Flowers from 1970

Chapter 19: epilogue

Chapter 19: epilogue

Clay had finally put down the phone, he had never touched it and avoid looking at it again. He just couldn't bring himself to.

He moved out of his home shortly after. He had done so multiple times before settling in England.

There he found a lovely woman named Ophelia, whom he married.

The couple eventually were expecting their first child, and had been unsure on a name until Ophelia found a sticky note with "Wilbur" scrawled on it. She had asked Clay what the word meant, but he denied any knowledge of what it meant or where it came from. After some convincing, Clay agreed to name their first child Wilbur.

Wilbur had grown up a happy childhood, with loving parents who gave him everything he ever wanted or needed. Clay would tell him bedtime stories every night, and sometimes Nick would come by to share in the tales too.

A few years after, Ophelia was expecting another son. Around the same time, Clay's friend Dave had lost his long fought battle with cancer. Clay's second child was named Dave in his memory.

Clay continued to keep his notebook of dates near him, planning to go visit George Davidson himself, but couldn't bring himself to, so he turned to the person who would believe him. Wilbur.

He had continued to live a good and full life, but never forgetting the boy he spoke with on the phone.

---

George stared at the handprints on the wall every night for weeks on end, until he noticed something written under them.

I love you It read.

He had placed his hand atop Dream's handprint and crumbled, listening to Unchained Melody until he fell asleep every night, taking in the words and cursing time.

Woah, my love, my darling
I've hungered for your touch
A long, lonely time
And time goes by so slowly
And time can do so much
Are you still mine?
I need your love

All he heard was Dream's voice.

The photo of young Clay lay on his desk, framed and untouched.

He had kept every promise he had made Dream. He took care of the flowers, in which two had bloomed.

One was kept in George's yard to grow and live, while the other was cut and placed on Dream's grave.

After a while he realized that what Dream did wasn't selfish, and that it was an of act love.

It was the cliche "If you love them, let them go."

George was let go.

Eventually George had gone outside for the first time in over a month. He smelled the fresh fall air and remembered that the last request Dream ever made of him was to live his life.

So that was what he did.

---

There came no explanation or answers about why one day, at the end of July both in 1970 and 2020, a phone call had been so powerful enough to break time. Neither George nor Clay had gone looking for any, or told anybody. The phone calls, however unexplainable and impossible, and all of their contents were still their little secrets.

The calls made have defied every law of time and space there was, but it was no match for how much it had changed two young men's lives. The connection of those two hearts were stronger than the magic that brought them together.

So, however painful and tragic the end of this story became to, now you know that once upon a time,

in the same room,

of the same house,

fifty years apart,

Clay and George Davidson had loved each other.