The flowers on the table were wilting. They had been so beautiful, when she’d first gotten them. Bright, almost implausible in their splendor.
They’d stood for weeks, wafting the faint scent of sweet things throughout the room.
The kitchen was dark. The lights were off, and even the faint sunlight filtering in through layers of cloud and dust and curtain was somehow dim and gray. She stood in the doorway, leaned up against the wall, arms crossed and fingers digging divots into her arms.
It was cold, now. She didn’t feel it.
She blinked, lethargic and far away, sorting through memories. The kitchen, flooded with light, warm with the heat of so many bodies. The flowers, bright and happy, at the very center of it all. Music, crackling with radio static. Hands, holding hers. She swayed, slightly, holding on to herself; dancing to the sound of long-gone music.
The rattle-cough of the AC kicking on startled her. She stumbled. The flowers shivered, petals raining down soft and crinkly, and she shook with them. The heat had faded, and she finally felt the chill.
Almost unconsciously, she sucked in a deep breath, steadying herself and trying to catch the last notes of sweet summer smell. There was nothing there anymore. Only the table, and the withered flowers, delicate in their faded state. She exhaled, and in the quiet darkness it almost sounded like a sob.
The flowers swayed and trembled in the wake of her fading footsteps.