Yellow, Yellow, Yellow

The sun beat down hot and heavy in the sky, the shadows on the ground were slimming. He’d be here soon. Tree tops swayed in the breeze as the bees carried out their pollination. The meadow was small yet open. I ran my fingers through the thin blades of grass surrounding my feet, knees tucked under my chin.

A distant crunching of coarse soil diverted my aimless contemplative state, disrupting the calm and natural hum. The footsteps drew nearer, the rhythmic thud of heavy soled boots treading the crudely outlined path.

From my left he emerged, a distance away so that I could make out his familiar silhouette. The blades of grass continuing to dance around me. He paused. Inhaled deeply. Slowly a smile stretched across his face, bearing stained and crooked teeth, as he squinted at the flaming orb nestled above us.

I stayed seated, eyes trained solely on him, tracking attentively every twitch of muscle, every swaying limb. He moved slower now that he was in the open. Taking his time, savouring his surroundings. After all he only visited once every year. He wouldn’t rush himself even if the field were to catch ablaze around him. Although my eyes were trained on him, his never diverted from the rectangular patch of yellow situated a few hundred metres ahead. Every stride felt like an eternity. Still I sat, patiently observing. After what felt like moments upon moments having passed, he slowed, approaching the coloured patch of earth.

Silently, effortlessly, I stood. My eyes never once leaving his broad frame. Timidly, I placed one bare foot in front of the other, my cotton skirt rustling around my pale legs as I stepped. Through the rough grass I stepped and stepped and almost tripped. The occasional stone pressing against the sole of my foot, anchoring me to the surface. Closer and closer and closer. He was clearer now. This year he had worn a crumpled linen button up shirt tucked haphazardly into dirty brown slacks. The weathered leather broad brimmed hat was consistent to each visit previous. The familiarity brought no comfort. This whole while as I floated forward, nearing him, he murmured indistinctly to himself, head bowed.

Finally I found myself alongside him. Not once did his focus shift from the flowers planted firmly in the dirt. I joined him in intently analysing every petal attached to each stem. The air sat thickly around us, suffocating. He had been silent as I approached but now after a few moments he broke the stillness with his deep, hoarse voice.

‘Oh Kate. Although you were not my first, you were, you are, just as special. You always will be.’ My eyes flickered up at his face, smug in his proclamation. My stomach coiled and bent and pushed up against my throat. It wasn’t anything I hadn’t heard before however my body responded the same.

Many minutes followed as we stood, no words ever leaving my firmly pressed lips. For a second time I looked up into his face, his bastardly face. His satisfaction sickened me. Slowly I reached into the folds of my dress where a pocket was sewn, fingers curling around the handle of a silver kitchen knife. I drew it out, all the while looking and looking and searching his eyes, his eyes that were captured by the weeds in the ground. Although his flesh was physically situated in front of mine, his mind was elsewhere; reliving, replaying, remembering. I allowed my hand to hang, the tip of the blade pointing down. I disconnected my eyes from his, lifting the knife to enter my line of sight, tilting it slightly so the sunlight glinted up at me. Flickering back and forth, back and forth, back and forth. I stepped in front him, the flowers tickling my ankles as I did so. Lifting my hand that clutched the knife, I pressed the edge of the blade to his trachea. He looked right through me.

Bubbling within, the anger began to leak and trickle down my flushed cheeks. Oh how I wanted to. One motion, one movement, in a messy and bloody moment he would be no more. He sighed, a lengthy and full exhale of stale air.

‘Well my sweetness. It has been lovely. As it always is. I must go now. The other girls await.’

A pause ensued.

‘I love you dear. I’ll be back in a year. I trust you’ll be here waiting for me.’ He chuckled. Foul and filthy and pleased. I wanted to slash and scream. My knuckles white and bared against his prickly neck.

He tipped his hat and briskly swivelled on his heels, denting the soil with his weight. Back turned to me he gained distance, swiftly and keenly. Smaller and smaller he became, my liquid rage continuing to pool, vision blurred, the landscape swam before me. Heavy. So heavy the metal in my fist became as my arm fell limp beside me.

‘Next year Johnny Walker. I’ll get you next year, I swear it.’ I whispered.

Suddenly hollow I became. Crumpled in a heap on the ground, I gazed at them with glassy eyes. Yellow, oh so nauseously yellow they were.

Yellow were they, the marigolds on my grave.

The marigolds on my grave.