Daffodils

Earlier this afternoon, right as I was about to enter through our front gate (having just returned from the grocer’s), Ian snuck up behind me and grabbed my hand, almost making me lose hold of my parcels. Were it not for his almond eyes gazing tenderly then into my own, I should have scolded him. Immediately he led me away. I felt his great masculine hand gently overpowering mine; I felt his excited pulse. His eyes were glistening with happy impatience. I shall never forget the way the strands of hair on the back of his head each lit up beneath the high-time sun like the delicate sparks of a fire.

He led me deep into the woods, far past familiar fringes, till we arrived at a little nook hidden by mossy veilings. With great decor he parted the way for me, bowing like a well-paid butler, and by what was I then to be greeted with, but daffodils! Hundreds of them! Bright as angels! Their starry faces blowing through golden trumpets up, up, up towards the heavens!

“Oh, how did you know?” I cried. “How did you know that I love daffodils so much?” As he watched me clasp my hands together and inhale the scent of them deeply, he smugly smiled, folding his arms proudly about his chest.

“I have you figured out right, Marianne,” he bragged.

I laid me all down in them quite gleefully when I noticed one in particular next to me, kissing my cheek. It was the tallest of them all—the handsomest.

“ And you, dear one,” mused I to its cheerful yellow face, “are splendid, don’t you know? You’re like the spire of a church towering over the more common levels of the city, inherently noble. Why if you were a person, I should deem you the most lovely and refined of all my acquaintances. Oh, how I wish you were a person, dear flower!” And with that I thrust my arms about its stem as if to hug it, but careful not to smother it.

Ian reached down and plucked it.

The headless stem eyed me with its ring of sap. The soil beneath it feeding… what?

Chivalrously, he knelt down on one knee, and presented it with a stately, “My lady…”

I just looked at him for a moment.

“Oh, how could you!” I scolded him. “Why did you pluck it? Why?” My anger started to rise, choking any further words from me.

“I… I… don’t know?” He offered pathetically, clearly baffled at the situation.

I let out a frustrated sigh.

“You just killed that flower! It shall have lost all its youth by eventide now to be sure! I don’t want that flower, see! I don’t want it to suffocate in some cracked old vase of a dingy old cottage with me! I want it to enjoy freedom! Out here! In the fresh, invigorating wild, where no one can touch it or interfere with it! How could you!” My eyes were stinging, and not just from the pollen.

Ian suddenly looked irritated. “You are overreacting, Marianne. It’s just a flower. It would have died in a week’s time anyway.”

“It would have, I don’t deny it. But it would have died naturally and would have enjoyed its life better in these surroundings.”

“Stop being such a child!” he spat. “You are overreacting.” He threw the flower down and departed out through the mossy tapestry.

For a while I was silently stunned. I didn’t know what to think about the situation. I began to question my own behavior. Heretofore it would have seemed natural to me to have reacted so indignantly about the lovely daffodil, yet Ian’s annoyance made me wonder if I really were being a child. Perhaps I was, but was it so wrong of me? I looked down at the daffodil which Ian had apparently trampled upon on his way out. It looked soggy and shriveled now. My heart fell. No. In spite of all ration, I could not help feeling as if I wanted to take up that poor flower which had been robbed of its glory and life and bandage it back onto its stem, as if that would do anything for it. I would have given up a vital part of me just to see it happy again. But… why?

A few moments ago, this little haven had felt like bliss, but now it felt cold and invaded, and I hated myself for coming. Reluctant to leave, I left anyway, promising myself I would never come back. This haven should but remain a pleasant memory, wistfully painted like a kingly court upon my peasant mind…