The Obituary
Entry for The Taj Conspiracy Flash Fiction Contest I could never forget the whisper of the scarlet silk when it fell from her shoulders. It would slide down in a graceful arc, loathe to part with the elegant line of her back. I would follow the curve of her spine with my finger. A tattoo of a lotus in bloom marred the turn of her shoulder and I was glad for it, because it meant she wasn’t perfect, ethereal but importantly, she was here, she was mine. Our days would be filled with art and poetry. She wrote impassioned, if not mediocre verses on the injustice of the world and I painted landscapes that would be hung up as impersonal sentinels of hotel hallways. She would recite from the Les Fleurs du Mal and talk in a rhetoric that inflamed and instigated. I was certain that I could change the world with her. Three years after we first met, we went to Taj Mahal. She breathed in the tangy odour of the summer air, chafed and burned and complained about the world. I ...