Page 2 of Sweet Love From Saturn

An hour and a half later, my work truck was loaded and I was pulling onto the busy streets of downtown Pleasant Springs. My heart was racing and I had to take deep breaths to keep my anxiety under control. Being on time and sticking to aschedule was how I operated May’s Flowers, so being half an hour behind on deliveries was driving me crazy. Thankfully, no one complained about the delay. Letting out a sigh of relief, I pulled into the driveway of my last delivery and took my seat belt off. This arrangement was the biggest and heaviest of them all. The customer didn’t leave a note stating the occasion, but two hundred red and white roses were secured in my arms as I walked toward the front porch.

The door swung open right before I reached the top step and a man that I didn’t get to admire for long stepped out.

“Hello. Sorry about the late delivery. I put a ten percent off coupon on top of the bouquet,” I rambled.

“I’m sorry, Miss, but you have the wrong house. I didn’t order any flowers.” His deep voice penetrated my ears.

Setting the flowers on the top step, I dug into my apron to get the receipt. I looked up to read the white numbers on the home and I was correct. This was the address.

“This is 435 Wishing Well Drive, correct?”

“That’s correct, but I didn’t order these,” he countered with a finger pointed toward the roses.

“Maybe someone ordered them for you. I don’t know. All I know is this is the right address.”

“Miss, please take your roses and get off my porch. I’m telling you they aren’t mine. Clearly the address was mixed up somehow.”

“A mistake like that wouldn’t happen. There’s only one Wishing Well Drive in the city of Pleasant Springs.”

Not wanting to hear anymore, I picked the vase up and continued toward the handsome stranger. I’d been delivering for the last few years and a mistake like this had never happened. I could understand him not thinking the roses were his because he didn’t order them, but obviously someone ordered them for him. Everything happened so fast, I barely registered when this manknocked the roses to the ground. The sound of glass shattering and all the roses laid out at my feet were the only indicator that this shit had really happened. That was it. The tears streaming down my face were a contradiction of the laughter that followed. Defeat had overtaken me and that was the moment I lost my balance.

TWO

Mccoy Davenport

“Oh shit! Are you okay, Miss? I didn’t mean to do that shit,” I said in a panic.

Before the florist’s body could hit the ground, I sprang into action and caught her in my arms. I wasn’t trying to be an asshole about the roses, but they weren’t mine. I hadn’t placed an order and I knew good and well no one even knew my address to send me anything. Knocking the vase from her hand wasn’t intentional. I’d admit I’d become irritated at the back and forth, but disrespecting a woman wasn’t the type of man I was. Her sobs were inaudible but from the rise and fall of her back, I knew she was still crying. I had a feeling it wasn’t the broken vase that caused her despair. The pain I felt radiating was more of an “I give up”type of hurt. This cry was long overdue. All I had done was put the icing on the cake.

Deep in my own thoughts, I almost missed the beautiful face that stared back at me once we made eye contact. When I first laid eyes on her, my sole focus was the damn roses. Now that she didn’t have a big ass bouquet in front of her, I was able to appreciate her somewhat rare beauty. I knew Black people came in all different forms, but a Black person with freckleswasn’t something you saw often. Those freckles were laid against perfectly sun kissed golden brown skin. Her top lip had a dent so deep that it gave her mouth the perfect bow shape. To top it all off, long curls the color of ginger jutted freely in all directions from the top of her head. Here I was, not even knowing this woman’s name and she had me in awe.

“I’m sorry. This is so unprofessional of me,” Pretty said, standing back to her feet.

“I’m the one who should be apologizing. I never meant to knock the vase from your hands. My bad for that. I was only trying to do the right thing by not accepting them. I would hate to take something meant for someone else.”

“No need for an apology.”

When she bent down to pick up the broken pieces of glass, I put an end to it before she cut herself.

“I’ll clean it up; don’t worry about that.”

Standing back to her full height, Pretty looked at me before running her hands down the front of her purple apron. Right when I was about to invite her inside, she took off in a haste to her vehicle. Before she could back out of the driveway, my eye caught the sign stuck to the driver side door.

“May’s Flowers,” I said aloud, not knowing why I even cared.

I let out a breath before stepping back inside. My living room was the only room in the house presentable right now. Yesterday, the couch I ordered almost a month ago had finally gotten delivered. I wasn’t big on décor, but my mother helped me get a few pieces that would liven up the living space without it being too much. Today, my homeboy from back home would be here to help with the rest of my furniture. I was born and raised in Gwendal, Illinois, which was the opposite of Pleasant Springs. Gwendal was a big city with fast-paced living. Heavy traffic and congested living areas were what I grew up seeing.There was always something to do or a new club opening downtown.

Moving to a smaller city with a slower pace was something I’d been wanting to do for a while now. I was getting older and city living didn’t excite me how it used to. When my ex-fiancé and I decided to part ways, it felt like the perfect time to leave. I was only two hours from Gwendal, but that was far enough for my peace of mind. After retrieving the broom and dustpan, I headed back out and swept the glass and roses from the porch. There were so many long-stemmed roses that I felt bad for throwing them in the trash. When a purple card with glitter shimmered beneath a piece of glass, I recalled the pretty lady saying she put a coupon in the bouquet for the late delivery. Carefully, I picked it up and glanced at the front and back, satisfied that there was an address and phone number.

Going down to the shop to pay for the roses crossed my mind and felt like the right thing to do. After all, this shit was my fault. After emptying the dustpan in the dumpster, I went back inside and grabbed my phone. There were two missed calls from my best friend Justin. Right as I went to call him back, I heard the soft roar of an engine pulling into my driveway. I wasn’t sure if the walls of the house were thin or if the neighborhood was just that damn quiet that I heard everything around me. That was the reason I had been on the porch before the florist could ring the bell.

“What’s up, bruh? I called you a few times because I couldn’t remember the address. All I remembered was the street name and I wasn’t sure if I was coming down the right way,” Justin said as he closed the door to his brand-new Venus 7.

“My bad, man. I wasn’t by my phone. I had to sweep some glass off the porch.”

“Damn, what the hell you break?”

As we walked into the house, I filled Justin in on the brief encounter.

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