The sunflowers were wrong.
Too tall. Too bright. The ones Dad grew in the backyard were shorter – stubby, with petals that curled at the edges like they were shy about being looked at. These bodega sunflowers were aggressive. Cheerful in a way that felt like an insult when you were buying them for a dead man.
I bought them anyway. Carried them back to the dorm wrapped in brown paper. Set them on my desk and stared at them while the room got dark around me.
Six years. Six years since the phone call that split my life into before and after. Six years since Mom's voice on the other end – wrecked, unrecognizable, the voice of a woman who'd just had the floor pulled out from under her entire existence. Six years since I sat in the principal's office at fourteen and thought he made me eggs th
