When a Flower Dies

by Josephine Chia

  “Thank you for this,” Anthony whispers to Emily, squeezing her hand. “I’ve not seen mum so cheerful for such a long time.”

  Emily is strangely touched.

  But Pansy’s joyful moments were not to last for long. The periods of euphoria and calmness become fewer and fewer. Most of the time, Anthony has to dash down to the nursing home to deal with yet another difficult episode. Almost always, it is when Pansy remembers George and yells for him to come to her, throwing food at the nursing staff if they didn’t bring him to her.

  As high as we have mounted in delight

  In our dejection do we sink as low.

  Anthony remembers the quotation from his mother’s old book on Wordsworth’s poems. His mother never goes anywhere without the red leather-covered book, so ancient now that the leather has gone dark and soft, the paper thin and well-thumbed, silverfish amongst the pages. At some level, Anthony is aware that the book, for his mother, is a link to his father. The nursing staff at the home had told him that Pansy often clutches the book to her chest when she sleeps.

  “The Gardens is showcasing spring flowers,” Goldie says to Anthony. “Can I borrow your car and take grandma out for the day?”

  “You sure you can manage? What if she has one of her episodes?”

  “I’ll be all right,” Goldie says, but not that confidently. “She must be missing her English garden and seeing the flowers might make her happy.”

  “Oh, okay,” Anthony says. “But call me straightaway if you need help.”

  When Goldie picks up her grandmother, Pansy is in a sunny mood.

  “When did you get back?” Pansy asks her, as if she hadn’t seen her the previous week. “You look so beautiful.”

  Her grandmother seems to know her, yet not know her. She is comfortable and trusting enough to get into Goldie’s car, yet does not seem to have a clear understanding of their relationship, making Goldie wonder if she still thinks of her as her mother. But fragments of their time together are brought up occasionally, which makes Goldie feel that her grandmother does know that Goldie is her granddaughter. However, as they motor along, Pansy repeats the same question over and over again about when she got back. So Goldie decides to respond in a short sentence, in a bright voice, “Oh, I just got back, grandma.”

  Nonetheless, Goldie is pained by her grandmother’s deterioration. It appears that Pansy is satisfied with the answer. Goldie fancies that her grandmother is sometimes physically present but mentally elsewhere. It saddens her.

  “Do you remember asking me what my third wish was?”

  Goldie is taken aback by the sudden question which seems to have come out of the blue. What on earth is her grandmother talking about? A quick shuffle of her mental files and Goldie is suddenly pulled back to the occasion of their last outing together before she left for China. Her grandmother had said that Goldie had made her first wish come true when she could pass her cooking skills to Goldie; the second was that she could pass Goldie the Peranakan heritage when Goldie was happy to wear a sarong kebaya. Then Goldie had asked her what her third wish was, though she had thought Pansy did not hear it, since Pansy had not answered. How on earth did her grandmother retrieve this conversation from so long ago when so much of her memory is in tatters? Goldie finds the manifestation of Alzheimer’s conflicting yet fascinating.

  “Oh, yes,” Goldie says unconvincingly. “I do remember. What is your third wish, grandma?”

  “I wish to be reunited with George,” she says simply.

  “Oh, grandma,” Goldie says, taking her left hand off the steering wheel briefly to place it on her grandmother’s thigh.

  “I want you to promise me something.”

  “Yes, I remember—about spreading your ashes at Bracklesham Bay so that you can be with grandpa.”

  “Yes, that as well,” says Pansy, as lucid as she has not been for a long time. “But another promise. Promise me that you will not grieve for me. I’ve had a very happy life. How many people can say that they’ve had the greatest romance ever? Now, all I want is to be with my best friend, lover and husband. It’s an occasion to rejoice, not grieve.”

  “I will be sad but I do understand, grandma…”

  And then a few minutes later, it’s as if the conversation had never taken place at all. Pansy seems to shrink back into the seat once she has delivered her important message, a veil of blankness dropping over her face. Goldie finds it hugely disconcerting. It’s as if she had imagined the whole thing. And yet, when she takes her grandmother into the Flower Dome, something sparks her back into life.

  “Oh, I love this place,” Pansy claps her hands when they walk into the cool air-conditioning. “Thank you so much for bringing me here. You’re such a loving person. I feel it in my bones that you will soon meet someone who will be the love of your life.”

