“I’m not going to ask how you fucked this up, boy,” Dad grumbled, coming up behind me. “When you’re done losing your guts, come find me and tell me how you plan to fix this.”
“What if I can’t?” I whispered miserably, wiping a long string of saliva from my face with the back of my hand.
“Then you don’t deserve her, and perhaps she’s better off alone,” he said simply, and then walked away.
Perhaps she’s better off alone. My fingers shifted, digging into the hard ground to start to tunnel roots. I stared at my hands for long moments. Perhaps she’s better off alone. Those words tormented me as my head lifted and I turned to stare after his retreating back.
∞∞∞
“Okay, but I need to see her,” I told the Gnome I’d been dogging for the last… sixty minutes or so. They were either going to tell me where she was, or call someone to come remove me from the premises, because until I was satisfied with anything they said or I was bodily removed, I wasn’t going anywhere.
“Why do you care?” Bushy red beard and mottled splotches of red dotting their light greenish grey skin, the Gnome raised a bushy brow at me. I had no idea if they were a him, her, or they, as Gnomes tended to all be bearded, short, squat, and typically naturally surly, and I didn’t wish to offend them by addressing them wrong. But if they were a male and I was assured of this before I got outta here, we may just come to blows. Ballsy, this one was.
“Your plant there is dying,” they said with a long, measuring look and a disgusted sniff at my lack of plant management, probably because they could smell I was of the Plant Other variety and had taken to carting around my love blossom like it was my child.
My hand clutched the white ceramic pot a little tighter. “I’m trying to fix that, if you’d just point me in the right direction of my- Of Aster-”
“She ain’t been here all week,” someone called from several rows of daffodils, roses, and pansies over.
“All week?” I spluttered, in alarm. Was she going to lose her job because of me?
Everything, this whole thing, it was all my fault. I couldn’t get the pained look on her face, pure, utter betrayal, agony, out of my head. She must hate me.Ihated me.
“Not that it matters,” a third added. “We can handle things while she’s away.”
“Aster never takes off,” a fourth added.
“Not unless she’s really upset,” the Gnome moving bags of manure chimed in.
And on and on they went, until I wanted to shout at them to cease and demand they tell me where she was. But these were Gnomes, and I supposed I deserved everything I got.
I’d never even really taken notice of her. I’d thought she was tall, taller than me, and my vain ass had thought, meh, I could find someone shorter. She’d looked at me and glanced away, and instead of taking note of her more shy nature, to be gentle with her, I’d labeled her too timid for me and noted I could look for a bolder mate. A bolder mate? What had I been smoking?!
Thinking of Alfie’s Katarina, her shorter, bolder self, I wilted under her direct, piercing regard. Vivienne, we weren't even going to go there. Frankly, Seg’s short, feisty woman frightened me a little. My neck hurt bending to talk to Pen, Ben’s mate, who was close to Will’s height, perhaps shorter, I’d never really paid much attention to their height differences. When I looked at Aster, we were eye to eye. That thought nagged at me. We were both bold but shy in our own ways. Thinking of the kind of balls it took to do what she’d done just to sprout a love blossom, and then to present it to me? A long breath left me, blowing out noisily. It took guts. She was determined when she knew what she wanted, without flat out bulldozing. She was confidently persistent.
I’d fed the poor woman the kiddy soup I kept on hand for my friends’ kids, if ever they should pop in for a visit, and she’d just rolled along with it. That Fairy hybrid Wood Nymph, I’d been trying too hard to please that winged menace from the moment she’d sashayed up my front walk, ignored my insistence alcohol was not welcome in my home, and complained about everything from the fresh bread and pot roast I’d made to the cutlery. Her face had been too done up. My problem with makeup was how strongly it smelled to me. Who cared how pretty it looked on her if it stunk. For me, it was almost gag inducing.
Aster was… Aster was simple, understated, go with the flow. She was beyond words kind. She’d cleaned my home even after she found evidence of just what I’d been struggling with, hiding out in the house to deal with my little problem, and she’d just rolled with it. Aster was warm and understanding, and I’d taken all of that and smashed it without a thought.
Aster was pretty perfect, actually. I didn’t deserve her and I knew it. But I was going to try and win her favor.
My hands shook with only the faint smell of her scent on the love blossom anymore. I was addicted to it. I’d taken to leaving clothes and other items in the sunroom just so it would smell like that curious bloom when I was going to be out of the house. I went to bed at night with that scent stuck in my sinuses, waking up to wet dreams of a phantom female... I’d come so hard it was painful.
I needed to see Aster. I had a lot of apologizing and ass kissing to do.
“Maybe she doesn’t want to see me, but believe me, I need to see her. I’m begging you,” I barked at the red bearded Gnome desperately.
The Gnomes closest all exchanged glances.
“We don’t know if we want to tell you,” red beard said on a long sigh.
Riddles. Always with the riddles and talk arounds with Gnomes when they wanted to be difficult.
“Look,” I fairly snarled, “I fucked up. I need to fixthis,” jerking the potted blossom at them, I waved it around pointedly, “it’s a love blossom, and I’m assuming you know what that is, before it’s too late!”
“I’ll tell you, but it’ll cost you.” The only Gnome with a nametag, Daus, popped out of an office building near the entrance. I remembered him from the day we’d come here. He was the assistant manager or something, I believed Ben had said.
“Done. Whatever it is. I’ll do it,” I agreed quickly.
