AQUIVER || Award-winning short stories about love won and lost

Sunflower

The letter changed everything.

It came on a sunny day as the corn waved in the hot, dry wind, its plumes swaying in a mesmerizing dance. The soft whinny of the neighbor's horse interrupted their simple lunch and brought them both onto the porch, facing the endless fields of green.

"I went to the Postal Office this morning and thought I'd bring you this," their neighbor told John while handing him the letter.

Sue smiled at the portly man. "We owe you. Won't you come inside for some refreshments?"

The neighbor shook his head. "I have a few more errands to run in town, but thank you for the invitation, Ma'am."

When he disappeared from sight, Sue turned to her husband and watched the groove between his dark eyebrows deepen. Between the raging Civil War and the uprising of the Sioux the year before, it was rare to receive a letter and even rarer for one to contain happy tidings.

Sue took John's hand and pulled him down on the wooden bench nestled against the logs of their cabin. His hands trembled as he unfolded the thin paper.

In silent support, she watched his face scrunch up in concentration. His lips moved as his finger followed the scrawls on the page. With every new line his finger touched, more darkness took over the tanned face she loved so dearly.

His hands fell in his lap, clenching the letter between calloused fingers.

"What's wrong?" she whispered when no words came forth.

"My father..." His voice trailed off.

Sue waited for the words she knew were coming. It took John long moments to overcome the grief she saw in his dark eyes. "He died in the Union camp."

Sadness squeezed Sue's throat. "Oh, darling."

She reached for him but he shook his head in silent refusal.

"He..." John swallowed. She watched his throat work while he tried to find the words. "Let me read you the letter."

Dear Sir

I agreeable to the wish of your father write to inform you that he was taken ill in Fort Snelling and was called to God on the 6th of June. He bore his suffering with great dignity and remained faithful to our cause until his very last breath. His last wish was for you to take his place in our fight for liberty. I can only hope you will show the same courage and fortitude as your father when considering your future.

With much sympathy for you in your affliction I am

Yours truly

Serg't Adam McMillan

Before he read the last word out loud, Sue was shaking her head with vehemence, unwilling to accept the truth she read in his dark eyes.

"It's his dying wish, darling. I can't—"

"No," she whispered, willing his words to disappear.

"Sunflower..."

His whispered endearment broke the dam holding back her tears. Finally his arms closed around her.

Sue looked up and watched his dry-eyed grief through the haze of tears veiling her own vision. "Don't go. Please, John, I can't—"

He stared at the corn fields while he murmured, "I'll ask your parents if you can live with them while I'm gone. It's best if I enlist as soon as possible."

Before she could break his determination, he meant. Before she could beg him and he could no longer refuse her plea.

He was never one to hurt her, his love a quiet comfort in its strength until it was ripped from her fingers.

At night, she held him tight.

In the morning, he was gone before first light of day, taking her heart with him.

At first, the letters came often. He wrote to her about the drills, the horrendous hardtack he tried to swallow down day after day, and the songs he learned from his fellow soldiers.

Every letter ended with the words that made her cry out for him, 'Sunflower, I love you beyond war and misery, beyond death. Keep me close in your thoughts, as I do to you.'

Before the sun rose, when she was sick of twisting and turning in her bed, she took one of his letters out on the porch of her parents' house to read.

At first light, she choose a sunflower seed from the small bag she kept in a corner of her room and walked to the back of the wooden shed where she planted the seed.

Some seeds bloomed into tall sunflowers, reaching for the light. Other seeds died a silent death in the harshness of winter.

It didn't matter.

In an ode to her husband, she planted her flower every day. When he came for her, he'd find the flowers he loved most surrounding the woman who loved him even more.

When the letters stopped coming and sorrow weighed her down, she still made her trek to the shed.

When the ground was frozen solid, she toiled until she tore a little pit into the dark earth to drop her seed.

The sunflowers kept her alive.

The war ended.

Sue stood amid hundreds of sunflowers and watched the horizon.

She barely registered the plea of her parents to come inside when night fell. Every evening, it was her younger sister who took her hand to lead her to her bed.

At first light, she planted the next seed of hope and took her position.

It took a hundred more sunflowers for her dreams of reunion to fade into darkness.

It took another hundred for the despair to take over.

It took thousands for her to accept the truth.

Never did she stop her silent vigil amid the sunflowers he'd loved.

Beyond war and misery. Beyond death. In her thoughts, forever.