p style="max-height: 999999px; font-family: Verdana, Verdana, Arial; font-size: 11px; -webkit-text-size-adjust: 100%;"The lilies bloomed with a fierceness that had previously been unseen by his green eyes. It reminded him only of one that had passed. He has always had a fire in his eyes as well. Though the hues were different, those of the flowers and the departed one's eyes, the likeness stayed. At least for the man sitting on the edge of a stone fountain by himself they did. The statue of a woman in a dress perpetually crying into the water below served a melancholic reminder, for the singular man at least./p
p style="max-height: 999999px; font-family: Verdana, Verdana, Arial; font-size: 11px; -webkit-text-size-adjust: 100%;"Lilies started with an L. So did His name. Why was it that L sounds were always the best? The way a word that begins with an L rolls of the tongue, he had always thought L words were the best. Or was that only because of Him? Did he, with a name that started with the twelfth letter of the alphabet, start the Spaniard's obsession with L words? He couldn't remember./p
p style="max-height: 999999px; font-family: Verdana, Verdana, Arial; font-size: 11px; -webkit-text-size-adjust: 100%;"All Antonio knew was the here and now. Which for him was sitting on the side of a stone fountain with an always crying stone lady gazing at a patch of vibrant lilies by himself. Oh how he wished That Man was there to look at the flowers with him. Of course, That Man would probably glance at them once and call them stupid, demanding all of Antonio's attention for himself./p
p style="max-height: 999999px; font-family: Verdana, Verdana, Arial; font-size: 11px; -webkit-text-size-adjust: 100%;"So why were the stupid flowers there, alive and growing, while That Man was simply dead? Who decided to let a seed live while He had to die? Antonio clenched his fists at his side, feeling the cold stone beneath his knuckles. Why was he alive while That Man was dead? It was too quick, too sudden. He was there one moment, and gone the next. That was that./p
p style="max-height: 999999px; font-family: Verdana, Verdana, Arial; font-size: 11px; -webkit-text-size-adjust: 100%;"Tears. He was used to tears by then, used to crying, sobbing, bawling. He did it often, for That Man. If tears could resurrect the dead, surely Antonio had cried enough to bring back one hundred of Him. Of course, Antonio didn't want one hundred of Him. He simply wanted the real Him. The original. The original he had seen put feet below the ground. The original no longer resembled himself, Antonio knew. That was due to the passage of time and horrid creatures that fed on corpses./p
p style="max-height: 999999px; font-family: Verdana, Verdana, Arial; font-size: 11px; -webkit-text-size-adjust: 100%;"A sharp breeze blew. Antonio thought it felt nice, but the lilies had to fight against the gusts. It bent in an unpleasant way. If the lilies had been necks, they would all be snapped, and the bodies connected to them would be dead. Was there a less grotesque way to go than a snapped neck? Of course there were. There were things like hanging, stabbing, or terrible car crashes. That Man had fallen victim to the latter. Antonio shuttered at the memory. At the body, His body, the image permanently etched into the walls of his brain./p
p style="max-height: 999999px; font-family: Verdana, Verdana, Arial; font-size: 11px; -webkit-text-size-adjust: 100%;""Lovino." It was a mere whisper from the lips of a lonely man, sitting alone looking at flowers and contemplating death. It would come for everybody, himself included. Everything will one day die. He wiped his eyes, not wanting to cry in the presence of bright flowers. What all had those three or four lilies seen he wondered. If they could talk, what stories would they tell? Would they be sad tales? Happy ones? Maybe they would tell stories of humans killing them by breaking them away from their legs. Antonio smiled sadly. In his head, he apologized to every flower he'd ever uprooted. For every flower he had pulled, a life was ended./p
p style="max-height: 999999px; font-family: Verdana, Verdana, Arial; font-size: 11px; -webkit-text-size-adjust: 100%;"What if, in the presence of something bigger, human lives were mere flowers. Punished for being beautiful. In Lovino's case, it seemed right. The priest had mentioned God wanting angels, "another perfect angel" in the old geezer's words. So yes, like a flower, Antonio's love had been killed for being too perfect. A dry laugh escaped his throat, picturing that on a grave stone. strongHere Lies Lovino Vargas: He Was Killed For Being Too Perfect/strong./p
p style="max-height: 999999px; font-family: Verdana, Verdana, Arial; font-size: 11px; -webkit-text-size-adjust: 100%;"That wasn't what He was killed for, and everybody knew it. He died because a stupid teenage drunk driver rammed into him with his truck. He died because of an idiotic child. Now that child was alive but He wasn't. He was dead. Gone without a trace, like a leaf blown in the wind, only to land in a river and sink to the bottom. Forgotten by the universe, save for a few./p
