Her Favorite Flower

Her favorite flowers were marigolds. In those halcyon days of summer past, we would run through fields full of all manners of wild flowers, but with every marigold she spotted she would stop, stoop low and take a deep breath. I can still see her there, in that periwinkle blue sun dress, turning back to me with a look of pure exultation. Happy to simply be alive! I can see her there, in those drowsy, endless summers, laughing and squealing with delight, with the purest pleasure at the simple fact that we existed at the same time, the same place, and that there were marigolds there too. A little slice of her own personal heaven.

Her favorite flowers were marigolds. In those halcyon days of summer past, we would run through fields full of all manners of wild flowers, but with every marigold she spotted she would stop, stoop low and take a deep breath. I can still see her there, in that periwinkle blue sun dress, turning back to me with a look of pure exultation. Happy to simply be alive! I can see her there, in those drowsy, endless summers, laughing and squealing with delight, with the purest pleasure at the simple fact that we existed at the same time, the same place, and that there were marigolds there too. A little slice of her own personal heaven.

Of course, this being in the past tense, it didn't last. Summer gave way to fall, comfortable in its own way. Brisk morning walks, the crunch of dry leaves under foot. "Robert," she'd say, turning to me, holding up a leaf of firey orange and sunlight yellow. "I love this leaf. It looks just like a marigold. A marigold for the fall." Then her expression would turn wistful, her face half hidden by the leaf as she took in a breath. "If only it had the same scent." I'd hear her mutter, as she turned away, letting the leaf flutter back to the ground. We'd go, after that, to get apple cider, and, if I was clever enough, I could coax out a laugh, a smile as brilliant as that leaf. I hold those memories tight, fearful of them slipping from my fingers, falling amidst the dry leaves on that autumnal ground.

And on the march of time proceeds, into winter. That landscape of grays and whites, like an old movie. I remember thinking then of those movies, watching them on the original projection film, the ethereal effect of black and white celluloid projected onto a true silver screen. She embodied that, that flickering impermanence somehow transforming into timeless beauty. My own Audrey Hepburn. Yet now, the memories are tarnished. All the detail present, but the magic lost. Like a DVD rerelease of a classic, that quintessential spirit lost in translation. I can see her there, breath puffing out in a white cloud, the squeak of fresh snow underfoot. Perhaps a mischievous grin on her lips as she tossed a snowball at me. But she never commented on marigolds in that season. No scrap of color to remind her, no smells carried on the frigid breeze. And without that, she never seemed quite as alive.

Spring, I thought, would be better. But she hated spring. Our morning walks too often postponed due to early showers. Then came the pollen. Washing everything in a haze of green and sickly yellow. The very air a haze with it, the light itself taking on that hue, the color of a slowly healing bruise. That same color light as the air and sky before a bad thunderstorm, but charged with grains of pollen rather than electricity. I remember her then, looking out the window with disgust, her nose running and eyes puffy, so bad it would look like she had been crying. "Robert, she'd say, without even looking at me. "Do you know why I hate spring?" I would laugh a little, perhaps passing her a cup of tea, saying some nonsense about it helping clear her sinuses, before joking that she hated spring because it was all that stood between her and her marigolds. She'd give a polite sniff at that, before giving up and blowing her nose for the hundredth time. "No," she'd finally respond. "I hate spring because I can't freaking breathe."

Perhaps, had it started later, in summer, or winter, or fall, we would have caught it. Just the pollen, we thought, that robbed her of full breaths. That made her wheeze, unable to climb the stairs to our little apartment without stopping halfway. But instead, as spring finally turned into blessed summer, her "allergies" only continued to worsen. I picked her the first marigold of the season on my way back from work. She sat there, by the window. A tired smile on her face as she lifted the flower up in hands that trembled with even that effort. And her face crumbled, such a look of despair that I thought my heart would stop right then and there. "Robert," I remember her starting, one final time. "I can't smell it."

The doctors said, if we'd caught it sooner, that it would have been a simple operation. That she would have had more than a fighting chance. But it was spring, and we didnt. I own a greenhouse now, in it I grow marigolds, year round. The air inside is always summer warm, filled with the heady scent of fresh flowers. It smells like her. I take them to her, every day when I walk home from work. She can't smell them now, caught in an eternal spring, like me. I know I am, because the pollen is constantly there, stinging at my eyes.