Glowing floret

Pulp had a tiny floret of a glowing baby’s breath she had picked up from a floret stand on her way earlier that morning. The florist had told her that it’s a rare one, the only glowing one from its bunch. She had never seen anything like it, she had to show it to Mother. Maybe the glow had something to do with the way the full moon was shining so bright last night, and perhaps if she looked close enough, it would open a veil to the other side of the world.

It seemed magical. So glorious, it was out of the ordinary, how a flower could glow like so. It might have been a myth, that a full moon would bring all sorts of creatures from the world of shadows to our damp and dusty one. Alas, our dear Pulp couldn’t care less than a speck of dust would if it could. For Pulp is a stubborn one, she believed a myth is not myth if it’s not partly true.

Now Pulp was on a morning walk, not supposedly initially, towards Mother, which was quite a distance from her dwelling. A glowing floret had a way of changing her morning course, because she thought Mother might like it. Or Mother might despise it. Either way, if she could see Mother for one more time then it is good enough.

If she could, she would tell Mother to forgive her, and she would like it so for Mother to tell her that it’s okay, that it’s the way of the world; sometimes you err, and sometimes you are the one to forgive, like she always does on Sunday mornings. To err is human, but to err is also stag beetle.

Pulp looked up at the blue vault of a sky above her, grand and vast like her dreams but almost too plain to be hers, not a star to be seen. That could never be hers, for her dreams were much more interesting and they certainly would have some twinkle twinkle little diamond-like stars in them. But then again, it was morning. And what stars would be awake this early (or late if you’re a star- who would only parade its beauty in the night sky, that is)?

Mother said her dream was far too big for a little stag beetle in a damp meadow, and it’s too big also if she wasn’t a stag beetle. Mother could be right, and we all know now that Mother was indeed right. She might’ve left, but right is what she has always been and still is so.

Pulp took almost an entire morning to finally reach it: Mother’s memorial ground. Her nonsensical dream has sent her mother to the afterlife, bound to a place where stag beetles and other bugs alike go when they depart from their loved ones for eternity.

A stag beetle lay trampled upon the deliberately planted grass, but the Earth spun on. She remembered clearly how she was screaming for dear life to nothing at all, not a help could be offered. No one heard her, no one saw her. No one cared that she had lost her mother to a little–not so little for a beetle, I suppose–child running around feigning innocence.

Oblivious little heartless creature. It was just another Tuesday for him as he continued on tagging another one of his kind and went on about his day as if little Pulp didn’t just lose her world right in front of her. Pulp helplessly called out to Mother but she was the disturbing image of a crushed potato. Mother looked less like Mother and had become a flat pancake. She saw how the world went on without stopping to pity her, and how cruel death was that it happened in a second without a chance of goodbye.

That morning–now early afternoon, the uniformly trimmed grass was apparently, and thankfully, too wet for little children to be out and about. So Pulp had the peace and quiet she needed to summon the magic from the glowing floret.

She dropped it onto the memorial ground, though she could not remember where exactly the spot was. Mother had been taken away she noticed the day after it happened, hopefully by the ground or the wind. Or the elves working the night shift under the supervision of death himself. She prayed it wasn’t the doings of the whisker crawlers. That would’ve been awful for Mother even in her afterlife.

Poor Mother, if only she was not so kind to let Pulp chase her silly dream of wandering the world that exists beyond the trees, the world beyond their dwellings. Mother knew it was not made for creatures like them. She had warned her, but Pulp was very insistent, notwithstanding.

So because of this, because she was a silly little stag beetle who didn’t know better, Pulp lay down next to the glowing floret and hummed a mournful tune her mother used to sing. It was a lullaby. She remembered it all too well, how Mother would tell her that lullabies are like goodbyes before you wander off to dream-lane so she hummed somberly hoping the glow of the petals would miraculously let her cross the boundaries between the worlds where she could see Mother again. Because maybe dream-lane was a real thing, and it had something to do with this.

Hum after hum, nothing happened. No veil opened. The fragile baby’s breath did nothing good. Why did she even dare to dream it would do something other than mock her?

Pulp lowered her head, and slowly caressed the earth beneath her. And as the wind blew past her, the willow waved and told her that Mother was gone and nothing could change it. Not a glowing bud could do a thing about it.

And even though deep down, she knew Mother would never blame her, Pulp could not fathom why the floret glowed even beneath the morning sun if it was not here to bring comfort to her. She envied the glow, the way she envied the days of her past, when Mother was by her side.

As silly as it sounded, she knew it all along that there wasn’t a thing as realm crossing and such. That lullabies were just lullabies and glowing florets were just glowing florets. And as for Mother, Mother is Mother.