No flowers for the dead - Chapter 32: Chapter 32
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It came in the winter.
Not the kind of winter that’s loud with storms or broken with ice, but the soft kind—still and white and slow, like the world had paused to listen.
Elias stopped getting up early.
He didn’t lose weight, didn’t fade like some tragic figure in a romance novel. But his movements slowed. His breath shortened. His eyes sometimes lingered too long on things that didn’t need studying—sunsets, Alina’s fingers, the shape of Elara’s laugh.
He never said it.
But Alina knew.
He was preparing.
⸻
One night, Alina found him on the porch in the dark, blanket over his legs, tea cooling beside him, eyes fixed on the stars.
She didn’t ask what he was thinking.
She sat beside him, and when he turned to her with that soft, private smile—the one he’d only ever given her—he whispered, “This is enough.”
Tears filled her eyes, but she didn’t let them fall.
Because it was enough.
And it had been everything.
⸻
The last morning came with sunlight. Warm, golden, kind.
Elias didn’t wake up.
He was lying on his side, one hand tucked beneath his cheek, the other curled beside a photograph of Elara holding a marigold—her favorite flower, even if she didn’t yet understand why.
Alina didn’t scream.
She sat beside him.
Held his hand.
And whispered, “I loved you more than I ever knew I could.”
She stayed there until Elara came in, half-asleep, and curled up beside them like she had when she was little.
No one moved for a long time.
⸻
They planted him beneath the treehouse.
No suits. No marble. No flowers.
Just roots.
Just soil.
Just Elara’s tiny voice, breaking as she read the words he had once written for her:
Love is not the legacy they told me to leave.
It is the only one I ever wanted to.
Not the kind of winter that’s loud with storms or broken with ice, but the soft kind—still and white and slow, like the world had paused to listen.
Elias stopped getting up early.
He didn’t lose weight, didn’t fade like some tragic figure in a romance novel. But his movements slowed. His breath shortened. His eyes sometimes lingered too long on things that didn’t need studying—sunsets, Alina’s fingers, the shape of Elara’s laugh.
He never said it.
But Alina knew.
He was preparing.
⸻
One night, Alina found him on the porch in the dark, blanket over his legs, tea cooling beside him, eyes fixed on the stars.
She didn’t ask what he was thinking.
She sat beside him, and when he turned to her with that soft, private smile—the one he’d only ever given her—he whispered, “This is enough.”
Tears filled her eyes, but she didn’t let them fall.
Because it was enough.
And it had been everything.
⸻
The last morning came with sunlight. Warm, golden, kind.
Elias didn’t wake up.
He was lying on his side, one hand tucked beneath his cheek, the other curled beside a photograph of Elara holding a marigold—her favorite flower, even if she didn’t yet understand why.
Alina didn’t scream.
She sat beside him.
Held his hand.
And whispered, “I loved you more than I ever knew I could.”
She stayed there until Elara came in, half-asleep, and curled up beside them like she had when she was little.
No one moved for a long time.
⸻
They planted him beneath the treehouse.
No suits. No marble. No flowers.
Just roots.
Just soil.
Just Elara’s tiny voice, breaking as she read the words he had once written for her:
Love is not the legacy they told me to leave.
It is the only one I ever wanted to.
End of No flowers for the dead Chapter 32. Continue reading Chapter 33 or return to No flowers for the dead book page.