  “That will be nice,” Goldie blushes.

  “Oh look, fuchsias! Do you know what we call these flowers colloquially? Dancing Ladies. Look, can you see the ballerina’s tutu in the shape of the petals? Her legs? Her arms?”

  “Oh, now that you’ve pointed them out… why, yes.”

  I wandered lonely as a cloud

  That floats on high o’er vales and hills,

  When all at once I saw a crowd

  A host of golden daffodils

  Beside the lake, beneath the trees,

  Fluttering and dancing in the breeze.

  “What did you say?” Pansy asks Goldie.

  “I didn’t say anything, grandma. What’s the matter?”

  “You’re sure you didn’t say anything? I swear I heard a voice reciting Wordsworth’s poem… in my ears… This one, on this page…” Pansy opens her Wordsworth book.

  “There’s no one here but us, grandma…”

  Pansy looks around her. Then her face brightens as she sees the flowers.

  “Oh, look! Daffodils!” she suddenly says. “It must be spring now! I love spring. Yes, I can feel it in the air. Shall we go and sit by the lake? I will read you my Wordsworth’s…”

  “The lake is outdoors, grandma. I can take you there later if you wish. But it will be warm now. How about we look round the Flower Dome first and then when it is cooler out there, I can walk you by the lake.”

  “Daffodils,” Pansy says excitedly, as if not hearing what Goldie has said. “Your grandpa and I used to compete to see who can spot the first daffodil…”

  “How can they have daffodils, here in Singapore?” Goldie says, disbelieving.

  Of course Goldie has never seen them in the Dome before.

  “Silly girl,” Pansy says, smacking Goldie’s arm gently. “Of course they can’t grow daffodils in Singapore. But they grow wild here in England…”

  “Grandma, we’re not in…” But Goldie stops, alarmed.

  She wonders if she should call her father straightaway. The cool air in the Flower Dome and the abundance of spring flowers must have made her grandmother think she was in England.

  True enough, there they are. Daffodils. There are daffodils and their small cousin, the narcissi, planted in pots, on banks and in the flower beds, scattered under the arched, giant glass sky. And once again Pansy slips dangerously back to another time and another place. She looks out through the glass dome and she sees a lake. Her mind wants her to see the daffodils planted on the banks of the lake. A bed of daffodils is planted on raised ground in front of the glass walls of the conservatory and this colludes with her delusion that they are planted on the banks of the lake. Pansy no longer sees the glass walls, only the lake and the daffodils. And she sees herself back in Bracklesham Bay, George and herself going for their regular spring walk to catch their first sight of the daffodils of the season.

  Beside the lake, beneath the trees,

  Fluttering and dancing in the breeze.

  This time she recognises George’s voice reciting the line of the poem…

  “Oh George…”

  “Grandma,” Goldie says with urgency, to help her grandmother
snap out of the strange mood that she seems to be slipping into. She hears her grandmother calling out her grandfather’s name so she guesses that grandma thinks she can see George.

  Goldie felt, rather than knew, that a dramatic change has come over her grandmother. It’s as if Pansy has been sprinkled with some fairy dust as she straightens from her usually bent posture. Her face glows with immeasurable joy. Goldie sees her grandmother staring through the glass wall of the conservatory as if she is seeing something on the other side which shows a view of the river. The daffodils in the foreground superimposed against the glass walls give the appearance that they are growing beside the water, next to the trees. Her grandmother calls out her husband’s name, her face wreathed in smiles. And before Goldie can stop her, her grandmother dashes forward with renewed mobility, tramples the fox gloves, geraniums and pansies in the flower beds as she smashes right into the thickened glass walls of the Flower Dome.

  Pansy sees George in the distance, standing near the lake where the daffodils are, smiling and waving to her. She is overjoyed to see him, and rushes towards him. “George!” Pansy shouts. “Wait for me. I’m coming…” In her excitement, she drops her Wordsworth’s book of poems.

  Acknowledgements

  With gratitude to the National Arts Council (NAC) and Gardens by the Bay for awarding me the Gardens by the Bay Writer-in-the-Gardens Residency 2014 to write this novel.

  I would like to thank in particular Annabelle Low of NAC who assisted me with my enquiries.

  Thank you also to the staff of Gardens by the Bay and in particular, Leong Cheng Yee, for facilitating the writers residency programme. and co-ordinators Bernadette Yew, Daniel Tang, Pheely Hsu and Jezreel See.

