Chrysanthemum Garden [Dazai x Reader] ✓

26. Bar of Chrysanthemum seeds

"When I die – promise me that you'll bury me with the flowers of my labour."

Father was painfully passionate about his sea of white mums.

I watched him water them daily, from the window at first, and saw him sit down to talk to them sometimes – I didn't understand why he cared so much for them.

On a specific occasion, I dusted my fear under the outside mat and asked him what they (the flowers) meant while he dug his hands in the soil; he replied tenderly, informing me that these flowers were a gift of grief to the dead and loved ones, the same which topped the casket at funerals – "those that are lucky to arrange the ceremony, that is."

"Can I... plant my own garden of mums?" I approached hesitantly, aware that female ownership of anything except her own secrets could be an alienated concept for him, expected from traditional influence.

He did not laugh like I expected, either; instead, he looked up from the soil where his fingers were buried in the dirt and asked me why.

"I want to grow a garden of mums for everyone that got killed that day – especially my mama and papa; they didn't get to name me like every other parent, so the least I could do is thank them for choosing to have me."

I knew I had plucked at a sensitive string in him when his eyes lowered back to the soil and he kept digging, a heaviness in his dark eyes while his close-shave stared back at me with a smirk of mockery: "You didn't think asking "politely" would work, did you?", it seemed to say, "You're just a girl, after all."

I was just a girl, after all. There were two types of girls: the pretty and rich kind that were destined to be princesses and queens, and the poor and unlucky type that married farmers and manual workers, given the duty of staying at home to look after the children, cook and clean; despite the contrasting differences – and my assimilation to the latter kind – neither type (except for maybe the queens who wore the crown) owned anything –

"Here."

Father had retrieved his brown fingers from the dirt and reached for my hand, fidgeting his rough fingers on my wrist until my palm faced upwards so that he was able to drop a couple of seeds on it.

"When you grow older you can have a big garden all for yourself, but for now, you can have two amongst mine. Choose wisely."

I knelt beside him hesitantly, heart pounding on my chest as I inspected the hard brown shells of the seeds, wondering who these flowers ought to be planted for – Of course I wanted to have two for my parents, but it didn't sit with me to have them mingle in Father's plot. I could wait a while longer for those, perhaps.

"Can we plant mums for people whom we haven't either met or lost yet?"

He furrowed his eyebrows in clear confusion and shrugged, supposing that perhaps it didn't matter who they were for because, in the end, the dead couldn't receive the physical gift and the ones we loved often just lived in our memory.

"I want to plant these for two people whom I haven't met yet: my future husband and the child which I am expected to have with them. When I have my own plot, I'll dedicate my chrysanthemum garden for mama and papa and everyone I killed that day."

But I didn't plant those flowers for my husband or child.

I stayed committed to the seeds I pushed in the soil, and ensured that they received the best treatment possible to grow big and strong; on sunny days, I carried leaking glasses of water for them to drink (and I gave them water when I grew thirsty, too), and I watched them dance from the window in storms as they drank from the rain.