Young Writers Society

A/N: This is my entry for the poetry as prose contest.  This is (loosely) based on "I Wandered Lonely As A Cloud" by William Wordsworth.  Enjoy! Link here

I drive to the bay, my tin can filled with daffodils in the passenger seat. My husband doesn’t understand this drive, just like he doesn’t understand why I insist on growing daffodils. He read somewhere that they symbolized death and the underworld, and ever since he insisted I should plant something else, something happier. But nothing else seemed as happy as my little yellow stars, and so we fought. Eventually, we expanded the garden area and put in some different flowers so we could have some variety without touching the daffodils.

A song comes on the radio, a throwback from ten years ago. My mind wanders to when that song blasted from the speakers on the beach as Rose and I came to celebrate the Spring Equinox. I liked parties about as much as I liked that song, but my roommate was like a social goddess. Usually, she’d let me stay in and study, but that night, she insisted.

“Elaine, come on! It’s so beautiful outside. You don’t really want to waste the best years of your life in this little box of a room, do you?”

I gave in, but by the time Rose got me a can of beer from the cooler and introduced me to James, I was regretting that choice. I opened the can and took the tiniest sip, but all I tasted was bitter. I couldn’t understand how anyone drank enough to actually get drunk. I tried to follow whatever Rose and James were talking about since I didn’t know anyone else, but the way she playfully touched his arm and the way he looked at her made it clear that I was an unwelcome third wheel.

The last time I saw them was on last year’s Christmas card, all grown up and smiling with their four-year-old daughter. One of the few college couples who made it.

Just 50 miles to go now. Sometimes I hate living four hours away, but I know I need the distance. I need to remember, but if I lived here, I would do nothing else, I told the daffodils on the bay six years ago when I said goodbye. The daffodils have become the silent keepers of memory. 

It’s strange to think how I might have never noticed the daffodils in my entire four years of college if I’d left that party when I first wanted to. Instead, I wandered around a while, watching buffoons chugging beer after beer and bikini-clad girls running into the frigid ocean and tossing around a beach ball.

I first saw him lying down on a fleece blanket in the grass on the outskirts of the party. Now that guy’s got the right idea, I thought. I immediately headed closer to join him, and then stopped, realizing he may not want to be bothered. Well if he doesn’t, I’ll go home. Carpe diem. Now I just had to think of something clever to say.

“Mind if I crash your stargazing party over here?”

“Not at all.”

His name was Ben, and he was a sophomore studying English, not that he knew what he wanted to do with it. He told me he loved stargazing because his dad would take him out camping in the middle of nowhere so they could see more stars.

“Have you ever looked up at the stars, at the pictures we’re supposed to see from ancient stories, and thought ‘I could do better’? That’s what I like to do, make my own patterns.”

“Sounds interesting. What do you see over there?” I pointed at some random part of the night sky. I couldn’t remember what the constellation was supposed to be, but we eventually decided it was now a cheeseburger. In retrospect, I think we were both just hungry, because I’ve looked at those stars a thousand times since and I’ve never seen a cheeseburger again.

We lay down side by side, renaming the stars. Every so often, his arm would brush against mine as we pointed at the sky. My heart started beating faster, no matter how much I tried to assume it was accidental. I knew all too well the consequences of jumping to conclusions when it came to guys. Before starting college, I promised myself that I would never make the first move and I would take things slow so I wouldn’t get hurt again. With Ben, I only kept one of those promises.

The next few hours just flew by. The whole time, I found myself wishing I could flirt the way Rose could, with her perfect green eyes and seemingly magical ability to charm any man. Every time I tried to smile just so or bat my eyelashes, I felt like a boy-crazy puppet. I wanted to be genuine, to be myself, but people like my roommate made me think that just wasn’t enough. Would it be enough for the dark-haired stargazer next to me?

My musings were interrupted by a stray beach ball that hit Ben square in the face. As he readjusted his glasses, Rose ran over and caught it. When she saw us, her mouth dropped open.

“Oh my God, are you two…?”

“No, no.” I responded, perhaps a little too fast. “We’ve just been hanging out looking at the stars.”

“Nerds,” Rose rolled her eyes. “Well Elaine, I’ll be heading home in a bit if you want to walk together.”

Before I left, Ben and I exchanged numbers. As we walked home, Rose and I talked about our evening. Rose was convinced she was going to marry James, but I was skeptical. 

Five years later, I struggled not to cry at their wedding on a much nicer beach than the little patch of land where they fell in love. They’d had their big fights and their time apart, but at the end of the day, they were never quite as happy with anyone else.

