Winterbloom [BL]

Chapter 10: Friendship Blooming Anew

"My house is some ten minutes away by bus. I live with my grandma," and to avoid the usual, "What about your parents?" question that people tend to have but avoid then carefully slip into the conversation later, he added, "My parents work in the airline industry and fly around all the time so they're barely home. My grandma has been the one to raise me since I was around five. Uni's nearby so I've never felt the need to move out."

He was beaming. Clearly, Luan loved his grandma Anhe. Huey could relate to this sort of affection for an elderly figure. He wasn't too close to his own grandparents but he remembered that one kind lady in his neighborhood whose garden he always played in - the one he went to see from a distance as soon as he reached town after his long trip. That lady used to make him cookies and let him play all day in her yard, she was awesome!

Wait... Luan... has a grandma... who loves gardening and has a diversely planted garden...

Nah... there're probably heaps of grandmas in this town who love gardening, who am I kidding?

He simply didn't want to become confused thinking about a hundred different possibilities once again like he was last night. The chat was flowing smoothly? So be it, let's not jump to conclusions.

"I suppose we can both agree on being influenced by a grandmother figure's gardening efforts in developing our interests." Thinking about Anhe put a smile on Huey's face too. Everybody just loved her. "An aged lady was my neighbour when I lived here. She also had a huge, carefully kept garden and I would spend a lot of my time there. Pretty much whenever I was bored, I'd run there to play and she'd tell me all about her plants. Her place was sort of like... a second home."

Luan remembered that Grandma Anhe had told him about how before Luan moved in, Huey would come over regularly and give her company. He was proud of his grandmother being such an inspiring person who sparked other people's interests from her own passion. He was happy Huey seemed to recall her at least, given he had known her throughout his childhood while he and Huey only became close for... well... a few days. It would be childish to be envious of his grandmother over this matter. Luan mentally scolded himself once again.

Huey continued, "But I still wasn't specifically interested in botany back then. She'd talk about a lot of natural things like plants, animals, clouds - though I don't remember much. I guess she inspired my... how would you put it... curious nature? She made me curious about the sciences, then I found a botany textbook in my dad's collection that I..."

Luan's eyes lit up. That textbook! So he does remember!

"... that I used for comparing the structural features of plants in her yard. I suppose in the end, it was that chance encounter with a textbook that led to me being here today."

Never mind, my contributions got credited to a textbook. Didn't you bring the textbook to help annotate our scrapbook after we became friends? Luan wanted to hold his forehead and sob out of self-pity. In any case, he chose to not be petty and continue probing further for even the slightest possibility to spark some hidden flashbacks. 

"Wow, that's a pretty wholesome picture to imagine. You've probably missed her."

"I have."

"Have you... tried to see her again?" In other words, have you been to my house yet? Of course, he already knew that hadn't happened, else he would be aware.

Huey actually had gone to wander his old neighborhood as soon as he arrived in town but firstly, he had no idea how to approach her. Despite having been close to her when little, having treated her more fondly than his own grandmother, he was seeing her seventeen years later and didn't know what to say. Secondly, he saw another silhouette in the house that day and, assuming she had guests, he left. What he didn't know was that the silhouette belonged to the very man standing before him.