Red lily with grey clouds on ribs

The lily came up on Tuesday, two days after the rain stopped and the cloud finally lifted off the tops of the blocks. I found it when I went out to hang the washing, a green spear pushing through the gap where the balcony rail meets the concrete. You remember the bulb Dad gave me the spring before he went into Whitmore. I had given up on it. I had tipped it into a tin of compost and left it on the ledge under the kitchen window, where the drip from the flat above falls.

The bloom opened yesterday. It is the deep red you used to call claret, with the petals gone violet at the edges, and the stamens curl up as if someone had bent them with a fingernail. The neighbours from the eleventh floor came down to look. Mr Okafor said it seemed to be wearing a coat of smoke, because the grey clouds keep drifting across the sky and the light goes dim and then bright again over the flower.

Last night the lift broke again, so I walked down eleven flights with the shopping. At the bottom the wind caught the dust by the bins and turned it into a slow spiral. I thought of the lily, how it had nothing to do with the car park or the bins, and how it had come up anyway.

I am sending you a stem in this envelope, wrapped in the Gazette. Put it in water on your sill. It will not mind the draught.

Love, Jean