Thirty-five
Rolling a fern frond between my fingertips, I analyze the vase of white roses, red dahlias, and yellow daisies I’ve been working on for half an hour. The fluff factor is off, and for whatever reason, the daisies and the dahlias aren’t smelling right together, but Liz won’t let me give up.
“Hmm,” she says from behind me, cocking her head to the side just like Sam does whenever he’s deep in thought. “Maybe some lavender? I think the purple would soften the red tones and bring the daisy scent down a notch. They smell stronger than normal, don’t you think? Or you could try a few sprigs of eucalyptus?”
I wrinkle my nose. Eucalyptus branches, Liz’s latest addition to the shop, haven’t been selling nearly as well as she’d hoped. “I know you’re trying to get rid of it, but I don’t think Mr. Harrison wants to give his wife a bouquet that smells like cough drops. Maybe if we get an order from the retirement home or if someone calls with a cold…”
Liz sighs. “You’re probably right. I just hate the thought of it going to waste, you know? Maybe we should donate it all to the hospital. There’s bound to be someone with a respiratory infection who could use a little cheering up.”
At least she didn’t offer them to me. I’ve turned down the last three buckets of wilting flowers she tried to pawn off after realizing James would want to know where they came from. While I could’ve explained away daisies or roses as something I picked on a walk, branches that had to be shipped up from central California wouldn’t be as easy.
The argument with James is still bugging me. Twice, I’ve turned to Liz with questions on the tip of my tongue, and twice I’ve turned away. Her offer to talk is a lifeline I’m afraid to use, no matter how desperate I am for her advice. What if I say too much? Or what if she figures out what I’m hiding and calls the police?
I decide to approach what I want to know from the other direction. Threading two lavender stems into the arrangement, I say, “Sam doesn’t talk about his uncles much. Do they ever come visit?”
Her amused snort isn’t at all what I expect. “Oh, they visit all the time. Too much, if you ask me. Sam probably doesn’t talk about them because he and my brothers butt heads. They never thought Joe was good enough for me, which irritates Sam, and Sam reminds them of Joe, which irritates them. It’s a lose-lose situation.”
“That’s awful,” I say. Even if James doesn’t approve of me dating, he and Sam have been best friends for years. That has to count for something. “Why didn’t they think Joe was good enough for you?”
“You know, I don’t think anyone would’ve been good enough in my brothers’ eyes. Danny and Michael used to beat up all the boys who asked me out in high school, but Joe was persistent. The day he took down both of my brothers in front of half the school was the day I knew I’d marry him.” She smiles wistfully and turns the diamond ring on her finger. “We were only sophomores and my brothers were both upperclassmen. No one bothered Joe after that.”
Now I know where Sam gets it. “They didn’t try to stop you from marrying him?”
“They tried.” She laughs, but the disappointment hidden beneath the sound speaks louder. “Neither of my brothers came to the wedding. Joe enlisted in the Army, so we had to put it together really fast. They assumed it was a shotgun wedding, but I didn’t get pregnant with Sam until a couple weeks later. Not that they’d listen.
“Now that he’s gone, Danny calls on Mondays, Wednesdays, and Fridays, and Michael calls on the weekends. They’ve been pushing me to move back to Sacramento where we all grew up, but Sam’s life is here. His memories are here.” She gives me a sad smile. “You’re here. I can’t take that away from him.”
“Maybe you can move when Sam goes to UCLA?”
“Maybe.” Turning back to her arrangement, she shrugs. “We have a pretty big family down there, so at least Danny and Michael wouldn’t get away with bossing me around as much. Our parents thought it was cute when we were growing up, but now… not so much. They loved Joe and think Sam is the greatest grandkid ever. Even if they hardly see him.”
The touch of sadness to her voice reminds me of what she’ll be losing when we leave. I can’t help but wonder if she knows how responsible he feels for watching over her.
“Sam’s afraid to leave you, I think,” I say after an uncomfortable silence. “He knows he reminds you of your husband, and more than anything, I think he wants to be the man of the house like his dad wanted.”
Liz sighs. “I love my son, but he is just like his father and his uncles—stubborn and overprotective. He means well, I know he does, but Sam needs to make his own life and his own memories. That’s what his father would want.”
What would it feel like to have parents like Sam’s who wanted the best for me, no matter what it cost them? The closest thing I have to a parent is James, and he’d rather keep me locked up in our bedroom where he can keep an eye on me than let me live my own life. Sure, I told him not to fight, but only because we’ve both seen what fighting for money did to our father.
Jabbing the fern frond right into the center of the bouquet, I try and fail to rein in my irritation. Figuring out what to do with my mess of a life is hard enough without having my brother trying to control everything. If he gets his way, we’ll still be living in a cheap apartment on the crap side of town when we’re fifty. He’ll still be at the mill and I’ll still be sneaking out to work with Liz, putting together crappy arrangements no one will ever buy. Sam will be married to some rich movie star in California and won’t even remember the scarred high school girl he dated for a couple months back when—
“Sarah, don’t let those boys run your life.”
I jump, nearly dropping the water spritzer I was about to mist the failed arrangement with. Liz pushes away from the counter she’s been leaning against, arms folded as she watched me make a mess of her precious flowers, and walks over to my workstation. Before I can come up with an excuse for why I’ve destroyed Mr. Harrison’s twenty-fifth anniversary arrangement, she holds up a hand.
“I know my son and I know your brother, so don’t even try to deny it. If Joe’s death taught me anything, it’s that life’s too short to let someone else control you.”
She takes the spritzer bottle out of my hands and studies the bouquet, head cocked to the side again. “If I’d listened to my brothers instead of my heart, I never would’ve gone out with Joe. I certainly never would’ve married him, and Sam never would’ve been born. No matter how much they badgered me over the years, I can’t bring myself to call anything that resulted in the birth of my son a mistake. Something tells me you’ll agree.”
She picks up the six fern fronds I’d been debating on adding and weaves them into the bouquet, framing the one I jammed into the middle.
“There,” she says and steps back. “It’s pretty, don’t you think?”
I nod and stare at the finished bouquet, standing perfectly fluffed and balanced on the table in front of us. It’s one of the prettiest bouquets I’ve ever seen.
Liz puts the spritzer back in my hand and gives my fingers a squeeze. “Your instincts are better than you think, Sarah. Maybe it’s time you start paying attention to what they say.”