CHAPTER ????
THE LAST PARAGRAPH
The knock at the door was so unexpected it almost startled Cecelia. She had so few visitors that the doorbell had long since become inoperable. The knock was soft, not bold, and Cecelia put down the bouquet of peonies, wiped her hands on her apron and went to the door.
There stood __________. “I’ve written something,” she said. I would like you to read it. She pulled a manuscript from he satchel and handed it to Cecilia. Cecilia read the cover and glanced up with a slight smile. “When Blooms a Rose,” she said. “I like it. I look forward to reading it. Tonight. Yes, I’ll read it tonight,” and she put the manuscript on the ________ right next to the _________. You were kind to bring it to me to read. I’m honored.
I wanted you to read it first. It’s important to me that you read it before anyone else. You have been so kind to me. “You have been, been,” she searched for the words. Cecilia took her by the hand and clasped it between her own. She could feel the warmth of her fingers and the softness of youth, the vulnerability of life yet to be lived.
That was that. She left with little said.
Barely had the door shut that Cecelia picked up the manuscript and opened the cover. There, on the very first page were the words: To my angel, Cecelia, who nurtured a bloom from a dying vine. You gardened my heart. Every flower there is from you tending.
Cecelia clasped the pages to her heart and slumped down in the chair, and she wept.
She lit a candle and lifted the pink and green afghan from it’s place on the end of her bed. She didn,t even pull down the covers but slid on top of the neatly made bed and propped herself up against the crocheted pillow case. She could not go to sleep without reading more. Every page was like a repeat of that warm hand she had held earlier in the day. Every word, every line like a walk through her aromatic garden in the spring. This was Spring to Cecelia. The barrenness of winter had turned a corner and she could feel the sweetness of spring well up within her.
Rarely does a life have such significance in the grand scheme of things. Rarely does one find that kernel of purpose and promise born into her in the womb, or maybe in some heavenly realm where God resides and writes reminders to Himself about necessary acts of providence. But every so often it happens. Every once in a while the star of divine design meets with a galaxy of destiny and a universe is born and ushers forth a personhood that innately follows the arc of a a shooting star. More often than not, and in the case of Cecilia, that stars leads directly to the edge of adversity. For it is in adversity that life truly begins and then evolves. Cecelia had fancied it her lot in life, her burden to bear, if you will. But the burden pressed upon her as a child had truly been her bridge to the whole of the Magnolia Junction experience. It had been her own junction, that place where you depart to escape the mundane, to flee toward some illusive adventure in some far away place, only to discover that the true adventure begins and ends at that very same junction of departure.
Cecelia watched the flicker of the candle against the faded wallpaper and followed the black smoke of the diminishing wick as it curled like a ribbon dangling from a helium balloon let slip into the unknown by a tiny hand. Her thoughts dangled there as well as her eyelids became heavy. She was tired. It was time to rest.
And with that she closed her book, blew out the candle and put the past behind her. She would rise to meet the morrow with a fresh outlook on life and a cherished belief in herself and in the whole of mankind, especially her neighbors and friends of Magnolia Junction.
