Dandelion Graves

Hands trembling over the grave, she wept.

What did it matter in the end how hard she tried? Wiping the sweat from his brow, the blood from his lips… It was supposed to help him squeeze past death. The rosemary smeared across his throat should have made him invisible but Death came anyway. Death came and yanked Lax away from her.

And there was nothing to show for it.

Lax left no imprint on the world. He didn’t leave a trail of people behind him to remember the way he laughed or ran out at every sunrise just to watch the geese travel from one field to the next. The sun didn’t even bother shining when he died. It rained.

It was still raining. Gentler now, though. Misting.

She ran a hand over the disturbed dirt, picking up flecks of soaked soil. How long had she been sitting here keeping this pathetic vigil? Twenty minutes? Two hours? Long enough that her legs were cold and the rain had soaked through her jeans.

“He’s gone, Dovey.”

Young knees popped as a man squatted beside her and patted the damp earth.

“So I should leave and move on with my life? Find a new–”

“Don’t start with me. He was my brother.” The man sighed heavily, looking down at the dirt as though he could see through it. “Pretty home though. Good place to sleep.”

“Pretty?” Dovey asked, anger touching her voice.

Steel eyes slid toward her.

“Better than that dirt-floored hut, isn’t it? He’s got a bed down there. A pillow. Doesn’t even have to worry about the sun coming through the blinds.”

“He liked the sun, Axel,” Dovey spat.

The man reached into his pocket and dropped a handful of dandelions, some yellow, some white and fluffy, on the grave.

“Nah, Lax hated the sun. He liked the bird and the bees. Ha. And weeds, but only the pretty ones. Like dandelions and buttercups.” He pressed a handful of dandelion seeds into the fresh dirt atop his grave, methodically planting them until only the yellow dandelions remained. “There. Now he’ll always get to piss someone off with the dandelions. In a few months, this whole graveyard will be yellow.”

Dovey was quiet for a moment, watching as age crept into Axel’s face. He was too young to look this way, she thought. Too young to have the weight of the world crease between his eyebrows.

“He hated upsetting people,” she said quietly.

“Yeah. But I don’t. And he got sick because he didn’t want to upset Ma. Well, she’s dead. He’s dead. And I’m left. I think I’m all right with pissing some people off, Dovey.” He stood with another pair of pops from his knees. “In fact, I think there’s some people who need pissing off.”