p style="max-height: 999999px; font-family: Verdana, Verdana, Arial; font-size: 11px; -webkit-text-size-adjust: 100%;"It was a pitiful death, but in the end everyone would meet a similar end. Looking-once again-at the lilies, Antonio reasoned that they too would die. Whether due to a child with sticky fingers, the cold, or some kind of bug, they would die too. As would he. He pulled it out of his trench coat. It was cold, unfeeling, and heavy. He silently said an apology to the unlucky soul who would find him, and he pressed it to his head. Lovino. It was his last thought./p
p style="max-height: 999999px; font-family: Verdana, Verdana, Arial; font-size: 11px; -webkit-text-size-adjust: 100%;"Lilies started with an L. So did His name. Why was it that L sounds were always the best? The way a word that begins with an L rolls of the tongue, he had always thought L words were the best. Or was that only because of Him? Did he, with a name that started with the twelfth letter of the alphabet, start the Spaniard's obsession with L words? He couldn't remember./p
p style="max-height: 999999px; font-family: Verdana, Verdana, Arial; font-size: 11px; -webkit-text-size-adjust: 100%;"All Antonio knew was the here and now. Which for him was sitting on the side of a stone fountain with an always crying stone lady gazing at a patch of vibrant lilies by himself. Oh how he wished That Man was there to look at the flowers with him. Of course, That Man would probably glance at them once and call them stupid, demanding all of Antonio's attention for himself./p
p style="max-height: 999999px; font-family: Verdana, Verdana, Arial; font-size: 11px; -webkit-text-size-adjust: 100%;"So why were the stupid flowers there, alive and growing, while That Man was simply dead? Who decided to let a seed live while He had to die? Antonio clenched his fists at his side, feeling the cold stone beneath his knuckles. Why was he alive while That Man was dead? It was too quick, too sudden. He was there one moment, and gone the next. That was that./p
p style="max-height: 999999px; font-family: Verdana, Verdana, Arial; font-size: 11px; -webkit-text-size-adjust: 100%;"Tears. He was used to tears by then, used to crying, sobbing, bawling. He did it often, for That Man. If tears could resurrect the dead, surely Antonio had cried enough to bring back one hundred of Him. Of course, Antonio didn't want one hundred of Him. He simply wanted the real Him. The original. The original he had seen put feet below the ground. The original no longer resembled himself, Antonio knew. That was due to the passage of time and horrid creatures that fed on corpses./p
p style="max-height: 999999px; font-family: Verdana, Verdana, Arial; font-size: 11px; -webkit-text-size-adjust: 100%;"A sharp breeze blew. Antonio thought it felt nice, but the lilies had to fight against the gusts. It bent in an unpleasant way. If the lilies had been necks, they would all be snapped, and the bodies connected to them would be dead. Was there a less grotesque way to go than a snapped neck? Of course there were. There were things like hanging, stabbing, or terrible car crashes. That Man had fallen victim to the latter. Antonio shuttered at the memory. At the body, His body, the image permanently etched into the walls of his brain./p
p style="max-height: 999999px; font-family: Verdana, Verdana, Arial; font-size: 11px; -webkit-text-size-adjust: 100%;""Lovino." It was a mere whisper from the lips of a lonely man, sitting alone looking at flowers and contemplating death. It would come for everybody, himself included. Everything will one day die. He wiped his eyes, not wanting to cry in the presence of bright flowers. What all had those three or four lilies seen he wondered. If they could talk, what stories would they tell? Would they be sad tales? Happy ones? Maybe they would tell stories of humans killing them by breaking them away from their legs. Antonio smiled sadly. In his head, he apologized to every flower he'd ever uprooted. For every flower he had pulled, a life was ended./p
p style="max-height: 999999px; font-family: Verdana, Verdana, Arial; font-size: 11px; -webkit-text-size-adjust: 100%;"What if, in the presence of something bigger, human lives were mere flowers. Punished for being beautiful. In Lovino's case, it seemed right. The priest had mentioned God wanting angels, "another perfect angel" in the old geezer's words. So yes, like a flower, Antonio's love had been killed for being too perfect. A dry laugh escaped his throat, picturing that on a grave stone. strongHere Lies Lovino Vargas: He Was Killed For Being Too Perfect/strong./p
p style="max-height: 999999px; font-family: Verdana, Verdana, Arial; font-size: 11px; -webkit-text-size-adjust: 100%;"That wasn't what He was killed for, and everybody knew it. He died because a stupid teenage drunk driver rammed into him with his truck. He died because of an idiotic child. Now that child was alive but He wasn't. He was dead. Gone without a trace, like a leaf blown in the wind, only to land in a river and sink to the bottom. Forgotten by the universe, save for a few./p
p style="max-height: 999999px; font-family: Verdana, Verdana, Arial; font-size: 11px; -webkit-text-size-adjust: 100%;"It was a pitiful death, but in the end everyone would meet a similar end. Looking-once again-at the lilies, Antonio reasoned that they too would die. Whether due to a child with sticky fingers, the cold, or some kind of bug, they would die too. As would he. He pulled it out of his trench coat. It was cold, unfeeling, and heavy. He silently said an apology to the unlucky soul who would find him, and he pressed it to his head. Lovino. It was his last thought./p