  I am particularly grateful to the experts at Gardens who have given me their valuable time and expertise: Dr Adrian Loo, Director of Research and Horticulture, who gave me insight into healing plants; Sean Koh, Manager, Flower Dome, for his advice on Europeans flowers; Edwin Ong and Phira Unadirekkul, on migratory birds visiting the Gardens.

  Thank you to Brendon Phuah, Senior Officer from the National Parks, who helped me with information on the heritage trees.

  I was very fortunate to run into several people who had either grown up in the seaside villages mentioned in this novel or holidayed there. So thank you to Peranakans Mr Chia Hock Jin and his cousin Mr Alan Koh who gave me valuable information on the area around Kampong Padang Terbakar, Koh Sek Lim Road and Bedok Rest House. I would also like to thank Joyce Tan who reminded me about the agar-agar seaweeds, and Amy Tsang, my companion for bird and butterfly watching, who is extremely knowledgeable about both. I would also like to thank Linda Chee of the Peranakan Association for verifying some of the Peranakan terms.

  Thank you also to Mr Chun See Lam whose blog, Good Morning Yesterday, refreshed my memory.

  I am indebted to several books which helped me when my memory failed:

  100 Useful Herbs of Malaysia and Singapore by Joseph Samy, M.Sugumaran, Kate L.W. Lee, edited by K.M. Wong (Marshall Cavendish, 2014).

  Jamu: The Ancient Art of Herbal Healing by Susan-Jane Beers (Periplus Editions HK Ltd, 2001).

  The Encyclopedia of Healing Plants: A guide to Aromatherapy Flower Essences & Herbal Remedies by Chrissie Wildwood (Judith Piatkus Publishers Ltd, 1998).

  Plants That Heal, Thrill and Kill by Wee Yeow Chin (SNP International. 2005).

  Dream Gardens of England: 100 Inspirational Gardens by Barbara Baker, Jerry Harpur, Marcus Harpur (Merrell, 2010).

  I would also like to thank my readers and friends without whom I will remain only a closet writer. In particular, I would like to thank Mary Narayan who is a firm supporter and faithfully attends most of my readings and discussions. I would also like to thank my sister, Magdalene, and her family, who provided a roof over my head so that I can write.

  I would like to thank my editors, Tara Hasnain who edited the MS in its first draft and to Ng Kah Gay who edited the final draft. Thanks also to Julia d’Silva for proof-reading the MS. And last but not least, I would like to sincerely thank Fong Hoe Fang who is publishing a second work of fiction from me, and to Jacaranda Literary Agency for taking on my book.

  About the Author

  Josephine Chia is a Peranakan author and is published internationally in both fiction and non-fiction. She was born in Kampong Potong Pasir in colonial Singapore. Her first short stories were published in SINGA, a Singapore literary journal published in the 1980s and 1990s.

  She immigrated to England in 1985. In 1992, she became one of twelve winners of the Ian St. James Awards for short fiction, the first Singaporean to win the award. Her story “Tropical Fever” was published together with the other authors in an anthology, Blood, Sweat And Tears, published by Fontana, an imprint of Harper Collins. Since then, she has also been published by other UK publishers as well as Malaysian and Singapore publishers and has won other awards and prizes. She has returned home to live since 2012.

  Ethos Books brought out a new edition of her first novel, My Mother-In-Law’s Son, in 2013. Serambi Indonesia translated her first memoir, Frog Under a Coconut Shell into Bahasa Indonesia with the title, Katak Dalam Tempurung. Her second memoir about her village, Kampong Spirit, Gotong Royong: Life in Potong Pasir 1955 to 1965, won the Singapore Literature Prize for Non-Fiction in 2014. It has been scheduled for translation into Malay by Pustaka Nasional.

  Josephine has run Creative Writing workshops for the National Book Development Council, the National Arts Council, the National Library Board and the Ministry of Education’s Creative Arts Programme. Josephine is mentor to aspiring writers under the National Arts Council’s Mentor Access Programme (MAP) and the Ministry of Education’s Creative Arts Programme.

  Josephine was Writer-In-Residence at Gardens by the Bay in 2014. She has participated in several Literary Festivals and Book Fairs around the world. She is a member of UK’s Society of Authors UK’s Society of Women Writers and Journalists.

  About Ethos Books

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