The Corsage

She kept the corsage.

It was on the mantlepiece, wilted and fading; a lousy metaphor for a lousy memory but still, somehow, a symbol of hope. She would look at it sometimes and wonder what could have been, but then she remembered his face and she would try to forget it had ever happened.

But the corsage was there. The white flowers were turning brown and the smell had gone but it was still there. Why he had bought it for her she didn't know. Why, if he had planned all along to push her away with his words?

That night after he had dropped her off at her apartment she'd called him Greg and kissed his cheek and he had looked at her as if she was crazy. Even after all he'd said she still had hope. She'd cried herself to sleep that night but afterwards in spite of everything she still had hope.

And she still did. In spite of everything. In spite of Stacy Warner and Cuddy and Carmen Electra, Allison Cameron had hope. And maybe that was the worst disease of all.