Under The Wildflowers | ONC 2024

Chapter 3.

When Dominic returned to his parents' grave the next day, an unexpected and potent emptiness greeted him where flowers once stood.

The once vibrant declaration of sympathy through colorful floral tributes was replaced by earthy tones of loose soil, a testament to Dominic's violent and frequent uprooting. It carried the freshness of morning dew, the remnants of rainfall aiding in the sight's dejected state.

As dawn gently lifted the veil of night, brushing the sky with hues of blue and orange and ushering in the morning light, Maybourne Cemetery, wrapped in tranquil silence bore witness to Dominic's return.

It was as if nature itself mourned in unison with him.

The smudge beside Dominic's mother's name had also been wiped clean, the bareness of the grave prompting him to recall the first day Marcus and Lily Gray had taken Maybourne as their new home.

Kneeling before the tombstone, he carefully traced each engraved letter with a trembling hand. Tears welled up, escaping the confines of his water line. And he tilted his head up in a futile attempt to stop their descent.

How he wished they were still here. Longing for the simplicity of a normal life again. He wished he knew how to overcome this crippling feeling and the overwhelming loneliness that came with it.

A subtle movement in his peripheral had caught his attention, compelling him to glance upwards. There, in the distance, Celia stood before a grave, positioned northward from the oak tree and several paces from where he crouched.

She couldn't see him as he knelt down, and he watched as the morning breeze played with her uniform causing it to flutter gently.

The pleats of her navy blue skirt were slightly ruffled, and the white buttoned-up shirt, typical of St. Peter's girls, remained partially untucked, the other side hanging loosely. The red tie bearing their school's crest was absent from her neck granting him a view to another beauty mark atop her chest.

As Dominic recalled, this was exactly how she wore her uniform yesterday too. This subtle defiance against the pompous customs of St. Peters had intrigued him as he watched the wind cast her hair behind her.

She delicately brushed a tear from her face before kneeling, hugging her knees as if creating a protective cocoon of solitude.

In this unique moment of what Dominic considered 'shared grief', his heart bowed at her forlorn condition, recalling the sincerity in her strange gesture of comfort that she so readily exhibited to him, a stranger.

He rose from the ground, compelled to approach her. Finally standing beside her, he caught a flicker of surprise in her expression before she too stood and both of them directed their gazes to the tombstone that had left her in tears.

There were wildflowers adorning this grave, a burst of color against the somber backdrop of Maybourne. The first name had been diligently carved out as if someone had painstakingly scraped each letter away, leaving only "Wynter" visible.

"She was my sister," Celia stated, answering his unasked question. Her voice trembled as she fought to hold back tears. "She was 17 when she died."

His gaze shifted between her and the gravestone, the familiar pang of heartache making their daily rounds inside his head.

"Born September 5th, 1988, died September 5th, 2005. On her birthday no less," each word hanging heavily in the air.

"What happened?" Dominic mustered, her melancholy contagious.

"I don't remember," her face twisted, as if trying to recall a distant memory.

"How old were you?" Dominic gently pressed, his curiosity battling his empathy.