Oscar lived a quiet life in a little flat above a flower shop in Bristol. The shop belonged to his parents, who had long retired to Cornwall, leaving him in charge. At 32, Oscar’s routine was painfully predictable: open the shop, arrange bouquets, chat with Mrs. Willows (the elderly customer who never actually bought anything), and close up by 6 PM to retreat to his flat for microwave dinners and reruns of Doctor Who.
He wasn’t unhappy, but he wasn’t happy either.
Everything changed one Tuesday when Amelia burst into his shop, dripping wet from the rain, holding a broken umbrella. She looked frantic, her cheeks flushed, her eyes darting around like a cornered animal.
“I need flowers!” she blurted.
“Well, you’ve come to the right place,” Oscar replied with a nervous chuckle.
“No, I mean perfect flowers—something that screams ‘I’m sorry I left you at the altar.’”
Oscar blinked. “That’s… specific.”
Amelia explained—her voice trembling but confident—that two years ago, she’d left her fiancé, Daniel, waiting at a church in London. It wasn’t because she didn’t love him; it was because she was terrified of being ordinary. She’d run off to Paris to “find herself” and realized too late that Daniel was the most extraordinary thing she’d ever known. Now, she was back to win him over.
Oscar, who had never left Bristol, couldn’t imagine leaving someone behind like that. But he also couldn’t imagine the courage it took to try and fix such a mess. Against his better judgment, he stayed past closing to craft a bouquet that Amelia described as “apologetic but hopeful.”
“Add sunflowers,” she insisted. “He used to call me his sunflower because I always turned toward the light.”
By the time she left, Oscar felt a strange pang of jealousy toward a man he’d never met.
Over the next few weeks, Amelia became a regular. She claimed Daniel hadn’t responded to her texts or calls, so she was trying a “floral assault” instead—sending him a different bouquet every week. Oscar would listen to her stories about their past, smiling politely while secretly wishing she’d stay longer.
One day, after helping her pick out hydrangeas, she hesitated at the door.
“Why don’t you ever ask about me?” she said suddenly.
Oscar blinked. “I—I mean, you talk about Daniel a lot…”
“But what about what you want to know? You’re always so quiet, like you’re hiding behind those flowers.”
He stammered, his ears burning. “I—uh—I’m not good at asking questions.”
“Then just tell me something about you,” she said, leaning on the counter.
He told her about his parents, his predictable life, and how he sometimes felt like a background character in everyone else’s story. She laughed—not at him, but at the sheer honesty of it—and said, “You’re not a background character. You just haven’t met the right plot twist yet.”
For the first time in years, Oscar felt seen.
Then, just as quickly as she had entered his life, Amelia disappeared. Weeks passed without a single bouquet order. He tried to convince himself it was for the best, that she’d probably reconciled with Daniel, and that he should be happy for her. But he wasn’t.
One rainy evening, Oscar was closing up when Amelia appeared in the doorway, holding a drenched bouquet of sunflowers.
“I didn’t go to Daniel,” she said softly.
Oscar froze. “What?”
“I realized I wasn’t trying to fix things with him. I was trying to fix things with myself. And somewhere along the way, I started looking forward to our conversations more than his texts. You’re… different, Oscar. Quiet, but not invisible. And I think I might’ve fallen for you.”
He stared at her, his heart pounding like the rain outside. “But I’m not extraordinary.”
She stepped closer, holding out the ruined sunflowers. “You don’t have to be extraordinary. You just have to be mine.”
For the first time in his life, Oscar took a risk. He reached out, took the flowers, and kissed her—right there in the middle of the shop, with Mrs. Willows peering through the window and the rain clapping in applause.
It wasn’t extraordinary. But it was perfect.
Comments
Post a Comment