It’s late. My thoughts are spinning in my head way faster than I would like, but I try my best to push them down. 

My father sits in his basement, his fortress, not a care in the world. I hold a mug of tea in my hands as I stare blankly at the TV, watching but not really seeing. It’s always worse at night. The quiet, the darkness, the melancholy silence, and the solitude. My head throbs in low, infrequent intervals. 

I set the mug down. I don’t think I can drink it right now. I bury my face in my hands and take a deep breath. 

“I’m taking a walk,” I call down the stairs. No response from my father. He’s probably busy. Busy with what?

I sling a jacket on and walk out the door.

It’s a chilly night downtown. The days have been getting colder. A friend of mine didn’t like winter. He loved flowers and they would die when it got too cold. 

My heart starts to sink as if tied to a weight. My thoughts drift through my head aimlessly and my consciousness starts to wander…

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“Miss, are you all right?” 

I snap awake. I’m standing in front of a restaurant, goofy music coming from exterior speakers. A stranger in a goofy restaurant uniform is shaking my shoulder. I force a smile on my face. “Yes, it’s fine. I’m okay. Thank you.” My words are not convincing, but he nods and returns to his work anyway. 

The streets of my sleepy little town are nearly empty. There’s no one out here but me. The yellow light of the streetlights drowns all other shreds of color with their dull, lazy glow. 

I continue my walk but my steps are a bit slower. How long has it been since he never saw a flower again? How long has it been since my friend’s son cuddled with his brother, his usually stone-cold face warming into the barest smile? How long has it been since they sat in their kitchen, chatting calmly, drinking steaming mugs of tea? 

It only happened a few weeks ago but it feels like it’s been an eternity. 

I walk back down through the neighborhood on autopilot. The lights on the houses are almost all out, making it seem even more silent. I pass by the neat little backyards, the decks of the little white picket fence houses decorated with somewhat underwatered tulips and hyacinths. 

Without thinking about it, I arrive back at their house, as if a magnet pulled me there. There’s yellow tape surrounding the perimeter, blocking off the yard of ashes and charred wood. I step over it and enter the bones of the house. 

I stare at the blackened walls, the now shapeless furniture. This is the chair where he once sat. This was the couch that his brother stayed on. This was the kitchen where my friend made countless cups of tea. 

My boot comes down on something, making a slight crunching sound. I look down at my feet. Underneath my boot is a few pieces of burned ceramic--the ceramic of his favorite tea mug. 

I pick up the shattered pieces and pocket them. 

The whole second floor has collapsed, the feeble, burned beams no longer able to support it. I have never seen their rooms. The scorched remains of a bed lie where the bathroom used to be. 

I lie down on it. I can’t help myself. 

I sink through the ashy layers of the mattress. 

I come back up, spitting ash out of my mouth, brushing it out of my hair. 

I go through the back where a screen door once was and enter the barren ash field that was once my friend’s garden. 

His garden was the gem of the neighborhood—everyone who lived here had been there once or twice. It was the most luscious garden I had ever seen in my life—he took care of it well. Now it’s strewn with rubble, the backyard swarmed with empty construction machines, casting shadows on the ash in the moonlight. 

I sit down in the ash. Where were the buttercups planted in his garden, the hyacinths, the dahlias? I struggle to map the garden in my mind. I think eventually I will forget the colors, the type of flowers, their shapes and sizes. 

I shuffle through the charcoal and find two crushed bushes underneath a few blackened beams: A rose and a lily plant. I touch their leaves gently. I had transplanted those in the ash before the construction workers came to knock his house down. 

The bushes are smashed beneath the weight of fallen debris. I examine the plants. I’m not an expert on gardening or anything, but I think that they’re dead. 

I stand back up and feel that sinking feeling again. I sit back down mechanically. 

I think I’ll stay here for a while.