family
Learning To Love Marigolds
I always hated marigolds. They were a perennial favorite of my mother’s, and she planted them in the flower beds of our little home every year, without fail. It was a small rectangular bed, carved out of the yard, next to the worn gravel driveway, and edged with railroad ties. Yellow and orange, and sometimes trimmed with red. I think they made her happy, the bright colors. A beacon of hope in an otherwise humdrum existence. But as for me, I hated them. I wanted the pretty reds, and purples, and pinks of other flowers like lilies, irises, or even begonias. Or sweet smelling roses. Basically, anything that my grandmother, my father’s mother, grew. Yellow and orange were, after all, basic and ugly colors. And marigolds smelled bad.
C. H. CrowPublished 3 years ago in FictionA Floral Feud
THIS STORY HAS BEEN UPDATED AS "TWO WITCHES AND A WEED" It was a long war. It had started with snails, moved on to weed seeds, weedkiller, then angry calls to the local Council complaints office, and, possibly, witchcraft.
Fiona HamerPublished 3 years ago in FictionMarigolds on the Cathedral Step
Sanity is fluid. We all want to believe that our minds will stay forever intact. Severe mental illness is something we hear about on the news, something that happens to other people, not to us. All too often, we don't realize how fragile our grasp on reality can be. Sometimes, mental illness can be brought on by a combination of genetic and environmental factors, such as abuse. Sometimes, all it takes is one major, terrible event to send us over the edge.
Angela CookePublished 3 years ago in FictionThe Sun Will Rise Again
Marisol stared down at her dress embroidered with red and yellow flowers, and watched as a single tear dropped down off her face making the yellow flower have an orange spot momentarily. It was so hot most of her tears dried up before they could roll off her chin. Dresses in every color with similar flower designs were scattered about laying on the bed, hanging on the walls or draped over the only other chair in the room on display for any visitors to see. The woman who owned the room told Marisol it was to show people all her mother’s work and what her mother enjoyed to do, but earlier that day she overheard her trying to sell a few of the dresses to some people that were passing by. Marisol didn’t look up when she heard a few of her mother’s friends step into the small room that she and her mother used to share. Dirt on the floor kicked up as they moved. She had swept the floor three times, but the dirt kept coming in from the visitor’s feet. She remembered her mother telling her almost every day “Kick the desert out of your shoes before you come in!”. One day her mother scooped up handfuls of dirt and placed it in her shoe before she came into the room and slowly poured it out making it seem like the desert was in her shoe to make her laugh. She squeezed her eyes shut and she didn’t think she would ever laugh again. The three elderly women touched their foreheads, chest and shoulders and kissed their rosaries. They looked at Marisol solemnly and placed their hands on her and murmured prayers. They touched her mother’s coffin and prayed some more. Marisol wished that one of them would take her in, she knew that it was impossible though. Most of them were already struggling with their own families with not enough room for her. She didn’t look up as they left. Another tear rolled down spotting the red flower this time.
Two Fields in Bloom
In a field of small exploding suns, I hold my son. He asks me what all those little suns are called. "Marigolds."
Thomas EvansPublished 3 years ago in FictionMarissa's Gold
“Hija, hold these,” Marissa’s mother said through withheld tears. She handed the girl an armful of marigolds. They would be used to decorate the grave of her father. Since he died in the hospital last week, it had been nothing but sequences of hysterical cries and silent sobs. Marissa didn’t think she had any tears left to give.
Kiersten KellyPublished 3 years ago in FictionThe Botanist's Son
“And this one, my boy, I call a chalice, brimming with sunlight.” My earliest years are to me a flux of images. The first chapters in the story are not really linear, and this makes it quite difficult for me to keep track. I haven’t made sense of it all just yet. There are, however, a few facts that remain my frame to cling on, defiant columns rising from the sea. Firstly, I know my father was a scientist. More specifically, a botanist. The man loved flowers, and he could tell you a lot about them. Often too much. I’ve been told that he possessed the conversational quality of a single C-sharp note, sustained on an organ; at first one was curious to hear it, then one became bored, then one would be forced to take leave before their lack of tolerance became too obvious and, more than anything, impolite. His lectures were notorious for being at once zesty and unbearable. But, as a boy, I was rapt with them. Something I’d inherited from my mother.
H. R. M. LaventurePublished 3 years ago in FictionDancing for the Dead
Her favourite flower was the common Marigold. Her friends often made fun of her because of it, asking why she didn’t like something more exotic like orchids, but she didn’t care. Marigolds held a magic for her, one she was unable to explain to anyone else.
Community Service
I’ve never been a religious or spiritual man. On the contrary, I’ve always found those who place their faith in imaginary friends to be not only delusional, but pathetic. I can probably thank my father for that mentality, who taught me from a very young age, “the only things worth worshipping are whiskey and women.” Emphasis on, women.
Pink Jewelry Box
The ride home from the hospital was never easy. Every Saturday they would pile in the car and drive the half hour at the off chance they might get to see their grandma one more time. Roro had become too ill for the kids to get to see her, but their mom was allowed to go in. It was nearing more than a month since they began this new Saturday morning routine, and all Anna, Clark and Lori were able to do was sulk around the waiting room and bother their mom for vending machine money for what seemed to be the only edible food source in the entire hospital.
Brooklyn MollPublished 3 years ago in FictionMarigolds In Summer -
She’d been wearing a dress, the first time he laid eyes on her. Some sort of white floaty dress that had been covered in these yellow flowers.
Kiana HenarePublished 3 years ago in FictionA Simple Locket
Well, It's official! Senior Year! It seems like just yesterday my parents were walking me and my twin sister into school. My sister was my whole world. She just had this glow always around her. We would always play under the biggest tree we could find during the summer. Our parents were working non-stop to try to start saving for both of us to go to University. We would play until our hearts were content.
Shaelyne SmithPublished 3 years ago in Fiction