This critical research examines the fragility of human connection and the impermanence of memory, using the act of giving flowers to explore what resists preservation. Inspired by Derrida’s concept of absence, it challenges traditional documentation by embracing the incomplete and fragmented nature of experience. The transient gesture of offering flowers, embodied in ephemeral receipts, symbolises the distortion of memory by time, perspective, and emotion. By prioritising emotional resonance over factual accuracy, the project reimagines how archives could reflect the fluid and fragmented qualities of human experience. Through this lens, it celebrates the limitations of preservation as integral to understanding memory’s complexity and the archive.