The sweet smell of lilies still lingers on each deep inhale I take. It’s not overpowering and it doesn’t quite match up with having the real thing under one’s nose, I can just barely touch on it within the farthest depths of my lungs, and then it’s gone. It’s the sensation of a sneeze interrupted.
I need the real thing. Not just to see it. Not just to touch it. But to devour it whole. It’s the only thing on my mind day in and day out. All night I dreamt of the soft-wet petals melting in my mouth. The sweetness is almost revolting yet I can’t stop choking it down, stem and all.
My eyelids snapped open this morning and the silence was deafening, I used to hear the birds singing in the walnut trees, dogs barking at squirrels. Now nothing. Of course when I jumped from my bed and opened the window the sounds of the world rushed in, rusty lawnmowers and all. But in those few seconds I felt such a panic I have never felt before, and my only comfort was and is the ghost of a lilies aroma.
The corpse from which this magnificent flower grows- I came upon by accident, but I remember exactly where it is, the smell grows stronger the closer I get. I’m writing this from my phone. The screen is blinding in this darkness. The trees are tall and block out the egg-shaped moon in some parts of my path, the west coast of Vancouver Island, near the fishing villages in B.C is a beautiful ancient forest, but my ankles are bleeding from the thorns. The tide was out especially far, as it is tonight. That night I was finding the biggest sand dollars of my life, but I didn’t care, being lost and all. Anyway. I ended up down a maze of tidal caves which were mostly not enclosed, they seemed like magma tunnels that had caved in. I’m nearing the end of them now. I don’t seem to have been writing very quickly.
I had become hopeless on my last trek out here and sat down to text for help. That’s when I smelled it. Little did I know the scent was cupids arrow sticking out of my beating heart. The smell makes my bones feel wet, unlike the leathery ones of the corpse from which my gorgeous lily grows. It makes me want to peel back my skin and climb between the silky petals of my beloved flower. I just have to squirm down the hole, past the seaweed and…I see it now.
I see what I thought was a corpse is breathing with my lily. It’s petals slowly dip up and down, gently rippling against the ribcage……… As I’ve been staring at the lily it has come to my attention that our corpse woman has the most beautiful eyes I’ve ever seen in my life, her finger is pointing to me, curled at the bone.
She’s motioning me home.