She silently gathered a bouquet of the tiny white flowers, tossing them into her mother’s grave before the first clod of earth. The white flowers studded the black burial dress, a reflection of the black sores on her deathly pale face. She wept prettily, as she had been taught. One tear after another fell from her shining eyes, but she cried silently and with a smooth brow.

She threw one last bloom on the grave of her father, gazing back as her brother pulled her away. They must run to the north, trying to outrun the plague. Her little sister was in the cart, bawling. She fed her the last of her father’s poppy syrup, watched her calm and sleeping. She envied her the hours of forgetfulness. At the city gates, they denied all knowledge of the plague, said they were man and wife. Orphanages were festering hells of plague orphans. Bonfires lighting the sky, burning the tiny sore-speckled faces away.

Scattered a handful of dried white petals onto her brother’s body. Sweet crushed petals on the foul straw pallet in an inn where he died. Took his shoes, sold them for another bottle of poppy syrup. Poured it into the greedy mouth of her sister, before she began screaming and seeing plague sores everywhere again. Before she starts begging not to be buried like mama and papa.

Screaming and cursing, tore flowers up by the roots and hurled them at her sister’s fevered body. She sobs loudly, face contorting like a gargoyle’s. Tearing at the ground, throwing soil and flowers at her. Little girl’s grubby dress covered with clods of dirt and flowers. Might as well bury her now. She wakes, starts screaming. She thinks she isn’t dead yet. She is, they all are. Everybody dead. She forces poppy syrup down her screaming throat. Her sister is silent as she buries her in flowers.

Sees plague sores on her skin. Wonders if they’re real, if she’s going mad like her sister did. The old man at the corner doesn’t think she’s sick. She lets him take what he wants. She’s already dead. He throws a coin at her, evicts her from his bedroom. She spends it on poppy syrup. The sores go away. She must be mad. Even so, she is warm, and heavy. She looks for white flowers, but there are none in this dark and cobbled alley. She sleeps, forgets, dreams of white flowers but doesn’t remember why they make her sad. Dies in a poppy haze, the only corpse in the city with white, unblemished skin.