It must have rained in the night, before the temperature plummeted and skimmed the shining surface of the rose memorial with a slickening of ice.

She takes her time, stepping carefully onto the tiles in case the concentric curves swirling away from her prove treacherous underfoot. She huddles deeper into her winter coat, but it hangs too loose on her now, billowing in the January wind that scours the park, little protection against its teeth. She’s shivering but her steps are steady as she makes her first circuit around the edge, watching the sunlight glint and sparkle from every pillar. Once back at the spot where she started, she takes a deep breath and begins again, tightening the circle this time, spiralling inwards. Her right hand lightly touches the pillars she passes, as if to collect every date and commit their events to memory. Her left hand is clenched tight around a white lily, her fingers chilled to match its bone-white shade.

A year ago today. The morning had been just this bright, but had felt leaden with shadows that only they could see. They’d come to fill the heavy moments before setting off for the hospital, for the looming appointment that was stealing all the light from the day, threatening to rob all the hope from their hearts. A year ago today, he’d still been there to hold her hand against the cold, and she remembered feeling his heartbeat through that solid, reassuring point of contact. She’d wondered if he could feel hers too, could tell from its panic-fast beat that the brave face she was putting on was just that, a façade. She had talked too much, too fast, too brightly.

‘Look, you never know, they might say there’s something they can do. Survival rates are getting better, there are new treatments all the time. These days, more people your age die with cancer than from it…’

As soon as it was out of her mouth, she’d wished she hadn’t said the word. She saw the pillars anew as they walked past every date, and she couldn’t help wondering… when the next World Water Day rolled around in March, would he be in the middle of treatment? Would he see Concrete Cow Day in September? She’d shaken the thought away. Of course he would. The world couldn’t be that cruel.

But of course, the world could. He made it as far as World Hospice Day in October, but by November and World Computing Day, he was gone. With that same inevitability, she realises that her steps have carried her to the very centre of the rose. She bends to place her own tribute there, in that central spot that bears no date, where she can pretend it might be possible to step outside of time, back into the days they had shared. Her offering lies marble-white on granite. She fears the wind might take it, but its petals merely tremble as she turns and walks away alone.