day lilies | cashton oneshot

day lilies

In a small flower shop at the edge of a small cleanly city, Calum Thomas Hood was tending to day lilies. The load of lilies was certainly not small, and he had spent most of the day tirelessly watering them, clipping them, and caring for their simple needs.

Wiping his brow and letting the cool afternoon breeze wash over his face, he sat on the small stone bench just outside the store, right beside the patch of bright flowers.

Breaks like these were spent sparingly, for there was still plenty to do, but they were also greatly welcomed and appreciated in the warm and relentless climate. Grabbing his water bottle from the ledge on the store window, he drank deeply before calling for his manager and old family friend, Mrs. Bridgely.

Mrs. Bridgely was a small elderly woman (not quite yet into her 60's, but with a mass of gray hair always tucked neatly into a bun) who always smell like Christmas, a soft mixture of nutmeg, pine, and those freshly baked gingerbread cookies that old people just always seem to love. That part wasn't surprising, considering she never failed to bring Calum what she called "leftovers" from her batches of cakes and cookies for her 3 grandkids. She had been kind enough to hire him for a summer job at her flower shop, The Sun's Children, and Calum was absolutely in love with it.

Weeding flowers and watering plants may not be the first thing that comes to mind when people think of masculine teenage boys, but Calum didn't mind. He's perfectly content with it, and the pay is decent enough for a short day job.

"Mrs. Bridgely! Can you come out for a sec?" Calum called, checking first to see if she was working with any customers at the moment. A quick glance around the humble interior of the store showed there was only a young woman rummaging through the seed stores and an elderly man testing the edges of some new shears.

Retying his green dirt stained apron, he wiped his hands on the rough worn fabric and waited patiently for her to hobble out. Poor lady- she's got an awful amount of arthritis for someone her age. Despite that, she walked out of the tinkling door with a wide smile on her face and that kind spark in her eye that was the very thing that encouraged Calum to ask for the job in the first place.

Leaning on the frame of the door, she nudged the wooden door stopper into place with her shoe and shakily pushed it into place. Taking a moment to tuck some seeds into her flowery gardening apron, she looked up at him (he was very tall, around 6ft, towering to Mrs. Bridgley's 5'3) and asked in her honey warm voice, "What do you need, dear? Is it a drink? I have some sweet tea in the back if you need." She smiled again, prepared to walk laboriously back just to fetch a cool cup of tea for the sweet boy who always managed to cheer her with his cheeky grins and polite small talk.

He raised his blue tinted water bottle, "Thank you, Mrs. Bridgeley, but I've got some water here." He grinned and gestured to a little lump of red flowers, smaller and fewer than the others. "I was just wondering wether I should drive out later and pick up some more of these kinds of day lilies. They seem to be pretty popular." He laughed, a little shy and embarrassed, and the older lady had no trouble at all figuring out why.

Calum, being the kind and sociable young man he was, never failed to strike up a conversation with the other curious young people visiting their quiet flower shop at the end of a long street of Starbucks', bars, tattoo parlors, and other fairly bigger businesses. Mrs. Bridgely would look out of the clear glass window to see a girl asking around, looking for this or that, and Calum would tell them all about the different flowers he cared for, pointing out a particular bunch of red star shaped day lilies that he always considered his favorite.

She guessed a lot of girls bought the flowers at his recommendation. Or rather, his charm.

It was strange, the boy wasn't usually very flirtatious, and watching him converse with the girls his age didn't look any different than him politely asking Mrs. Bridgely herself how her day went. She supposed he was just courteous and not actually very interested in having a girlfriend. Or maybe he had one already, and Mrs. Bridgely just wasn't as watchful of the boy as she'd thought.