Roses
We will die soon. Not in years, or months, or even days. We have moments left in this cell where they keep us, the weak prisoners who managed to survive. The managing has worn us out at last. My dirty fingers find the wall and I sink into a crouch on the floor. Even now, I cannot always bring myself to touch the filth, stained and tired as I am.
We die in two ways here: shot or sick. The specifics ceased to matter after the first week. So many of us were killed then, and when someone I knew went missing I stopped wanting to know the story because I feared the horror of it might weaken me.
A part of me is secretly glad it is to be the shot. Those who die sick waste away, whereas the gun ends it quickly, like a strong wind from the north used to snuff out the windowsill candles at home.
I look around me at the women in the cell, all waiting. The girl next to me trembles. She is slumped against the wall, barely human anymore, more like a very lean vegetable freshly plucked from the soil, about to be-
I stop the thought with a shake of my head and whisper to her, "What is your name?" She does not respond, except to lift her arm to me so I can see the tattoo. "No, your real name." She shakes her head, wetness forming in her eyes. "Mine is Sarah."
She murmurs, "Greta." The will to live dies in her eyes as I watch her, a candle flame snuffing out on its own before the wind comes. All around the cell, the light in the womens' eyes is dying. I focus on Greta.
"Let me tell you a story, Greta," I shiver in the cold, but ignore it. I must be careful, for the guards forbid conversation. I begin my story, whispering. "When I was growing up, my mother had a garden. Half of it was for vegetables, but the other half was for flowers. She grew the most incredible flowers, Greta. She loved tulips and peonies, but I loved roses and she always grew some just for me. Red and white roses right below my window so I could see them."
Around the cell, I see the womens' eyes focusing again as they listen. Greta looks at me for the rest of the story. "I used to help her with the flowers. When I was very young, we had a difficult winter, and many of the plants died, despite my mother's efforts. I wept. That garden was my whole world." I see a light flicker in Greta's eyes. Maybe she had a garden too.
"What happened?" she asks, her eyes finding me for the first time. There is a small light in them.
"My mother told me, 'Wait and see, Sarah. The strong flowers will survive.' I did not believe her. Our garden had become a wasteland, when it had been paradise before. I was certain the roses beneath my window would never bloom again." In my mind, I see that dead yard, muddy from the snow and sleet, so ugly and hard beneath that slate grey sky.
"Then, one day, the flowers did bloom again. We replanted so many of them: rows and rows of tulips for my mother, a hedge that I used to shape with my shears every spring, pansies, lilies, and flowers only my mother knew the names of. They were beautiful, but it was the roses, the flowers that survived that cold winter, that were the most beautiful. Because they were the strong ones-
I do not need to finish the sentence for the women because I see in their faces understanding, and life burning in their eyes. They are the strong ones, to have survived so much. Greta's eyes are alive again, pulsing with hope, like the lantern my father used to light when the wind was too strong for the candles. We smile at one another, even as the guards come in all their black to take us outside.
The sky is blue, the way it was that day that Mother called me out to look at the garden. The tulips were blooming, pink and yellow, and the hedge was no longer a bunch of crooked sticks poking their arms out of the mud, but a thickening green line stretching down the length of the garden.
The guards line us up, yet I hardly notice their presence. I see the sun, smiling down on me the way it did that day so long ago when it pulsed new life and warmth into my winter white skin. In my mind, the pansies are bright and cheerful, the lilies pure and soft. The roses beneath my window bloom sweet and perfect.
The shots are fired, I suppose, but I do not hear them. Wonder takes hold of me for there are roses here, beautiful roses, blooming in the courtyard of our camp. They are red and white.
Just like us.
We die in two ways here: shot or sick. The specifics ceased to matter after the first week. So many of us were killed then, and when someone I knew went missing I stopped wanting to know the story because I feared the horror of it might weaken me.
A part of me is secretly glad it is to be the shot. Those who die sick waste away, whereas the gun ends it quickly, like a strong wind from the north used to snuff out the windowsill candles at home.
I look around me at the women in the cell, all waiting. The girl next to me trembles. She is slumped against the wall, barely human anymore, more like a very lean vegetable freshly plucked from the soil, about to be-
I stop the thought with a shake of my head and whisper to her, "What is your name?" She does not respond, except to lift her arm to me so I can see the tattoo. "No, your real name." She shakes her head, wetness forming in her eyes. "Mine is Sarah."
She murmurs, "Greta." The will to live dies in her eyes as I watch her, a candle flame snuffing out on its own before the wind comes. All around the cell, the light in the womens' eyes is dying. I focus on Greta.
"Let me tell you a story, Greta," I shiver in the cold, but ignore it. I must be careful, for the guards forbid conversation. I begin my story, whispering. "When I was growing up, my mother had a garden. Half of it was for vegetables, but the other half was for flowers. She grew the most incredible flowers, Greta. She loved tulips and peonies, but I loved roses and she always grew some just for me. Red and white roses right below my window so I could see them."
Around the cell, I see the womens' eyes focusing again as they listen. Greta looks at me for the rest of the story. "I used to help her with the flowers. When I was very young, we had a difficult winter, and many of the plants died, despite my mother's efforts. I wept. That garden was my whole world." I see a light flicker in Greta's eyes. Maybe she had a garden too.
"What happened?" she asks, her eyes finding me for the first time. There is a small light in them.
"My mother told me, 'Wait and see, Sarah. The strong flowers will survive.' I did not believe her. Our garden had become a wasteland, when it had been paradise before. I was certain the roses beneath my window would never bloom again." In my mind, I see that dead yard, muddy from the snow and sleet, so ugly and hard beneath that slate grey sky.
"Then, one day, the flowers did bloom again. We replanted so many of them: rows and rows of tulips for my mother, a hedge that I used to shape with my shears every spring, pansies, lilies, and flowers only my mother knew the names of. They were beautiful, but it was the roses, the flowers that survived that cold winter, that were the most beautiful. Because they were the strong ones-
I do not need to finish the sentence for the women because I see in their faces understanding, and life burning in their eyes. They are the strong ones, to have survived so much. Greta's eyes are alive again, pulsing with hope, like the lantern my father used to light when the wind was too strong for the candles. We smile at one another, even as the guards come in all their black to take us outside.
The sky is blue, the way it was that day that Mother called me out to look at the garden. The tulips were blooming, pink and yellow, and the hedge was no longer a bunch of crooked sticks poking their arms out of the mud, but a thickening green line stretching down the length of the garden.
The guards line us up, yet I hardly notice their presence. I see the sun, smiling down on me the way it did that day so long ago when it pulsed new life and warmth into my winter white skin. In my mind, the pansies are bright and cheerful, the lilies pure and soft. The roses beneath my window bloom sweet and perfect.
The shots are fired, I suppose, but I do not hear them. Wonder takes hold of me for there are roses here, beautiful roses, blooming in the courtyard of our camp. They are red and white.
Just like us.
Absolutely beautiful. Thank you!
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