Missing Flowers

I never liked flowers. Never really saw the point to them. Sure they look nice, planted around the bushes of your front yard or blooming from the branches of your neighbor's tree, but why pluck them from the ground, bunch them up, and pass them off as some sort of gift? Especially when the recipient is someone sick and dying, held up in the bowels of some stuffy hospital. The flower is just going to end up wilted and dead. Are we trying to remind the sick of what is inevitably going to happen?

Of course fate always seems to have a sense of humor, because after the accident, the first thing my wife said was that she brought me flowers. Roses, she said. Half a dozen. I had to take her word for it. I couldn't see them, didn't know they were there, and at the time, couldn't care less. What the hell was I going to do with a bunch of flowers? She said she knew I hated them, but that they might help me feel better. I wish I could have answered her, but that's the thing about the state I'm in. Completely paralyzed, can't eat, can't talk, hell I can't even open my eyes. I can't do much more than listen and think. And even then I have trouble keeping myself from wandering between thoughts.

Honestly I was surprised my wife brought anything for me. She had been acting strange, always accusing me of thinking she was cheating, simply because she was gone on business a lot, but the thought never crossed my mind unless she brought it up.

Apparently my wife wasn't the only person who felt I would benefit from flowers. Seemed like everyone I knew brought in flowers, each and every time they stopped in to see me. Charles, my business partner, would bring in tulips. Emily, the neighbor, always brought a basket of poinsettias, and Ashley my secretary would give me daises, not to mention all the other assortments sent in from other friends and family that just couldn't be there.

For the longest time my wife would bring me a fresh batch of roses every day. IfI had any need for a watch I could set it to her. She would keep me up to date on the case and the trial. Apparently some of the medication I had been taking was known to cause serious health issues when mixed with certain other medications and my doctor failed to inform me of the risks, or something like that. So my wife felt compelled, in her words, to file some sort of a suit against the doctor. Not that it mattered to me any more.

As the days turned to weeks, and eventually months, my visitors slowly thinned out and disappeared, as did the flowers. Only my wife stayed faithful and continued to come, always with roses. I sometimes wondered what would end up higher - the doctor bill or her flower tab and if my life insurance could cover it. She would tell me more about the case, and how she was anticipating the outcome to be extremely promising. The news always made me happy, because she sounded happy. Sometimes she would update me on the family, how her parents were doing or how we received a letter from my cousin. But other days she would just sit next to me and not say a word. The perfume from the fresh roses said everything that needed to be.

And then there was that day. The day she didn't come. I was worried. Maybe something happened to her and she needed help. She could have been in an accident, or sick, or something, I don't know, worse.

The next day she didn't' show up either, but by then I understood why. I overheard two of the orderlies commenting on my case, and how apparently it had been settled for a very large sum of money, and not just with the doctor but with one of the pharmaceutical companies as well. One of the orderlies spat out a number, but I don't remember it now. Something probably exaggerated.

So maybe my wife had been having an affair, and she just wanted me to confront her about it, or maybe she just split because of the money, but it all made sense why she stopped coming to visit, and its funny, because I was never mad about it. I understood why she left and honestly, couldn't really blame her. I wanted her to be happy and it was obvious she would be better off someplace else than sticking around for the rest of herlife. Of course now that the room is quiet I do miss her, and all the others that would come to visit. Now I'm alone, trying to rethink and organize my thoughts. What I wouldn't do for just one more bouquet of flowers. I never expected this.