It's Not About The Flowers

‘I sat in this park, on this bench, wrestling with my fingers... you know, the way I do. It was nice, the sun was out, cloudless. But it didn’t matter. I felt cold, I shivered. It was as if the rain was falling on me...

Then I just realised there was something else I needed. But I couldn’t...I couldn't grasp what it was I needed. There was something though, something missing, something...that I was supposed to have but didn’t. Something missing from my fingers, something to hold.

So, I went for a wander around the shops, Woollies, WH Smith, you know all the corporate crap, and there right in front of me, was a florist. Maybe it was fate or...something...

The place smelt girly, so I went in. Heh, it felt right initially.

But I'm walking, and walking, and this place...it is small. Jill’s on the high street, no room to swing a baby in there, so I'm walking round and round and round, in circles, checking out these nice laminated pictures of flowers... and the girl behind the desk begins to laugh as she walks up to me and asks if I want help picking.

I told her no, I was just browsing. She said I had been browsing for half an hour. She even did the quote fingers as she burst into hysterics. I may as well have been pacing up and down in the shop, just ignoring the photos completely.

I told her that I wanted to find a flower for someone. A special one, one that would jump out, grab me by the arms and say, 'She will love this! She will cherish this!'

She said that she could find just the thing.

She beckoned me over to the chair behind the desk, pushed me into it, and wandered off, into one of her back rooms.

“What are you doing?” I called. She said that she had no other customers, and that I had her all to myself. Maybe she was just being friendly. Plus, my over-active imagination...

She brought back a flower, a tall, butter yellow petalled thing.

“Sunflower,” she said with a grin. “A flower of loyalty. Beautiful as a Florida day. This is going to make her know, that you will love her forever. And you will. I can tell.”

And I do. But I roll the stem in my fingers, looking up at its petals, flapping like it would take off any moment. It felt too much. I shook my head. She looked almost affronted, and I didn’t really blame her to be honest. She was playing me, just like a saleswoman.

“Ya sure?” she asked, leaning forward and playing with the petals. “I would love this type of flower. I would have it in a big pot, in the hallway. It would be the first thing guests would see when they came in the house...”

I said that the girl I was buying the flower was for didn’t have a big pot. She raised an eyebrow, looking falsely offended.

“I guess I best stop flirting with you then!”

“Guess you’d better.”

“Well... it works on the rest,” she said, taking the sunflower back from me. “I do it with every guy that comes in, because you never know, when true love is going to walk through that glass pane door.”

“Does it work?” I asked.

“Oh yeah. Sometimes, two, three...even four days in a row.”

A few moments later, she was back again, and she had this heavenly white bunch of tiny flowers, their petals were the nicest, most delicate white petals you ever saw, like coloured tears clinging to a piece of green rope.

“Those are nice...” I said, as she sat down, delicately handing a stem to me. I lightly twirled it in my hands, watching the petals spin and spin.

“They should be. They’re mine,” she said. She was so proud of her flowers.

But it happened again. I found myself staring into the pollen, observing and judging every tiny detail, this one still didn’t feel right.

“Lilies,” she said, this time the pride obvious, and that saleswoman like tone came back again, that fearsome tone of hers.

“The flower of innocent love. Perfect if you are about to confess your lurve to some saucy minx which I think you are. Want them? Fiver for a bunch?”

“They are good...and yes, I am about to tell her-“

“Ooh you are quick, I’ve only just met you!”

“Har har – but these aren’t right.”

She looked crestfallen. “Why? Those are perfect!”

“They’re not,” I said, trying to figure out what was wrong. They were nice...perfectly nice...but they weren’t perfect, you know?

But then I bet you’re wondering what I was really looking for.

“You are an irritant,” she said, giving me the baleful glare as she got up. “Alright, this is war. I’m finding you a flower you’ll love if it’s the last thing I do.”

“Okay...” I said, and I was a little embarrassed so I tried to change the subject. “What’s your name anyway?”

“I'll tell you when you buy a flower... ass!”

I couldn’t help but laugh as her door swung closed behind her and I was left to wait for the next petalled candidate.

“Okay,” she said, flustered, sitting down opposite me and shoving a very familiar flower in my direction.

“If this, a sunflower or a Lily doesn’t do it nothing will. A rose. A good old fashioned, frigging rose.”

“Oh come on,” I said. “If I wanted one of these, I would’ve just picked one up.”

“You- are- an- irritant,” she said, jabbing a finger at me while I twirled the thornless Rose in my hand. “I honestly don’t think I’ve had a worse customer.”

“Thanks,” I said. In case you didn’t realise, I didn’t quite mean that particular piece of respect.

“You don’t want any of them?” she asked. “Not one customer of mine has walked out of here without a flower for over two years. And you are not busting that record. Sunflowers, Lilies, Roses, all beautiful, all wonderful to receive!”

“Couldn’t you get some more flowers out?” I asked. “What about all the others in the photos, surely you can recommend some more of them?’

“But that’s not your problem is it?” she asked. And there it was.

I knew she had struck upon the right chord because I was about to say the same thing.

“It’s not about the flowers.”

“To be fair...” she began, taking the rose back, stroking the petals with one finger. “It never is about the flowers themselves. They’re beautiful, yes,” she sniffed the rose and smiled. “But it’s not about the flowers when it comes to love. It’s about what they mean.”

In my head, I already had an idea.

“Thanks very much,” I said, getting up to leave. And she blocked me in. Holding her arms across the way out from behind the desk.

