by Kathryn LaVon Davis

Created on: May 08, 2010

She sat in her car and begged, pleaded for a sign.  She'd sent him cards only occasionally, to let him know that she loved him.  Each time, they would get together for the briefest interlude.  She would be filled with happiness for those moments, and then he'd be gone again; off lving his own life with the woman he'd gotten back together with, the woman he left her to return to.  The woman that occasionally he cheated on.  She knew he did because he cheated with her.

"Because he loves me.  I know he does." she thought.

Today, she thought she would buy a single red rose and place it on his front patio.  She never wanted to do too much or too little.  She didn't want to stalk him. 

There were nights, though, that she walked under the moonlight and talked to God.  Why did he break her heart?  Why did he leave her for someone he'd broken up with?  Why did he continue to come to her but never stay?  She knew the answer.  She was nineteen.  He was thirty-three.  He loved her, she knew it, but he didn't like how the age difference made him look. 

Sometimes, when she was brave or had enough to drink, she would walk the miles to his house.  She never knocked.  She didn't throw pebbles at his window, but he always sensed her presence and appeared outside.  Often his daughter would be visiting from out of town.  His daughter; six years younger than she was.  Other times the woman would be there.  Even then, he still managed to break away and each time, there were rushed moments of passion.  Tender and loving and ...outside.  She had no pride.  This was love.  She'd never known anything like it.

The days that followed would not  evidence that there had been passion the previous evening. The days that followered were filled with silence.  The days that followed were filled with the sounds of her rebreaking heart. 

Some days, she'd visit her best friends and they would call him.  Whenever he heard she was there, he never failed to show up.  They would sleep on a mattress on the floor, playful and loving.  The morning would come and again, he'd be gone.  It was always weeks before she'd see him again.

She worried; "is the red rose too much?" She sat in her car and begged, pleaded for a sign.  The radio began to play "The Rose."  She went into the flower shop and purchased one red rose.  She drove to his house and placed it on his patio.  And waited.

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