Lose Some, Win One
As soon as the paint had dried on her new mailbox, Ania planted her first rose bush seeds. That was seven years ago. Since then rose bushes lined her driveway, her front walk and the border of her yard.
Anyone diving down the street would notice her house for this one thing, the fastidiously nurtured, meticulously groomed rose bushes. It was Ania's pride. She never married. She never had children. These bushes were her progeny.
And so it was that she was devastated one morning to find a line of bushes along the side of her house mowed down, flat.
She called the police.
"Yes, ma'am," the responding offers said when he saw destroyed bushes. "I see that. They have been demolished. Looks like a car crush to me. Someone lost control as they tried to turn the corner and ran right up onto your yard."
Ania regarded the officer with moist blue eyes that revealed the tears she had recently shed.
"What can we do, officer?"
The officer, veteran of homicides and domestic disputes, stared at her. Something about those eyes, her dedication to this bit of beauty, moved him as no crime had for years.
"Well ma'am, I'll tell you. These bushes are gone. That's for sure. But don't mean we have to leave it at that. I happen to know a bit about roses. Got a few myself. Tell you what. This Saturday, I'll bring a cutting over from one of my finest and we'll fix this. By next spring, you'll see. This corner will look like nothing ever happened."
Ania looked up at the man...for he was quite tall. All of a sudden she didn't feel so bad. Her roses, that had brought her such pleasure in her life, now brought her another gift.
A friend.
This story is written in response to Mariannewst's Freewrite prompt: car crush