It's cold. Karen thought moodily as she hustled down the nearly empty streets. Too freakin' cold.
But of course, it was late autumn, so naturally it would be cold. This did not stop Karen from thinking some rather nasty things about Mother Nature, but her rude opinion of Mother Nature did not prevent her from arriving at her destination.
Her eyes found the stone immediately, and her fingers reached out to run over the engraved letters, as she did every year.
P-E-T-E
She smiled down at the gravestone, down at her husband, and began to speak.
She spoke of nothing of great importance - Ellen's "single mother" granddaughter was getting married in the spring. The rug in the living room was still in horrible shape. Their son had sent a letter - he and his family were enjoying life in the city and promised to visit soon; just as he had the last seven letters he had sent.
And as she spoke of these special nothings, her mind wandered and she began to speak of the past.
She reminded her late husband of how they had met, how she was reluctant to speak with him, convinced that she would be leaving soon enough anyways and that it would only hurt them both, how when he had helped her out of the storeroom she had remembered how he had done so once before as children, and she had simply flung her arms around him and kissed him.
Karen laughed a little when she got to that part, fondly mentioning how his face flushed darker than Ann's hair in the sunlight.
She closed her eyes and reminded him of their wedding - how she hated her dress, but found herself thanking the Harvest Goddess she was wearing it when he had smiled at her breathlessly and said that she looked beautiful. But then she reminisced about how he said she was absolutely radiant when she looked his father straight in the eyes and just dared the man to try take him away.
As the first teardrops hit the granite she was kneeling in front of, Karen spoke of how upset she was when she first found she was pregnant and he had thrown out all of the alcohol so that she wouldn't drink it. She told him that their son's daughter was one of the prettiest little things she'd ever seen and that she wished that he could meet her.
Finally, Karen opened her eyes and swept some gray hair from her face - the wind was starting to pick up. She said that she did a little looking around and thinks that maybe he needs something more than she does now and gently placed the photo album next to the things left by others earlier in the day.
As she forced her frail body to stand once more, she ran her fingers over the engraving one more time and whispered a faint "I love you" and she turned to walk away.
As Karen settled down into bed that night, she smiled, knowing that the skies would clear soon enough, and that spring was on its way.
Karen was buried right next to her husband. The ceremony was short, simple and to the point, much like the woman herself.
Everyone in the village showed up for the ceremony, but nobody shed a tear. Nobody dared to, knowing exactly what Karen would say if she saw them crying, and crying over her no less.
Many wept as soon as they returned home.
Not many people tend to hang around Flowerbud Village's graveyard without reason, but there is a certain story that has been told, and everyone has heard of it.
On a cold autumn night, you may see a girl walking down the streets of the town, looking brisk, and proud. If you follow her, you will find yourself in the graveyard, where a boy will be waiting for her. As soon as they see each other, they will run toward each other and embrace. And as the lovers separate, they will smile at you, wave, and fade into the distance.
They say that if you witness this, your love will last forever - even past the grave.
Some of the older folk in the village will claim to know know who the two from the fable are, and that their love was truer than could be, and that they are the apparitions of the two graves in the corner, closer to each other than the rest, a husband and wife - deaths separated by exactly 5 years.
If you were to go and inspect these two gravestones, you would find that the only thing written on them would be "PETE" and "KAREN", and there would be a single flower blooming between the two graves, no matter the season, no matter the weather, no matter the visitor.
And you may just hear the sounds of a man and a woman laughing, sounding like they could never be happier.