It was just a dandelion. A bright yellow fluffy sun poking up where the sidewalk pressed into the corner of the steps and porch.
In the shadow of all these towering monuments of achievement, we still get rain, but it leaves the air tasting like pennies and tar for hours after it’s passed. Our flowers are paper, our gardens drawn in chalk to be washed away and ‘regrown’ when time allows.
She’d never seen a real flower before, only pictures. Her eyes lit up at the first glimpse of the cheerful triumph, and her fingers, covered in chalk, sticky with her snack, instinctively reached for the inviting star. Her giggle filled the heavy afternoon air, and I barely got to her in time to preserve it.
I sat there with her in my lap, staring at the precious golden treasure. We oohed and ahhed. How could I explain it would live so much longer where it was?
I told her we could visit it again, and I looked around. Taking a piece of her chalk, I did my best. “Community Garden,” I wrote, as nicely as I could. “I grow best when left alone,”
I barely slept that night. As soon as she was asleep, I slipped outside and reassured myself that it was still there. I took paint and went over my sign. I had Aislinn help me make a little fence out of odds and ends and bits of trash, and I carefully set it up around the miraculous flower. Still, once I’d gone back inside, I stood at the window. I paced. I stared at the ceiling.
When the morning came, I rushed out to check on that drop of light. I needed to know it was safe, still growing, so I could breathe easily and get Aislinn dressed, off to her preschool. I hated sending her, but they had art on the walls. They had the expensive lights that felt like the sun. They had art supplies.
Two more days, and her father would be home for 72 hours. I hated his job, but it paid for the school. I’d rather save up to get further out, but that would take years. I’d rather just have him home. But the school gives her light.
I sat on the step with my coffee and watched that little flower. I probably counted the petals ten times. I agonized over whether to water it before giving it a drop from our grey water allotment.
Working around the house was so difficult that I ended up folding laundry on the steps. I nodded at everyone that walked by. Most of them stopped to look at the dandelion. Most of them moved on without a word.
It was a long and anxious week. Aislinn’s father came home, and she showed him the flower first thing. She made him read her all the books on dandelions we’d taken from the library. Even the one that was just about a mouse called Dandelion.
He sat with me on the steps, and we pretended we could see the stars. What else do you talk about with someone you loved when you shared a life? We still shared a life. She was just asleep inside. So I told him about her, and he listened.
He asked about the flower, the sign, and the fence. He went back to work. I watched the flower close back in on itself.
The days after her father left were always the hardest. Extra hugs at bedtime. Extra stories. Extra questions to coax her to talk.
She worried about the dandelion, but we’d read the books. I reminded her it was just changing clothes.
We laughed so hard together when it looked like a skinny little man with fuzzy white hair.
And then I got the call. I’d been waiting for it. Praying for it. Dreading it. She’d been accepted to the school in the country. The good school. On a farm. With animals. And fresh vegetables. An orchard. She’d always been bright, and she’d tested so well at patterns and numbers. She had promise. She had a scholarship.
So few children were allowed to leave the cities anymore. And the bus came so quickly. It was hard to smile for her, but she needed sunlight, and clean rain.
The bus pulled away, and I turned back inside. I saw the flower I’d all but forgotten. Bending down, I plucked the lacy white sphere and closed my eyes. Deep breath. Tilt it just so. Wish!
The fairies danced in the wind, floating this way and that, climbing higher and higher as they drifted away.
One seed stayed on the stem. Carefully, I placed it in the crack on the other side of the stairs and went inside.
The first message I received from my daughter? An image of a field full of dandelions. And clover. And violets. And children.
I am a non-binary, chronically ill mother making time for writing in the moments unclaimed by my family. I'm cared for by my bossy cat and truly supportive partner, and I love to get outside when I can. Story has always been my escape, my way to other worlds and other lives, and I hope someday my words can bring the same comfort and escape to others.
I have had stories published in Air and Nothingness Press anthologies as well as If There's Anyone Left.