[Previously title Marigold and Sunflowers]
He thought she was a sinful angel of temptation, but the most annoying one.
She thought he was an arrogant, mannerless asshole sculpted to make her knees go weak.
Ivy Marigold Taylor, an intelligent, down...
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She said I have a kind and beautiful soul, but she—she has a pure soul, a being so gold-hearted you can't help but feel enamored by the woman.
Gold- hearted. It is a word I always find myself describing her because it is the only one that really matters. Anyone can beautiful, but to have a heart of gold is rare.
Mrs. Taylor melted the sun and used the rays to carve her daughter's heart and I thank her for that.
I am captured in her whole being, completely devoted to Ivy Marigold Taylor.
A rope is wrapped around my heart and tugs and strains the most important organ in my body when I am deprived of her presence, and it's dangerous. I would blindly follow her even if it meant I was being brought to my death because I would find a type of comfort in knowing that she was there.
She said I have a kind and beautiful soul, but I have done things I am not proud of. Before I moved to America—before my father died—I have participated in selling drugs, weaponry, set buildings aflame even. I watch my father torture and a kill man as punishment for his betrayal, and for years I have felt guilty for a life I did not take.
That night I swore to myself I would not take another's persons life.
It took me six months for seventeen year old me to rid my nightmares of that man's face, while my father seemed to have slept in peace every night. Every morning he would see the difference between him and I. The bags weighing under my eyes, my pale skin, the lost of weight, and every morning he looked mournful—not of the man he killed but for me.
My brother and mother believe I left Italy because I couldn't process father's death with reminders of him every where, but their belief is wrong. After his death I was ready to take his place. I looked through paper and when I found reports of all the assignments I've done, records on the buildings I have burned, I saw the death casualties in the double digits.
He told me it was just enemy territory, the buildings were clear, and I was content with doing something for my father and not hurting anyone in the process.
But I have burned people alive and he whisked me away before I could hear their screams.
I cried that night.
Tears soaked my pillow and quiet hiccups filled my room until it replaced the oxygen. I choked and suffocated on my own cries as if my father's betrayal cut me opened squeezed my lungs. That's what it felt like when I found out the only moral I had, I did not follow.
I cried until I was emptying my stomach in trash at my bedside and I left the next morning.
I never understood how my father did it, kill with no mercy and live with no regret, and I never wanted to understand because if I did then I would be comfortable with taking a life.
My father was a powerful man who wanted to me to follow in his footsteps and hold the same amount of power, maybe even more, on my shoulders with a stone cold face and head held high. I could not bring myself to want the same thing he did.
