She sat in rapt contemplation of the tiny tender flower she was slowly, methodically destroying. She wondered at how this age-old childhood ritual had come to hold so much importance to her now. “He loves me . . . He loves me not . . .”

Her heart raced as she thought of him. The thrill of excitement when he spoke to her her. The chill of despair when she awoke in the predawn darkness, remembering that he never bothered to answer her calls. And now she was reduced to shredding a defenseless daisy as a final, feeble charm.

A hot breeze had played all afternoon against her flushed face. She hardly noticed it now as she sat mesmerized by the power of the spell she worked with her flower. Feeling neglected and ignored, the wind rallied once more for a goodbye gust in daylight’s last hour. And with its final gasp, the breeze buffeted the fragile flower, swirling the last of its petals up, around, and away before she could complete her count.

A small hot tear fell upon the naked flower stem, toppling it from her weakened grasp. She would never know how the charm might have ended. And somehow, that forced her to see the answer she had avoided for so long. She would never know the end.