Because my updates are rather short (the original book is really very short, too), I'll try to update multiple times at once. I mean, this chapter is more of a drabble. It's tiny! Anyways, here it is with a speedy update to soon follow!
Thanks as always!
A Rose
Gill Gray did not enjoy fall. The autumn air was crisp and clean, and the weather was never too cold or too hot. It was a very constant, comfortable season. In the past, Gill considered it his favorite. But now all he could see was death.
Everything that he considered beautiful: the trees, the grass, the flowers – all of it was dead or dying. The different colors were wondrous, but were they really? To Gill, they were sad. They were the plant's last cry of life before it was thrown away in this melancholy time of year.
If autumn is this cheerless, I cannot imagine the despair of winter! He thought to himself, slightly alarmed.
The clouds crawled across the sky overhead. His feet carried him down the dirt path, through the open fields. The local farmers' pumpkin patch was full with vibrant orange produce. It pleased Gill to think that something could survive and thrive in this terrible atmosphere of decay and ruin.
Mr. Gray suddenly stopped. Before him, lodged in the tangles of browning grass, was a lone flower. A rose. Its red petals desperately reached for the sky, vying for the sun to cast the warm life its way. The bush from which it bloomed was pathetically small, and it was the only bud that it gave.
He stooped down, staring into its face. It was undecidedly beautiful. But what made it so alluring? Was it its color? Its vitality? Its will to live against all the odds before it? The frost of winter or an unwary traveler's cart wheel would surely be its ready end.
"What cruelty of nature! That this flower is doomed to wilt and die as us all! To be crippled and betrayed by time… Robbing us of the beauty we hold. And a sweet flower such as this – it is cruel. Utterly cruel that its life should be so short and its beauty so wasted. The elements of nature and time are envious and pitiless for those that are lovely!"
Doing it a justice, Gill pulled his gloves tighter and reached for its stem. Avoiding its thorns, he twisted and yanked until it snapped and the flower was free from its condemning prison.
I will dry it. Press it. Preserve it. Gill Gray peered at the lovely, perfectly sculpted red rose and smiled. "You will be forever beautiful. If I have anything to say about it."
Standing with the rose tucked safely into the lapel of his vest, the day looked considerably brighter. Swinging his coat over his shoulder, Gill picked up his pace, whistling all the way.