A Place to Be Needed

The letter on the kitchen counter read, in part, "You've been accepted." He hadn't needed to read further. It didn't matter; he'd changed his mind.

The surroundings, the routines, the people were all familiar here. He watched the sun rise and set behind the tall buildings or through the trees depending on the season. The heavy rains in spring, people plashing through the torrents, the faithful purple and yellow that were the first to punch through the waking earth and gradually the full panoply of early summer colours before the deep summer drought, and then the rich, deep reds, oranges and yellows of autumn and finally the long, cold nights and the whiteness refreshed now and again to bring forth new generations of snowmen in the schoolyard and hide the dirty snow tracked through by hundreds of buses and automobiles and thousands of pedestrians.

He, himself, was no gardener. He had only a few indoor plants, but they were green and he tended them. Didn't need to own to prize. He was lucky there, since he'd never had much. For all that, he felt needed here—if only to appreciate—but mostly he wanted to remain.

#

"Natural causes?"

"Yeah, if you can call terminal cancer natural."

"That letter's dated four months ago. Must've decided against the hospice."

"Can't say I blame him.... Soil's still damp."

"What?"

"These plants have been watered recently."