Right where her favorite, “White Cascade,” was blooming yesterday.

— That’s enough! Always with your “my roses, my roses.”
We live like we’re in a cemetery! All you care about are those bushes and the garden hose. I’m sick of seeing it.

She remained rooted to the spot.

Her hands, out of habit, made a gesture.
As if she wanted to smooth a leaf.
To dust off a petal.

But there were no leaves left.
Nor flowers.

Only cut roots.

He had planted those roses twenty years ago .

Each shrub came from a cutting that his mother had brought him from an old garden in Guanajuato .

Her mother died long ago.
But the roses remained.

For Maria Elena, its scent was a living voice from the past.

The rustle of a skirt on the path.
The voice of her mother saying:

— Look, daughter… the rose only grows where it is loved.

And now everything lay piled up next to the shed.

Dried leaves.
Cut stems.

And among them — her beloved “Marie Curie” , the one who had blossomed the year her mother died.

“You’re… crazy…” she murmured.
“Why did you do this?”

He shrugged.

— Because enough is enough. Enough of wasting life on nonsense.
On flowers. On memories.

He paused.

— We’re not young anymore, María Elena . I want a real garden.
Chillies. Corn. Beans.
Not your “nostalgia.”

At that moment something broke inside her.

Not only in the heart.

Deeper.

In its very essence.

But she didn’t cry.

He simply turned around.
He went inside.
He closed the door.

And he sat down on the stool by the window.

On the windowsill there was a cup with dry soil.

Inside…
a small rosebush bud.

I’m barely alive.

He took him in his hands as if he were a child.

“Only you are left for me…” he whispered.

Outside, José Luis continued working with the rake.

Then he put on some music.
Rancheras.

Cheerful.
Fake.

Maria Elena was listening.

And I thought:

“And to think that it was once different…”

That he used to bring her bouquets of wildflowers from the fields.
That he said she was his spring.

In the afternoon, his son called from Querétaro .

— Mom, are you okay?

“Yes,” he replied calmly.
“Everything’s fine.”

He paused.

— Except that… maybe it’s time to change something.

He didn’t sleep that night.

He was looking at the ceiling.

I could hear the fire crackling outside.

José Luis was burning the rose bushes.