“You still need to buy a flower.”’

‘Wow. What a bitch.’

Dess, who sat on the bench beside Glen, shook her head as Glen laughed, beaming bright.

‘Nah. She was all right. You should go visit her sometime. She’ll sell you a good flower!’

‘Yeah I’ll go visit her. I’ll leave with her eyes,’she said, as Glen burst into laughter.

‘Someone get out on the wrong side of bed,’ Glen teased.

‘Well...I haven’t seen Ben since we got back from uni.’

‘Ah...sounds a bit crap.’

‘It is a bit crap, it’s more than a bit crap. It’s like the sky is raining crap.’

Glen patted her sympathetically on the shoulder. ‘Has he called?’

‘Nope.’

‘It’s only been four days, don’t worry about it...’

‘It's four days! That’s a long time for people to not talk. You’ll get to know that soon, if this girl gets with you...’

‘Maybe...’

‘Oh come-on, have some optimism. For the good of both of us. Tell me about her. Have you met her before?’

‘Oh yeah. Plenty of times.’

‘Oooh...’ Dess grinned at the thought of pumping more knowledge about Glen’s love-object. ‘What's she like?’

‘What's she like?’ Glen laughed, as Dess watched on, one of her eyebrows arched. ‘She’s like, the girl I can’t imagine my life without. The girl who always makes me smile. The girl who it’s always fun to be around. She is it.’

‘Hmm...she sounds alright,’ Dess said, nonchalant. ‘What flowers did you get her?’

At this, Glen turned bright red.

‘Er...no it's embarrassing.’

‘Why do people say that to me?’ Dess said, in fake wonderment. ‘It just means I am going to try and find out...’

Glen didn’t say anything. He was chewing his lip, fingers threading through each other, over and over.

‘...come on then,’ she said. ‘Where are they anyway? Thought you were giving them to her today?’

Glen looked at her, troubled. Then spontaneously he smiled, a thin thing, flicking up one side of his face as if lopsided.

He delved into his jacket. Dess smiled a little bit – she hadn’t seen his jacket as baggy before.

He drew out the flowers, making sure they were all right, not bent by the inside of his jacket, and handed them to Dess. 

‘....wildflowers and sticky weed?’

‘Yeah...’ Glen said, watching her nervously. ‘I wanted flowers that meant something. So I picked them.’

‘...sticky weed?’

‘Yeah.’

‘It’s not even a flower though,’ Dess said. ‘It’s just...a weed.’

‘It’s not about the flowers...’ Glen said.

‘I remember you sticking these on my back on the way home!’ Dess said, beaming as she remembered. ‘It was like our game...’

‘Yeah. It was.’

The pair looked at each other as the sunlight burst from a flock of clouds, like the dawning of thought. Then Dess looked away, to her bag as if it had suddenly hooked her attention.

‘So... when is she turning up?’ Dess asked, her voice quieter than it had been a moment ago as she looked through her bag, flicking through paper and pencils. ‘We’ve been sitting here a while now...twenty minutes or something...’

Glen smiled, awkward.

‘She turned up about twenty minutes ago.’

Dess, after a moment, stopped searching through her bag. Looking for something that wasn’t there. Terrified of the look Glen would have on his face. She looked around to see him kneeling in front of her, hands clasped together.

‘Oh God -’

‘What?’ Glen arched an eyebrow, before looking at himself. And dropping onto two knees instead.

‘Sorry,’ he said, a little shame faced.

Dess stared at him in a kind of wary confusion.

'Why...why me?’ she asked, face contorted not in annoyance, but sadness. ‘I have a boyfriend...we're friends, I couldn’t ever imagine-‘

‘I know,’ Glen said. ‘There are plenty of people in the line before me, we’re friends, so on, so on. It shouldn’t...but...’

Dess looked at the bunch in her hand. The weeds. The wildflowers, and the petals she stroked.

‘Oh yeah.’ Glen walked over the rusty bin, delved in. Bringing forth a tall, beaming sunflower.‘That’s for you as well.’

Dess took it lightly. ‘Thanks,’ she said meekly.

She stroked the petals lightly, as Glen figured out what to say.

‘I...had to buy a flower.’

‘Oh yeah. From the bitch.’

Glen laughed softly, ‘Yeah. The bitch.’

‘And I thought it wasn’t about the flowers.’

‘It wasn’t...’ Glen said, weak smile on his cheeks. ‘...she made me buy them.’

‘Nice...’

‘Yeah...’

For a moment, the two exchanged the briefest of glances,and then they both observed the grass with strange intensity.

‘I know...’ Glen started. ‘That I have no chance with you. I mean... You are the best girl I have ever met. Period.’

Dess smiled. Her eyes looking fondly on him as he continued, watching him over the petals of her rainbow like wildflowers.

‘There are a bunch of guys in line before me. I know that. We’re not even at the same uni. But...well I just can’t get over you.’

Above them, the clouds shifted through the sky, the wind beginning to blow. The trees swayed with the wind, their leaves whistling a momentous tune, the strong breeze rippling Dess’s hair.

‘Is there anything I can do?’ Dess asked, Glen looking up at her with a slightly tinged red face, as if he was ashamed of what he was going to say next.

‘What?’ Dess said, curiosity getting the better of her.

Glen smiled, with some cheek. Like he was about to release a chat up line, to either blow her away with the wind or leave her laughing in the grass.

‘You could kiss me,’ Glen said. ‘You wanna?’

- THE END -