Page 18 of Late Bloomer
“I’ve always known you were selfish, Pepper, but I didn’t know you were cruel.” The exaggerated southern accent takes some of the sting out of the words, but not much. “One day you’ll have to thaw that frozen heart of yours, and when you do, I hope you call me. I want a relationship with you.”
Trish hangs up, and I sit there, staring at the tiny sprouts of weeds at the base of my narcissus plants, hitting the corner of my phone against my forehead.
Do. Not. Cry, I will with every tap. That woman doesn’t deserve my tears. Trish has never done anything to stop them before; she certainly isn’t going to do anything about them now.
Eventually, I move on hands and knees to the weeds, plucking them out, scanning the bed for any other intruders before I pull myself up and make my way down the row in the inky darkness toward the cabin. I’m shocked absolutely shitless to find the world’s most unwelcome bearer of bad news standing at the end.
“I… I demand you tell me what’s happening.” Opal says,putting her hands on her softly curved hips and squaring her shoulders, standing her full height of what couldn’t be more than five foot two. I loom over her by a solid nine inches.
It’s a bit difficult to take Opal’s demand seriously, with her big scared eyes and messy hair and full, rosy cheeks. The woman is, unfortunately, rather cute. Which makes the massive upheaval she’s caused in my life all the more disarming. And annoying.
So very fucking annoying.
“Fine,” I say, slipping around her and trudging toward the porch. “You want to know what’s happening? I’ll tell you. Trish—the nice lady who sold you this place for a song?—she’s my mother. And a massive con artist. Tragically for me, this is apparently the one time she’s done something with the law on her side, which puts me in the super-fun position of being homeless. And I guess jobless since you want to turn this flower farm into some sort of shoe factory like a pink-haired Keebler elf. Does that paint a clear enough picture for you?” I turn on Opal, towering over her. I know I’m not supposed to shoot the messenger, but I’m certainly not above yelling at one.
Opal is silent for a moment, then swallows. “Don’t Keebler elves make cookies?” she whispers.
The anger that floods through me is hot enough to send this entire farm up in flames.
“Sorry. Sorry,” Opal rushes out. “I imagine now isn’t the right time for elf semantics.”
“How much did you pay for it?” I know—from endless studying of interactions between neurotypicals—that talkingabout money is rude. But I’m beyond forcing myself into social niceties when my entire world is falling apart.
Opal blinks those wide blue eyes. “I… uh… th-three. Three hundred. Thousand. Three hundred thousand dollars.”
That amount of money is so inconceivably large that I, not for the first time that evening, feel like I might collapse. My knees give out, and I plop down onto the top step of the porch.
“Let me get this straight,” I say through a rough throat. “You paid three hundredthousanddollars, in cash, for a flower farm on the verge of bankruptcy that you’ve never even set foot on before?”
“I… I paid with a check,” Opal whispers, like it makes any fucking difference to how absolutely bonkers the whole thing is.
“What am I going to do?” I mumble to myself, voice cracking as overwhelming thoughts clog up my brain. “Like, seriously. If I lose this place, I have…”
Nothing.
If I lose the Thistle and Bloom, I have nothing. No purpose. No safe space. No shelter filled with the happiest moments of my life. I’d once again be a lost buoy in the endless ocean of life. Directionless. Untethered. Alone.
“Stay with me.” Opal’s words are loud. A bit startling. I’m coming to realize that everything about her is startling, though.
“What?” I say, turning to look at her.
Opal clears her throat, eyes fixed on my face. “Stay here with me. Or, uh, I stay with you. Or, um, I guess we staytogether? In the cabin?” Opal’s hand flaps wildly toward the front door.
My mind goes blank. There is no way I can live with this strange woman with wild hair and an alarming amount of shoes who bought property off Facebook Marketplace without some sort of homicide situation.
“Inconceivable,” I eventually press out.
Opal giggles.Giggles. At a time like this? The woman is nothing but a compact, pink-haired monster.
“I’ve never heard someone say that word without doing thePrincess Bridevoice.” Opal giggles even harder. The homicide might come sooner than I anticipated. “But seriously,” Opal continues, trying and failing to gulp down her remaining laughs. “I think it’s the best solution to our problem.”
“Does it really solve anything?” I snap, looking at Opal, tracing the sincerity of her eyes, the kind softness to her dimpled smile.
She chews on the question, full lips puckering and a small furrow forming between her eyebrows. “I think…” she says slowly, carefully, “it solves enough for tonight. And tomorrow we can figure out the rest.”
I continue to stare at her, heart wary and exhausted, everything in me screaming that Opal can’t be trusted. No one can be trusted. Especially someone associated with Trish. But my oversaturated brain isn’t able to come up with any alternatives, and all I really want is to put on my softest pajamas, curl up under my quilts, and wake up tomorrow morning to find this was all an awful dream.
“Okay,” I say at last, standing up. “We’ll leave the rest for the morning.” I walk to the door, Opal’s boots clunking up the porch steps behind me. I hold open the screen door for her, but she hesitates.
