FOR it’s purely from nature — a smooth transition patterned with the change of the season.
Sarah sat on a bench in the cemetery, the fallen leaves all around her, a pained look on her face.
“I had waited so long for you to come back home,” she said in quiet grief, “but you never did.”
She closed her eyes, reflecting on her past — from a little girl in the countryside — and when she reopened them, she saw the image of that little girl as she ran, tumbling and playing among the dry leaves. She laughed a little, for it was the age of innocence, when there was cheerfulness and joy, and you couldn’t see the cracks in your parents’ marriage — until it all fell apart.
She was six when her mother and father separated. He had left, looking back just once when she called out to him — and then he was gone. She had cried herself to sleep many nights, hoping and praying for his return, but by then her hopes had somewhat diminished.

Life had been a struggle for her single mother, and Sarah had told her, “One day I will get a great job and life will be better for us.”
She focused on her studies, assisted her mother in their small business, and excelled in her exams, earning a great opportunity to attend university. It was, for her, a dream come true to pursue studies in medicine, whilst her brother, who had also excelled at high school, pursued a degree in engineering. When she graduated with a Bachelor’s degree, it gave her life a special meaning — but deep within her was still that longing to see her father, even if only for a moment.
That moment came many years later with a brief phone call informing the family that her father was in critical condition in a hospital in New York. The news formed a knot in her stomach, and only then did she ask herself the questions: “Did he think about us? Did he want to see us?”
Only he, she knew, could truthfully answer those questions. So now, maybe, they would remain unanswered.
She and her brother travelled the next day, hoping he would survive. By the time they got there, he was not very responsive. She looked at the man — her father — she had longed so much to see again.
“This was not how I had hoped it would be,” she said sadly to herself.
He looked older than mid-fifties, with thinning grey hair, deep wrinkles, and an uneven tone.
“Dad,” she whispered.
He opened his eyes after a long moment, a glazed look in them — and being a doctor, she knew he was close to his end. He passed away that night — a part of her now gone, forever.
At his funeral days later, she and her brother sat quietly as eulogies were read. They had nothing to say because he had not shared his life with them. His wife, his stepchildren, and his friends had much to say.
“A father who became a stranger,” her brother stated, an edge of bitterness in his voice.
Sarah squeezed his hand lightly. “It’s not easy to accept, but I guess that was our fate.”
She had embraced quiet courage as she grew older and practised thoughtfulness for whatever little they had, for she believed in her heart that one day things would get better.
And they did.
“We survived,” she said to her brother. “We did great without him — but at the end of the day, he is still our father, so we will pay our due respects.”
He sighed and squeezed her hand back with a little wry smile. Sarah understood why he was bitter — because he never had a father figure. He had to grow up without that support and encouragement; as a result, he lost interest in cricket, something he had once been passionate about.
“You win some and lose some,” he said, trying not to show his hurt and disappointment.
She sighed deeply as a gust of wind shook the tree limbs, and the drying leaves fell over her on their way to the ground. Though her heart was grieved, she saw the pure beauty of nature around her. That was when tears filled her eyes, and she cried for every impactful moment she had lived through in life.
She wiped her tears and, after a long while, gathered up some dry leaves and took them to her father’s resting place. She held her arms up and let the leaves fall slowly from her hands over his headstone.
“I leave for you something of beauty — the simplest things in life. Sorry, I don’t have many memories of you to cherish. That would have been nice, but you never came back.”
A knot formed in her stomach as she continued to speak softly. “I want you to know that I lived with hope that you would return — but after years passed, I stopped hoping. Now I’m standing at your grave.”
She took a deep breath to say her final goodbye and saw the glimpse of a figure through the trees. She took two steps backwards; the figure, standing in light mist, turned — and she gasped.
She froze, her heart racing, as the figure slowly faded away, enveloped by the mist. She took a few deep breaths and said, “Go rest in peace, dear Dad. One day, I will return to visit your grave, for it’s all I have of you.”
Sarah returned home. A dry leaf she had brought with her, she kept in a glass frame, and beside it, a portrait she had sketched. It was the face of the man she had seen in the mist at the cemetery — her father.