I get to the bay, park, and walk up to “the beach”, which is really just a small piece of sand and grass where the college kids like to hang out on nice days. It’s near sunset, and this generation of students looks much the same as mine, right down to playing with a beach ball in the water.

I sit down near the very same daffodils where we first gazed up at the stars. He picked some for me the next week as we sat down after eating way too much pizza. I had mentioned offhand that my birthday was coming up at the end of March, at which point he yanked a few out of the ground.

“My mother’s really into daffodils. She’s got a March birthday, too, and apparently that’s the birthday flower. I don’t know much about flowers, but they are pretty.” He paused and looked at the makeshift bouquet. “It would be really cheesy for me to say ‘But not as pretty as you, wouldn’t it?”

“Yeah it would.” I laughed, unsure how to handle this compliment.

“Well it’s true.” He continued. “ Look, words are failing me, and I’m an English major.” By that point, words had failed me too, and so I broke my own rule about taking things slow. On that night, it seemed rather overrated.

I pull out the notebook he gave me nine years ago. I only write it in when I’m at our beach. He said paper was the traditional first anniversary gift (another fact he’d learned from his mother). I pointed out that we weren’t married.

“Yet.” was his only reply.

The second year was “cotton”, and so he got me the golden sundress I’ve worn every Spring Equinox since. Stunned, I asked if he’d picked it out by himself. He said yes, but then admitted his mother helped him out. 

Ben’s mother has always had impeccable taste. Even now, she manages to send the best Christmas gifts. Last year, she found the perfect pair of heels that was both fashionable and very comfortable.

The third year, he swore he picked out the gift entirely on his own. It was a leather wallet, which was actually well-timed as my old one was falling apart. I set it aside at first, but he insisted I open it. As I unzipped it, he went down on one knee.

“It’s been three amazing years, Elaine. We’re graduating soon, and I still don’t know where I’m going next or where I’ll end up, but I know I want you to be there until the end. Will you marry me?” I slipped the ring on, and somehow it looked like it was always meant to be there.

I start fiddling with the ring, now worn on my neck. Some things, like some people, are worth holding on to. I thought about throwing it dramatically in the ocean at the funeral, but thankfully I listened to Rose.

“You save things for a reason, Elaine. It’s part of him, and he’ll always be part of you. I know you want to forget now, but someday you’ll want to remember.”

She was half right. I want to remember the daffodils, the long summer days, even the times when we were so stressed out from school that we nearly killed each other. I want to remember all the cadences of his voice, whether he was angry, joking, sarcastic, or all too serious.

But more than anything, I want to forget that phone call. I was with my mother, Ben’s mother, my sister, and Rose. This was our third attempt at finding the perfect dress, but somehow nothing had seemed right. I came out in a beaded A-line that I thought would be “the dress”. However, Ben’s mother was holding back tears, and it wasn’t because of me.

He had been out grocery shopping when a drunk driver decided to run a red light. The impact killed him instantly. I wish I could forget the site of his crumpled-up Civic and having to help Ben’s mother make those phone calls. I wish I had never been forced to switch from planning a wedding to planning a funeral.

“ ‘Til death do us part,” I whispered as we scattered his ashes at the beach. He’d told me once that he wanted to fly in the wind, not rot in the ground. Part of the ashes landed on the daffodils. I think he would have liked being part of them.

Most of the time, I am perfectly happy as Mrs. Austin Glenwood. I’m a successful CPA and he’s in marketing, so we’re well off financially. We have a beautiful house by the sea, not unlike what Ben and I first dreamed about. We’re busy, but we try to make time for each other. We don’t have children yet, but we probably will in the next few years. I love Austin and our life together.

But in March, my heart travels back in time. To two kids making new star patterns on the beach. To a time when the future was unknown, but we believed that we’d make it. To a love witnessed by the first blooms of spring from beginning to tragic end.

As I smell a daffodil, I see a man wearing the dress shirt and khakis he bought after we graduated. An English teacher, after all, couldn’t just wear old T-shirts. He looks a bit older, a little more worn, as if we had aged side by side. On his left ring finger he wears a silver wedding band, just like the ones we’d been looking at but never bought. He steps closer, and for a moment I believe we can touch, but my hand goes right through him.

As the sky grows dark he stays by my side and together we watch the stars in silence. Here among our daffodils, we have a piece of what might have been. As the sun rises, I feel a chill around me as we attempt to embrace. He disappears, and I leave the tin can of daffodils behind before taking my heart and body back to the present.