His "Childhood Friend" Planned My Wedding? Cool, I Planned My Exit! novel · Chapter 4 of 24

Chapter 4: Sunflowers for the Captain

I left the condo at five on Saturday morning, while Dexter was still asleep.

He had said he'd come in the afternoon. I knew he wouldn't.

The cemetery gate was open, and the grass was gray with dew.

My dad's stone sat at the end of the third row, under a maple that had dropped its first red leaves early.

Frank Bellweather. Beloved father. Gone fishing.

He had picked the last two words himself, in a hospital pamphlet, a year before the heart attack. He said he wanted a joke on his grave in case I got too sad.

I knelt and set down the thermos I had brought.

He drank his coffee black and terrible, and I had made it the way he liked.

"Hi, Dad," I said.

My voice cracked on the second word, so I stopped.

The wind moved the maple. A sprinkler ticked somewhere on the far hill.

"I canceled the wedding," I said. "I think you'd have said it was the best money I ever lost."

I laughed a little, and then I was crying.

When I wiped my face I noticed the flowers.

They lay against the base of the stone, wrapped in brown paper. Sunflowers, a dozen of them, with the stems cut clean that morning.

They were not mine.

I had never brought sunflowers. Dad hated how they stared at him.

A white card was tucked into the paper.

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