Flowers and You

A Story by Ceara

Anthy takes up gardening.

Five months after Anthea settles into the apartment with Alias, she takes up gardening.

It starts off simply, in a way that Alias barely remembers. In their tiny shared space of cramped cupboards and a few beaten chairs, a mason jar with a flower suddenly appears. It rests on a small windowsill, gleaning light through the dirty glass. Alias is surprised when he meets it one morning while brushing his teeth, a single spot of color in their whitewashed bathroom. It's just a daisy, with thin yellow petals spiraling around a fuzzy black center; a simple, tiny bloom half drowning in the much larger glass jar. However, after he rinses his mouth and puts his toothbrush away, Alias fishes the flower out of the glass and uses its leaves to balance it on the rim, so it doesn't fall in. He thinks it'll probably live longer this way.

When he asks his roommate about it, the blonde turns pink, muttering something about liking the color yellow. She changes the subject to dinner; specifically, that it was his turn to cook (it was always his turn) and that she wanted rice and chicken for dinner. He tries to tease her about it later, lightly joking that some boy must have given it to her, and how jealous he was, but after a hard smack with her pillow to his face, he decides to leave the flower alone for now. He's more curious about the shade of red her cheeks had taken, or the way her cornflower blue eyes avoided his for the rest of the night.

He hates this flower, he decides, as he watches the smaller girl stand on her tiptoes to try to grab the jar so she can replace the water. However, that doesn't stop him from pouring water into the jar whenever it's low and she's not around. He even gets used to greeting it in the morning, a quiet exchange between a boy and a flower.

It lasts a long time, but flowers without roots can't last forever. A few days after he notices the wilting bloom was starting to lose its sun-yellow petals, the flower and jar is gone. The windowsill looks strange and barren without it. Anthy acts normally, but Alias knows by the way her eyes linger on the empty spot that she's saddened that the flower is gone.

He briefly considers buying her flowers. He has enough money to fill their home with flowers of all kinds, to drown her in all the roses and orchids she could ever want. He almost does it. It would probably embarrass and annoy the girl, and the idea of seeing her flushed face is almost worth the certain pain that would come after teasing her in such a way. Anthy was nothing short of beautiful in Alias's eyes, but when she was anxiously twisting her braids between her fingers, with that glowing face and adorably angry pout on her face, Anthea Seaburg was devastatingly precious.

The sight of the empty sill is what stops him. That flower had been something special to Anthy, to the point that she wouldn't even tell him about it. It felt like the flower had bloomed from the gap between them, and all the flowers in the world couldn't fill that space. As he finds the glass shards of the old jar in the trash later, he wonders it had been more of a barrier, or a bridge.

One day, there is a pot on the window. The reddish color has almost the same effect as a shout in the pale room, and as he peeks inside, he spots a tiny green sprout in the dark soil. It's a surprising little thing, pale and spiky. He pours a little water in it, and wonders where it came from. Anthy doesn't say anything about it, and he isn't quite sure he wants to ask about it. He thinks about Anthy and flowers, gifts and their attractive coworkers, the ones that don't have to sneak in the dark and decode endless piles of gibberish text at two in the morning. He glares at the friendly blonds, the charming brunettes and the trying-to-be-mysterious dark haired ones that seem to drift around his partner. He's not even aware that he's doing so, until Anthy brings him a drink and asks if he's been getting enough sleep.

Time passes, enough that the spiky little green tuft shoots up towards their ceiling, bearing tiny little bell shaped flowers with dusty purple coloring. He can't decide if he likes this one of not, as it seems to be constantly thirsty compared to the daisy, and it smells like a truckload of honey. He decides he likes it after all when he catches a bee bouncing off the screen when he opens the window to let the room air out a bit. He likes it even more when Anthy pesters him to take her to the library, so she can get a book on how to take better care of it.

Apparently, the book had taught more than caring for just the blue-purple flowers, and soon, their bathroom in a tangle of green, scattered with purples and pinks, blues and whites. The sill is crammed with plants, the bluish purple plants (Spanish Bluebells, Anthy tells him sternly one day) now sharing a home with a vibrant pink plant with spade shaped leaves (African Violets, he's told later) and a trailing....b flower...Begonias, he thinks. He can't tell the difference between a Bromeliad and a Dracaena, and forget trying to pronounce her beloved Kalanchoes--he's going to keep calling them those-tiny-pink-flowers-in-the-ugly-orange-pot-over-there.

