not sitting on their thrones, the royal couple liked to plant flowers and shrubs and harvest vegetables to eat with their dinner.

One day, after the queen had been working in the garden for a long time, she fell ill with a pain in her chest. She thought she had done too much digging, so she rested in her bed for two days, but the pain did not go away. The king was worried and called the doctor. The doctor examined the queen and said that she should go to the hospital for tests and medicine to make her better.

When the king and queen got to the front door of the hospital, a guard told the king that he could not enter and suggested that he go back to his castle. At that time, an evil virus had attacked the kingdom. This virus spread quickly from person to person. To keep all the sick people safe, no relatives were allowed through the hospital doors. The king and queen bade each other a sorrowful goodbye. They vowed that they would

talk to each other every day on the telephone until the queen was well enough to return home.
Three weeks passed. The queen remained in hospital, and as she did not have good telephone reception in her room, she barely got to speak to the king. One day the king went to the hospital and pleaded with the guard to let him in, but he was turned away.

The king spent his days wandering sorrowfully around his castle and hardly ever went into the garden. All the flowers and vegetables withered and died and the king stopped eating his dinner and his tea. Three more weeks passed, and still, the queen did not return home, and still, the king could not go to see her.

One day a nurse called and told the king that he could visit the queen. Overjoyed, the king drove straight to the hospital, pushed past the guard, and ran up the stairs to the queen’s room, where he found her lying in her bed, looking small and frail and not at all like the queen he had said goodbye to six weeks earlier.

The queen wept with joy when she saw the king and they embraced warmly, even though the nurse had warned the king that he needed to stay two metres away from the queen in case he was infected with the virus.

After a short time, a doctor entered the room and told the king that he wished to speak to him privately. The doctor explained that the queen was very ill and would soon die. The doctor also said that the king needed to obey the hospital rules and not spend too long with the queen. The king told the queen that he would have to

leave soon. The queen said she was tired of being in the hospital and asked the king to take her home. The king asked the doctor if he could take the queen home, and the doctor said that the hospital did not have any free ambulances to put her in and she was too weak to go in a car. The ambulances were all parked outside the hospital, full of sick people who could not get in because there were not enough beds for them.

The king had an idea. He put on his mask and went to the hospital reception, where he found an empty wheelchair. He lifted the queen into the wheelchair, took a blanket from her bed, put it over her, and brought her to his car. He lay the queen down on the back seat of his car. She fitted easily, as she had become so small and thin.

The king brought the queen to the castle and lifted her into her bed. The queen was overjoyed to be in her own bed. She slept well that night, knowing that the king was looking after her, and the next day she asked to be taken out into the garden. She told the king that she was very disappointed that the flowers and shrubs had died and that he should make sure to plant some more and look after them properly.

Three days later, the queen died peacefully in her bed. The king was sad at first, but then he remembered what the queen had asked him to do. So he took his spade and shovel and went to work in the garden planting shrubs and flowers. In each new bloom he sees the queen’s smiling face and feels happy.