The Flower Arrangement Read Free Page B

Her dad yawned and rubbed the coppery stubble on his jaw. “She was up with Bugs Bunny here at the crack of dawn. Can you make us up a fifteen-euro bouquet, please, Lara?”
    It was what he asked for every week, and Lara had already set the flowers to one side. Three deep-pink anemones with sooty centers, a single full-petaled ballet-slipper-pink Antique rose, half a dozen bluebells, a pale pink hyacinth, a spray of freckly green hellebores.
    She made a circle with her thumb and forefinger and began slotting the flowers into it, spiraling the stems so they wouldn’t break when she tied them. She watched Zoe out of the corner of her eye. The little girlstopped to gaze up at a bright pink orchid, squatted down to sniff the narcissi and stood on her toes to touch the inside-out trumpet of a calla lily with her red-mittened fingertips.
    â€œCareful there, butterfingers!” her dad warned her.
    â€œIt’s okay.” Lara smiled. “She knows not to squeeze them too hard.” She tied the bouquet with a pale green ribbon the same shade as the hellebores.
    Ciaran whistled. “Wow! That is something else. You’re a genius, do you know that? It doesn’t seem fair that you make that amazing arrangement and I take the credit for it.”
    Customers were always telling Lara that she had a gift, that nobody arranged flowers the way she did. Three years of graphic design college and seven years poring over a Pantone color chart had probably helped. The course she’d taken at the London School of Floristry had taught her the basics of conditioning and arranging. But the truth was that Lara was as amazed as anyone at how instinctive it felt, how easily it all came to her. She rarely had to think about what she was doing. Her eyes and her hands took over, weaving the flowers together, layering color and texture to create something beautiful and unique every time.
    Zoe came over to examine the bouquet. “How did you know to pick those exact flowers?”
    Lara bent down and tucked a curl back under the knitted brim of the little girl’s hat. Zoe smelled of outdoors and chocolate cereal. There were bread crumbs clinging to the front of her coat. Up close, her eyes were the pale green of myrtle leaves.
    â€œYou want to know a secret?” Lara whispered. Zoe nodded. “I don’t pick the flowers, they pick me! Now”—she stood up and held out the vase of free flowers—“let’s see which one picks you.”
    The small red mitten hovered over the vase and then settled on a bright pink gerbera. Lara folded a sheet of pale pink tissue into a fluffy froth and tied it with a snippet of pink ribbon.
    â€œWhat’s the magic word?” Ciaran asked when she had handed the flower over.
    Zoe thought for a moment, then waved the flower like a wand. “Abracadabra!” she said imperiously.
    After they’d gone, Lara stood at the counter for a long time, twisting a stray length of ribbon around one finger while her mind probed nervously at the ache in her heart the way a tongue explores a broken tooth. Seeing Zoe every week was always a blessing, but sometimes it was a cruel reminder too. Five years, she thought, staring down at the ribbon but not really seeing it. Seeing, instead, the life she and Michael could have had if things had turned out differently.
    The sadness didn’t mug her the way it had in the beginning. Then it had knocked her down every day, worked her over and left her limp and shaking. Now it could leave her alone for a week, then suddenly slide up behind her, pull and prod at her, looking for a way to drag her down.
    She forced herself to pick up the phone and make some calls, then check her emails. She swept the floor again. She moved some of the flower buckets around and organized the counter and replaced the till roll. Then, when there was nothing else to do, she dug out the squeegee mop and marched herself outside to clean the already