The True Story of Love

Destiny's Rose - [3]

The farm Sara lived on was neighboring John's house to the north and Wesley's house to the south. Sara was mindlessly practicing her manuscript while she thought of her neighbors. They were both her age, but she wasn't too fond of Wesley. Unfortunately, her parents were very close to Wesley's parents. She knew they wanted Sara to marry Wesley someday, but she knew just as well that she could never do that. Something seemed off about him. Sara let her mind wander to more pleasant thoughts, such as John. He was her best friend. They had only once been in a fight. It was one day, a terrible day, nearly five years back, and John had come over to Sara's house. His face was red and blotchy, so she automatically knew something was wrong. When she asked him about it, he quickly told her to mind her own business. Sara did not kindly take to being told to butt off, and told him so. They got in a argument, names were thrown around, insults aroused, and voices were raised. Sara was near breaking down, when John's voice softened. She noticed his change in attitude, and looked at him with concern, dropping all angry fronts. When she looked in his eyes, they were filled with tears.

“My mum died yesterday,” John told her in a voice so quiet it was barely audible, “we were told she had been robbed and killed on her way to the market just before I came here. My father yelled at me for leaving, but I couldn't stay there. She’s gone.”

John had started sobbing midway through his explanation. Sara was immediately regretful for everything she had said to him. She took him in her arms, and they sat down in the middle of the field where they had been working together before the fight. She held him close to her, until his sobs subsided and he fell asleep. She hated to think of the pain John had felt that day. She would never forget how awful she was to him. It haunted her daily. She looked down at her writing and saw she had completed her practice for the day. She out away her practice booklet and went out to her flower garden. She loved flowers. She loved the smell, she loved the colors, she loved how every petal was always perfectly in place. She envied the flowers easy way of life, how it never had to work on its own. It was always taken care of, always loved, always called beautiful. A flower got to sit in the sun all day without worry of an angry mother. She walked towards the well to get some water for her flowers when she saw a figure on the horizon. As it came closer, she was able to make it out as the familiar silhouette of John. John smiled as he saw Sara. He could tell she was heading towards the well, and could only assume she was taking care of her flowers. He smiled to himself as he thought of the many ways in which Sara was like the flowers she tended to; always reaching for the sky, always sitting in the sun, always beautiful. He loved helping Sara in her garden because he could see the love she put into the little green things. He knew how she loved them so. John stopped at the well to wait for Sara.

“You couldn't even start getting the water out?” she asked him with a sweet smile on her face.

“Of course not,” John replied easily, “I couldn't make tending to your garden too easy for you. Where would the fun in that be?”

Sara looked at John with eyes full of playful disdain; he knew how much she hated getting well water.

“Well, if you only came to make my job of getting well water more miserable, you can just leave now,” Sara said as she turned on her heel, water buckets weighing down both her arms. She smiled to herself as she heard John run up beside her. He quickly grabbed the pails out of her hands as a sign of sorrow in their usual way of playful banter. She would get mad at John, and he would make it up to her by helping her. John knew she was never mad, but couldn’t help feeling a small bit guilty. Sara smiled at John now, happy that she wouldn’t have to carry the buckets all the way to the garden. John smiled back, and his dimples that Sara loved so much appeared.

“Happy now, Sara? I’m doing all your work for you,” John complained playfully.

“Quite happy, actually,” Sara replied, “c’mon my flowers are simply dying under this heat.”