New Flowers

Camellias and Lavender

"So someone left flowers on your desk, is that right?"

Jon sighed in impatience. Sometimes Elias seemed so... infuriating. Like he thought he was superior and had to teach everyone around him how to behave like an adult. It was tiring. "Yes, and since we're the Magnus Institute, it's quite worrying. I mean, one look at Artefact Storage could tell you that. I did a bit of research, but they don't appear to be harmful to humans, but they can be to animals. Perhaps someone was attempting to cause me stress by causing an animal stress, though it does seem quite far-fetched, seeing as animals don't exactly come into my office, where the gardenias were placed. That left me to believe they were a message of some type, so I decided to look up common codes using flor--."

"You're grasping at straws, Jon," Elias interrupted. "I have a donor party to plan, and plenty of files to go over. I would certainly appreciate it if you could leave it be? On another note, I left paperwork on your desk, I would appreciate it if you could fill it out, preferably sooner rather than later. Have a... nice day." With that, Elias shut the door to his office, leaving Jon in the hallway without answers.

Tim wasn't any help either. When Jon questioned him about the gardenias, he made strange contortions in his eyebrows and a ridiculous face, spouting nonsense about "thirstiness for Jonathan Sims," or something along those lines. Then he promptly refused to answer any further questions.

Eventually, Jon decided he wasn't going to find an answer through research, and if there was a message for him, whoever had sent it would follow up later with something more detailed. While they were beautiful in his office, they became a source of paranoia and annoyance. Whenever Tim came into his office, he'd wink and ask "Did you figure out who those flowers were from, boss?" or "So how's that development going? Any updates on the love life of Jonathan Sims? C'mon, gimme the details." It was confusing, but Tim always was, so Jon learned to ignore it over time.

Martin always acted strangely around the flowers as well. He'd stare at them with some emotion Jon couldn't decipher, then intensely ignore them the rest of the time. He almost seemed embarrassed. Jon didn't bring it up, neither did he. Eventually, the flowers became normal, and Tim stopped pestering him. They were just another addition to the strange archives, and when everyone was surrounded by monsters and tomes and tape recorders, a vase of flowers didn't seem like something to focus on.

The flowers died thirteen days later. They'd been wilting for two days. When the leaves started losing their pristine white tablecloth folds, Jon took off the damaged petals and put them in a plastic bottle. When they started to mold and yellow growths started to sprout on the decomposing leaves, he threw the flowers out, along with the bottle of petals and whatever had decided to grow in their remains. He saw Martin staring at the bin where he'd thrown out the dead flowers, wistful. Jon decided not to think about it.

He then left the building, packing up a briefcase of work he'd do that night during his meal. The vase sat on his desk in the dark rooms of the Magnus Institute at nighttime.

When Jon returned the next morning, a blooming bouquet rested in the vase on the desk. Instead of the formal white gardenias, they were a vibrant dancer's costume, a flower spun from spiderwebs, the blossoming sight of a sunny paper napkin. Yellow peonies, surrounded with yellow acacia which was assorted messily yet professionally around the blooms, like cherry blossoms of brushed out yarn. A sight, indeed.

Jon almost started to research if they were toxic. But if there were toxic flowers being delivered to him, then why didn't the last ones cause damage? Besides, who would actually care enough to hurt him? Jon pushed past his worry, trying to focus on the present. The flowers were breathtaking, and Jon reached out to brush his fingers across the silken texture of their petals.

Elias didn't care about the flowers in the slightest. Tim made a big deal at first, then punctually abandoned the newest archive gossip as soon as the topic changed. Martin was blushing again whenever he came into the room, but Jon didn't press him on it.

They were a welcome distraction to his statements. They seemed to make the air clearer, and bring some life to the room when Jon felt like he'd sucked the life out of it and worked himself into exhaustion. The flowers were a spirited element of his office, which he grew accustomed to, and even started to appreciate. The peonies and acacia started to wilt, and one night they were removed from his office and replaced with a mass of forget-me-nots.

There was now a circular mark left behind on Jon's desk from the vase. He didn't mind. Having some form of life in his office that didn't get tired and strained and afraid like people did but still gave off an aura of "you aren't alone" was serene. The mark of the vase on his desk was worth it.

Jon was curious about the origins of the vase and its frequently replaced contents, but he didn't question them. His paranoia on them faded to a blur in the back of his head as he brought his finger to the edge of a camellia that had shown up in the vase this morning alongside a bundle of lavender. It looked like expert piping work on a decorative cake.

Martin showed up and asked him if he'd like some tea, and brought him a cup of chai. He smelled like lavender. Jon didn't make the connection.

--

This chapter has been edited. Again, not many things I changed, just the sentence format and a few timeline changes to make sure Jon isn't in the know about something he hasn't learned yet in the canon storyline.
Thank you so much for your reviews and for reading up to this point! I appreciate every single one of you. Have a wonderful day! :)

--Fanaticit