Remember Autumn

Happy Birthday, Rowana

AMELIA held on to her son tight as if the wind would carry her away with its breath anytime soon. She was feeling weak, but the sight in front of her seemed to make her weaker.

Michael sniffed. It had been years since they first visited the stone before them—a flat rectangular stone over a bed of bright green carefully maintained grass. He still felt the same way since then. Same sorrow, same longing, same regret.

Glossy black ink traced the thin etches on the stone, etches that formed the letters of a beloved name.

ROWANA FURTHER

2000-2010

Beloved daughter and sister

The wind was still blowing hard despite the heat of the day. Amelia held a white handkerchief to her nose, a few tears forming in her eyes.

"Do you remember, Michael?" she managed to say, still holding on to his arm.

"I...I..."

Of course he remembered. How could he ever forget?

They used to have a little greenhouse tucked in at the corner of their lot. Michael's father had built it especially for Rowana just a year before he abandoned them with almost no explanation. He had flown to New Zealand without their knowledge. The only way they knew was by a large package sent to them filled with books and toys and clothes and some chocolate with a letter addressed to their mother. She had read it in private while Michael and Rowana sorted out the clothes and toys, their faces smeared with chocolate. After a few minutes, they noticed their mother missing. They had sneaked up to her room, and Michael had ordered Rowana to find out what their mother was doing to which Rowana did not object and even held a hand in a crisp salute. Rowana had not returned after five minutes, which Michael felt was an hour, so he entered the room also. Rowana was stroking their mother's hair as she knelt down with her face buried in her arms on her bed. Their mother had cried and was deprived of sleep for the next few days. Michael would later learn that his father would never come back, that he had left them for good. Rowana however was never to find out.

Amelia had gone to the greenhouse with Rowana to tend the roses—no, not just the roses. Rowana loved flowers, all sorts of them. And not just enough to put one in her hair as she often did when going to school. She knew how to take good care of them. Amelia's friend, an old granny named Mildred Thumbwell, had often visited to teach her how. She had daffodils and pansies and tulips, forget-me-nots and violets and sunflowers, even a couple of little cacti and a bonsai. She knew all of them, given them pretty nicknames. Amelia went out to help her daughter, though she never was born with a green thumb.

Michael was left at home, working on his homework. Amelia had instructed him to sterilize his younger brother Andre's milk bottles in boiling water, get back to his homework while looking after the sleeping toddler upstairs, and turn the stove off after a good ten minutes. Michael did as he was told, had gone upstairs to resume his homework as Andre slept. He had been working on a History project due the following week. It was had so many names and wars and acts that he had put his pen down and rested his head on the little study in the toddler's room.

He looked at his brother. Andre was sleeping so peacefully. He smirked. Wait 'til you get a mouthful of Mr. Rindlisbacher about this and this war, he thought. The toddler, little more than a baby, breathed so slowly. In, out, in, out, in out...

Michael woke up feeling dizzy. How long had he been sleeping? He opened his eyes. Everything was blurry. He rubbed them so he could resume his History project. He still could barely see.

Then he remembered.

"Oh no," he said to himself. Even as he did, thick gray smoke went up his lungs. He coughed, spat the foul air out. He stood up just as he heard his mother screaming at the top of her lungs, "Michael! The stove! Turn it off! Get out of there!"