With the sheet in my hand, I sink down onto the bed.
3. Learn to dance tango.
It’s not Jaden’s handwriting. I’ve seen his scrawled notes in the handover reports often enough, and this handwriting here is anything but scrawled. It looks soft and flowing. Feminine. It seems familiar to me, but from where?
4. Count the stars over Greenland.
Is this a bucket list? Who wrote it, and why is it in Jaden’s wardrobe?
5. Taste everything you’ve never eaten before.
Something about this point makes me pause.Do you know those crazy street food stalls at the Farmers’ Market?I hear Lilly asking in my thoughts.
It’s strange that someone here is planning the same thing Lilly wanted to do. A coincidence?
Wait a second. Lilly… Is that her handwriting?
As if on its own, my gaze wanders back up. I’m not quite sure. It’s possible, but I’m not certain, so I look for other clues.
Greenland. Did she ever talk about it?
No.
The dog. What about that? I rummage through my memory, search all our conversations for clues and find one: she told meabout the dog she had as a child and still missed terribly. But she never mentioned that she’d like to have another one.
The tango dancing also seems somehow familiar to me. She always followed the ballroom competitions on TV.
‘Oh, just once I’d like to be able to dance like that…’she said with a sigh more than once.
Although I don’t understand what this is supposed to mean or whether there’s any connection between Lilly and this list at all, my stomach turns queasy when I read the next item.
6. Create the most beautiful garden in the world.
I stare at the words as they slowly seep into my consciousness and feel them merge with my own memory.
‘A garden,’ she breathes longingly. ‘A quiet paradise, threaded with the scent of blooming lavender bushes and wild roses.’
‘That sounds amazing!’
‘An old olive tree spreads its gnarled branches, casting shade and whispering softly in the wind. Somewhere a little brook babbles, the water glinting in the afternoon sun.’ Her voice grows ever fainter, as if speaking costs her too much effort.
I reach for her hand. ‘One day we’ll sit there together.’ With the scent of lavender in our noses, birdsong in our ears, and the tingling of sunrays on our skin.
Lilly’s eyes are already closed again. ‘We will.’
The list blurs before my eyes and I don’t know what to think. She never told me she had a bucket list, only raved about everything she still wanted to do once she got better. Still, I can’t shake the feeling that the list I’m holding in my hands now might be hers.
I read on.
7. Walk across hot coals.
She might like that, but she’s never mentioned it. Maybe I was wrong. Lots of people have dogs, dare to try crazy foods, and dream of having a garden.
Thoughtfully, I turn the sheet over. There’s something written right at the very bottom in the right-hand corner.
A name.
Breathless, I stare at the Y. A tiny flower at each end, each one with different petals.