For some reason, she also keeps moving them around the apartment, like a fussy mother with unruly children. Sometimes he finds her plants on the kitchen counter, he found one "resting" in their small closet earlier. Eventually, he learns a little more--all plants need water and sun, but not all the time. Don't water the leaves on this one, and this one needs a little more fertilizer...he starts to look forward to the times when the tiny blonde talks about her flowers and tries to explain it all to him. She's passionate and proud of her little blooms, and sometimes, when she falls asleep reading more about them, he's happy to let her rest against him and use him as her pillow. Even if she drools.

He's not sure how he likes sharing a shower with a Peace Lily, though. She might be getting a little out of control, he muses, as he drinks his coffee with a Lucky Bamboo staring at him across the little table. In fact, he notices that most of the apartment has some spot of green somewhere now, like the plants are spilling out from the bathroom. That room is most definitely the epicenter of this explosion of foliage, to the point where just opening the door would make you dizzy with all the mixed scents.

The only escape from the plants seemed to be in the bedroom, which he was starting to find a little strange. There wasn't a single plant in their shared bedroom, not one leaf or tiny pot in growing there. It wasn't like it was too small, or too dark; the closet had a few plant friends every day now, including one she swore would glow in the dark someday. He doubts she's being considerate, since she'd just used his favorite mug the other day to help transplant a sickly flower, and the room is almost neatly divided into "his side" and "her side", with the bed right in the middle. And yet it remains devoid of plants.

The biggest mystery of all was the single flower that was missing; in all the orchids, mini roses and tiny cacti swarming the place, there was no yellow-and-black daisy. In fact, there is no flower than even remotely resembling a daisy plant anywhere.

He thinks about this a little too often, and at their more dangerous job it nearly costs him his life. Anthy fights and hisses like an alleycat in hands of the man trying to capture her while Ally tries to calm her down with his usual lighthearted banter and smirks, while ignoring the cold feeling of a gun to his temple. She quiets down when she hears the click of the safety being released, and stares into his eyes, forget-me-not blue into moss green. The silent communication that flows between them is nothing new to them, sadly, neither is this situation. Anthy gently pulls on the clasp to her bracelet, the shining wire inside gleaming like dew, and the two get to work.

It's a little like using her shears to cut off wayward buds or leaves, except plants are quiet, and never this messy. Alias calls in for cleanup while Anthy sits quietly. She doesn't say a word to him, not even when they're home, not even when he turns over in bed and accidentally brushes his leg against her butt. She stays quiet the next morning, and doesn't come out of bed.

At work, at their "normal" job, he tells Maximus that she has a cold. She scolds him in place of Anthy, quoting health books and prescribing rest and a recipe for a soup she's heard does wonders for the body, and then she half-threatens him with a promise of painful things to come if he doesn't take care of her. She needs all her models fit and beautiful, and snot is not a photo-worthy accessory. He assures her that she's fine, yes, he'll make the soup, and if she doesn't recover soon, he'll take every shoot she was supposed to. It doesn't please the finicky woman, but it seems to at least buy Anthy some much needed rest time.

He picks up her favorite calzones for dinner, and when he enters their home, he almost thinks he has the wrong place. All the plants are gone. In the kitchen, on the window, in their bathroom. All gone.

The calzones go uneaten and are shoved in the fridge for later; Anthy won't even poke her head out of the covers, much less climb out of bed to eat. The house feels ghostly and eerie, almost the way it had been before Anthy. It feels like she doesn't exist at all; like he'd simply imagined the tiny blonde and all her sulking, scolding and smiling, all her cute ways. It makes him grab his coat and leave, the scent of ghostly flowers echoing in his head.

Alias isn't good with people, anymore than he is with flowers. Not really, not when it came to delicate, real stuff like this; that was Anthy's part. Without her helping him along, he has no idea how to help someone, to get them to open up and talk. His charm won't work for this.

Two days pass like this, with Alias forcing her to eat and drink. She still doesn't say much, but when he tries to help her sit up so she can drink, she glares at him with red-rimmed eyes, fresh tears brimming somewhere behind the blue. He doesn't understand that, and feels too hurt to try. He ends up snapping at her, just to try to make her say something to him, to end the quiet. He's tempted to pull her braid until she cries, to insult her mother or flat chest, anything to get her to look at him. Instead, she burrows further into her blankets, using the downy quilt to block his voice out.

He doesn't understand. He really doesn't understand.

He flees the house once more, finding bitter solace in the busy streets. He has no idea what is wrong with his partner; is she sick, or hurt in some way? Had something happened to her, like the first day she'd come here, but she was bottling it up? Did she hate him after all?

Maybe her mother called her. He thought, blowing on his hands. It's not yet fall, but tonight feels very cold to him. Alias's fingers are numb as he tries to shake warmth into them. The last time Anthy had met her mother, it had ended up bitterly, without the two women exchanging a single word.

