Every year on my birthday, from the time I turned 12, a white gardenia（栀子花）was delivered to my house. With no card or note, I1who sent me the flowers. After a while, I2discovering the sender's3and just delighted in the beauty and4of them. But I never stopped5the giver. As a teenager, I imagined that it might be a6who had noticed and loved me7. I had even been8someone wonderful but too9to make known his identity.
When I was 17, a boy10my heart. One morning when I awoke, I saw a 11on my mirror in red lipstick："Heartily know when half-gods go, the gods arrive." And I12the quotation where my mother had written it13my heart healed. I had thought my mother couldn't understand. But she did.
One month before my high-school graduation, my father died of a heart attack. I became completely unin-terested in everything, even my graduation ceremony. But my mother, in the midst of her own14, would not hear of my 15it.
The day before my father died, my mother and I16a spectacular dress for my ceremony while shopping, which made me feel like a princess, but it was the wrong size. Because of my father's death, I forgot about the17. The day before the18, I noticed that dress —in the19size -lying over the sofa. It was presented to me--I didn't care whether I had a new dress or not. But my mother did.
My mother died ten days after I got married. I was 22. That was the year the gardenias20coming.
