He was 70 years old when she died. She had died from cancer when her kidneys had finally failed. He loved her till her body was placed deep into the soggy dirt, where she would live until she finally rotted to ash. They had done everything together since they had met in 8th grade; it was love at first sight he had always told her every night before bed. He would wake up on Sundays and make a big grand breakfast for when she finally awoke, he would be the one at night that got up to flick off the bedroom light, although she was the one that did most of the work around the house, he was the handy man and fixed leaky pipes or loose hinges when needed.

He loved her with no boundaries, and she to him. They never had children because of a medical problem, and never fully felt that they should. Instead they treated the neighborhood children as their own. His wife would french braid the little girl’s on the streets hair, and he would play sports with the boys while their father was at war. They would house them if their parents could not, and they fed them when their parents were having issues with paying the monthly bill. They were kind people.

Everything began to go down hill with old age. Soon they both needed to die their hair to keep it from turning peppered or silver. He now had gotten a hip replacement, and required a cane to walk around the house. When his wife started to oddly complain about a painful sensation in her stomach, he quickly brought her to the hospital to have a check up.

He remembered not being able to breath when his wife was diagnose, and told that she would only live another few months without a doctor’s or nurse’s assistance. In his mind that basically meant, ‘let her be normal before her body would start shutting down like a blackout in a huge city. He remembered that she didn’t cry until they were alone, in bed. Both were silently reading the newspaper.

She had just small hiccups at first, and then went into complete hysterics. He held her tight to his chest as the flow of tears gently soaked and stained his sleep shirt. He quietly hushed her and asked what so ever the problem was. When she finally caught her breath she pointed to an article to an article in the paper saying that a lady about her age had died from cancer last night while asleep. She cried again and asked why this was happening to her, and why was it happening now. She wiped the tears with the back of her hand as if she were just a small school girl, and asked her what he would do when she died. He just looked her strait in the eye and told her the truth: He had no earthly clue what he would do without her on his side.

His wife started to wake up later and later each day until he had needed to shake her to get her out of bed before noon. He made every meal everyday now but still made Sundays’ breakfast a little bigger and better than all the rest. He retired from work to stay home and take care of her, and now did all of the chores. She kept calling him silly and said that she was fine, but still remembered to kiss him when her eyes finally opened in the morning, when they shut at night, and plenty of times in-between.

They would spend hours doing things older people did: Throwing bird seed at the park, planting flowers in their garden, and just reading together in silence. She started to talk less, and move around less, but winced and slept more. She would, every so often, give him glanced full of sorrow but determination to live that he just wanted to die with her rather than face the fear of being left here on earth alone. One Sunday at breakfast he gave her the necklace that she would soon wear the night she died and the necklace she would bring with her to heaven.

She left him on earth when he was 70 years old. She took his heart with her when she went, but left him. Although he met her in heaven just a year after, he still made Sunday’s breakfast every week until he was placed into the murky mud, and marked with a grave stone that matched hers, and had that same beautiful flower. The same flower he gave to his wife at every Sunday’s breakfast.