Desert Flower
The door creaked open, pushed by some invisible force or maybe a draft from the other room. The girl sitting in the chair in that room lifted her downcast eyes, being pulled from her reverie of mourning. Slightly surprised by the sound, she sat almost comatose staring, as if held captive in some invisible tomb, as the door oscillated in the stagnant summer air. When her brother called from the kitchen she rose, corpse like, and mechanically closed the door. Upon returning to her chair she sat, brown hair spilling over her face, and returned to her reverie. A completely uneventful morning passed by when the girl again looked up, and saw the door flagging in the floating wind. Again, her brother yelled but this time when she rose to close the door, she noticed something. Forgetting to do the thing she set out to do, she stepped out onto the rough welcome mat and creaking old porch with peeling paint. She seemed, for the first time in a long time, to notice her surroundings. Forever she lived in a haze, sitting, maybe eating, and crying herself to sleep, but now that the door was opened she saw the beauty of the world, and calling her brother, stood looking out into the now fading afternoon. Looking worried, he ran to the door, for something must be wrong if his sister, shell shocked by the sudden death of both their parents, called his name. Outlined by the horizon stood a great tree in the desert of their home, and next to it one of the small cactus flowers that all thought to be extinct. Still she stood staring and he, he looked worried. Worried not because of the beauty, but because she might finally understand what happened, because of that flower. And that flower, it would tear them apart. She turned, and as the dust particles floated through the air in their updrafts and downdrafts, she set out across the wasteland. She went quickly to find out more, and he followed quickly, both to find out why that flower might be there but also to keep her from the truth.
Upon their arrival at the tree and the flower she bent and saw another object on the ground. An old phone, with a cracked screen and the flashing face of her mother. The only image left. Upon picking it up it all made sense. That was why there were no bodies. They buried empty coffins. Why her brother did not mourn. There was no car crash, only one person who decided to play God and kill them, just to see if he could get away with it. She turned to scream at him and call the police but all that remained were dusty footprints sprinting off into the distance. She picked the flower and returned home where once again she retreated into herself to mourn not two, but three people. She also mourned the loss of her own dear brother.