I Planted Flowers

I planted the flowers in March. I went outside and it was warm and the threat of frost was basically gone. The yard needed cleaning. I mowed and tended to the weeds and started thinking. Imagining the flowers soon to come, the yard in full bloom. The peonies I knew would arrive not long from now. The black-eyed susans. The brief glory of cherry blossoms. Then, I started thinking of what I’d like to see. And, of course, what she might enjoy.

We’d started seeing each other again just a few months before. Just before Thanksgiving, really. Seeing each other is a generous way to describe it. She’d reached out after nine months of the breakup. Nine months of nothing. I’d sent a few messages after she ended things, but she never responded, and nine months went by. Then, one morning, she messaged me. I assumed it was a mistake, a hangover or maybe at that hour of the morning, she was still drunk.

But, she messaged again. We messaged again. The magic was still there, the electric current coming alive as words appeared on screens. So, we met. That night was nothing more than a few drinks and a very, very long talk. She held me as we said goodbye. We hugged like old friends, like lovers. Both crying tears of joy, happy to just be with each other, happy we were “back.”

We would see each a few more times, then the Holidays and time with our respective families and then a move for her and a change in job for me. Still, we talked and laughed and called and messaged and planned to meet, though it didn’t quite happen.

Then, it was March and it had been months since I’d seen her, but we were still talking and it felt good to have her back. Back in my life, back in my phone, back to making me laugh with just a few words like no one else could.

I wanted to let her know. To show her I still felt the same, still loved her deeply. Flowers would arrive on her birthday and her thanks was almost overboard. No one else had sent her flowers, she let me know. She loved flowers, especially fresh flowers.

So, it was March. I planted flowers for her. Picked the seeds, found various blends and hearty annuals that would be impressive in a vase. In the meantime, I used St. Patrick’s Day as an excuse to buy her fresh flowers. Yellow roses delivered with a bottle of wine and a simple note.

She was delighted, she said. We simply MUST meet again soon.

I wondered if there was someone else, someone who might object to the attention being lavished in her direction. She never mentioned such a thing, such a person. But, there were days when we’d message each other and then she’d just . . . disappear. I took solace in the fact that she always came back, always made me laugh, always asked about me. Sometimes, she’d apologize for an absence or make a vague plan to meet. She was stressed, she’d say. Something with one of her parents. I meant a lot, I was often told.

It was nice, for me, to have her back in my life. But, I wanted more than just having her back. I wanted her. All of her. Maybe more than I had in the first round of our romance. She was going through some key transitions, some challenging life experiences, so I was quick to forgive her off and on absences.

Plus, I was in the middle of a bit of a transition myself. New job, new projects, soon to be new home. This would be the last year of the flower garden in this location.

By May, the flowers had begun to bloom. Peonies in a short vase were the first to arrive on her porch. Then, there were more. Wild flowers whose names I don’t quite recall, didn’t make a point to know. On a Monday or a Friday they would show up on her porch. I would walk the long sidewalk to the bright red door of her house and leave the flowers there. Once or twice I would knock, but she never answered. An hour or two later, I’d receive a text celebrating the arrival of the beautiful plants.

By the end of May, she was calling again. Our phone conversations turned to a meeting. The meeting turned into spending the month of June together.

One night, near the end of dinner on what had been a glorious day together, she told me she didn’t want to be “here” anymore. I assumed she meant the restaurant. I told her I’d get the check and we could leave. And she said no, it wasn’t just here it was … here. With me. She just needed to leave. I asked her why, and she just said she couldn’t do it. Just an hour before we’d been laughing as we shared an appetizer, fed it to each other. Now, she was walking out and I was left confused and hurt.

The next morning, she asked if everything was ok, told me she’d be out of town for a few days. I told her I was fine. She kept asking to meet in July, but I kept not meeting her. I didn’t want to be left again, I didn’t know what she wanted. I figured if she wanted me, she knew where I was and she could make that clear. Besides, maybe some time off from each other would serve us well.

August and we were back again. Seeing each other briefly at first, then as September came, spending days and nights together. Flowers (from the store now, again) were on her porch, or I’d even bring them in when I came to visit. Always her place, always all night. Mostly talking and laughing and just being together.

We were planning a trip to escape. A week at a safe and comfortable beach, a private house. Then one night in November, she told me. Told me about him. About the guy she’d been texting that morning over breakfast, the one she had made plans to go out with that night. She cancelled those plans, she said. We were having a nice day, she told me. So, she cancelled on him and intended to say with me.

I told her I was leaving, I was not ok, this was not ok. I had spent the past 25 hours with her, and days and nights the week before. She had spent the day and night with me and her response was to agree to see this man. A man I knew existed, but thought she hadn’t seen in some time. Maybe she hadn’t.

It was 7:30 at night and I told her there was still plenty of time for her to see him, to message him, to let him know she was there for him.

The next week, we met for lunch. She had a manicure, which was rare. I knew that meant she had a date. And it wasn’t with me. She would see him that Friday, I would find out from a mutual friend.

Then, she would message me again and again and again asking to meet. I eventually stopped responding.

I planted flowers for her in March. She planted seeds of doubt. I planted flowers planning to show her how much I thought of her. She thought so little of me she couldn’t be bothered to respond to texts. I should have known our feelings for each other were different. But, then we’d be together and our flower would bloom and grow and be. We’d be beautiful together, wonderful, two awkward, seemingly lost souls dancing only in the light of each other’s sun.

I planted flowers for her and she was out finding new gardens. I planned a future, she planned an ending.

I don’t know exactly what she thought might happen when she told me, I don’t know why she couldn’t have just taken the flowers and told me to move on.

I planted flowers for her in March, and in November, she trampled them and tore out my heart.

I’ll plant flowers again this March. For me, for my life, and for my own joy.