He's nearly decided to call her handler and have her pulled out for a break when he spots something through the fogginess of his breath. A sudden idea is born as he peers through the glass, his mind feeling alive for the first time in weeks.

It might work. It might not work, but he thinks it will. He hopes it does.

~*~*~*~*~

Anthy is less than happy when she feels the chill of the evening air take the place of the dull warmth of her blanket world, shivering at the cold intrusion. She's also fed up with Ally's tricks; and his face, she can't look at his face without crying, and this time she's going to punch him so he gets the message--

Ally stands before her, blanket in one hand, red in the face as he stares down at her, chest heaving up and down rapidly. His thick dark hair is messily hanging over his eyes, which gleam a brighter green than Anthea remembers them being. It's a strangely attractive sight, since he's always so neat. Ally can be lazy, but never with how he looks; he's usually even prettier than Anthy is, especially when he pretends to be a girl. Anthy isn't sure what to make of his sudden disheveled look, any more than she is with the thing that he's thrusting in her face.

It's a little pot, glazed and painted a soft blue, but that isn't what Anthy is looking at. She's looking at the little flowers nestled instead; tiny, bright faces of miniature suns, with soft black eyes in the middle. It's a flower she'd know anywhere, and it isn't only by reflex that the smaller blond blushes.

"Wha--Where..." She tries to speak as her dark haired partner pushes the plant into her hands, wrapping her fingers carefully around the small clay pot.

"Black-eyed Susans. Not Daisies." He says finally. Anthy still isn't sure what to say, so she lets Ally continue.

"The shop person said that they'd grow really nicely in a pot. We'll probably have to get a bigger one later. He recommended a planter, since they like lots of room to spread. They like a lot of sun, like, a lot of it, so I think the best place to put them would be the sunniest window....like this one...." The male paused, alarmed by the sight of the girl's tears. "Why are you crying? You don't like it?" He starts to panic a little, assuring her he can always go get new, different flowers, or even a whole house full again.

Anthy grabs her partner before he can leave to buy the entire store, her arms wrapped fiercely around him as her face rests against his back. He feels really cold--she wonders how long he was outside. He smells a little like smoke and a little sweet, like her new flowers. "Don't leave, stupid prince." She croaks, her voice a little creaky from not talking for so long. "I like them. I love them." She gently lets go of him so she can do the polite thing and not drip snot all over her partner while she tries not to cry again. "But...why these ones?" She asks, as he turns around to look at her again.

If Anthy had ever seen Alias look embarrassed, she couldn't remember him ever looking so cute about it. He scratches the back of his head, even avoiding her eyes for a moment. "Well...you like yellow flowers, right?"

~*~*~*~

A little while later, the two are in bed together as the sun warms them through the curtain, making a cozy and lazy feeling. They aren't doing anything other than simply touching and breathing; Anthy's head is laying against his side, and their legs are tangled while their hands are locked together. It isn't often that things are this peaceful, and both are happy to just stay there, soaking up the lax warmth of the room. Anthy's happy to just have Ally safe and alive in her arms; she tells him so, and explains why she's been so cold to him.

"Every time I looked at you, I could see that gun pressed against your face. I couldn't bear it if..." She trailed off, pressing her face into his shirt as he chuckled.

"I almost die all the time."

"This was different!" Anthy protested, kicking his foot with a pout.

The two were silent again for a while, before Alias broke the silence, idly playing with her hair.

"The first flower....where'd that come from?" Anthy scowled as she tried to hide her face again, much to Ally's amusement. She mumbled something he couldn't hear, so he turned over and tickled her until she kicked him again, red from both her bashfulness and the tickling.

"I said it was from you, stupid prince!" Alias is pretty surprised, since he can't remember doing so, but a little more prodding gets Anthy to elaborate. "We were doing a shoot, and you put this flower in my hair, and...and it was so pretty, so I took it home. No other reason than that!" She insisted, turning pink again. Ally decides that he really liked that flower, after all.

"What about the pot? Did you buy it?"

"Sasha gave it to me. After the Susan died, the window just looked so lonely..."

Ally also decides he'll buy everyone coffee later. For no reason in particular.

He's getting a little sleepy, relaxed by the warmth and the gentle scent of Anthy next time him. Ally mumbles the next question, fighting back a yawn. "S'yellow really your favorite color?"

Anthy moves so she's resting on her elbows, looking at his long lashes and and running a finger along the curve of his jaw.

"Maybe." She says, watching the shade of the deepest jade peer at her from sleep-heavy eyes. No plant had ever carried a shade so lovely, a color so rich, it sings of life.

"I've come to really like green." She smiles as she leans over him, and gently covers his mouth with a soft kiss.