Red 

By: Katelyn Conroy

 

  The last time I saw my mother was five years ago.  She seemed to be napping before her visitors would arrive and I didn’t feel a need to wake her.   Clothed in her finest, she was wearing her favorite dress that father had picked for her.  Her nails were painted a dark shade of red, and her eyelids had the most delicate curve to them.  She looked captivating even in her motionless slumber on the satin cushions.  Soon after that they took me away from her, and that was the last time I saw her.

  I never thought she did anything wrong, but father seemed to. Why else would he have left?  It couldn’t have been me; I was always a good girl.  Mother always made a point to tell me I was.  Every Friday, mother would come home with a red rose for me.  (Red was always her favorite color.)  She would kiss my head and tell me that I was a good girl as she put my rose inside of its vase.   Father didn’t like this too much, and then one day he stopped coming home, and so did the roses.

  Memories of my mother ran rampant through my head, as I approached her new home.  It had been five years, and I was finally going to see her.  I found her outside right where they told me she would be, and I couldn’t help but smile.  I sat down beside her and gave her a bright red rose. I started telling her how lovely the shade from her oak tree was, and how green her grass was growing.  I rambled on about my new home and how nice my roommate was.  I told her not to worry, they were taking good care of me, and I was being a good girl.

  I like being a good girl, and that’s all I’ve been haven’t I?  I was only being a good girl that day five years ago wasn’t I?  Mother said she couldn’t live another day without father, and the whole time I did it she was covered in her favorite color. The men in their white coats found out I did it, and they brought me to my new home and gave me a brand new jacket. It was nice of them to do that. The men were always nice. They even let me close her coffin and give her back all of the roses I had saved.  They were dried up by then, but they looked nice against her favorite dress.  She loved the roses I brought, I knew she would. I was a good girl.