Chapter 17 Esme
ESME
The next morning, I threw myself into work. Trevor was curled in his bed behind the counter, his chin on his paws, watching me with the patient resignation of a dog who had accepted he could not make his mistress smile.
Mid-morning, a man arrived with a golden retriever trotting in behind him on a leash, tail wagging, immediately interested in Trevor.
Trevor raised his head and let him approach.
They touched noses, sniffing each other.
The visiting retriever’s tail went into overdrive.
Trevor’s moved once, politely, then he lay back down.
The friendly dog plopped down next to him anyway.
“Charlie, mind your manners,” the man said, tugging the leash gently. “Sorry about that. He thinks everyone is his best friend.”
“Trevor’s the same way,” I said. “He’s just quieter about it. Can I help you with something? I’m Esme, the owner.”
“Nice to meet you. I’m Arthur. I’d like to send flowers to someone. A thank-you arrangement.” He looked around the shop. “I’m not sure what’s appropriate. I’ve never sent flowers to a young man before.”
“What’s the occasion?”
“He saved my life,” Arthur said. “I got caught in a rip current down by the point. Wave came out of nowhere and swept Charlie and me out to sea. This young fellow—surfer, strong guy—came out of nowhere. Got me and Charlie to shore. I could barely breathe. He stayed with me until I was all right. Made sure Charlie and I got up to my car.”
My hands stilled on the stems I’d been trimming. “A surfer?”
“Runs the surf shop down on the beach. Grady Nash. You probably know him—small town like this.”
I set down my scissors. “I know him. He’s a good friend of mine.”
“Ah, then, you know what a good man he is. Humble too. Wouldn’t take anything from me afterward—no money, no dinner, nothing.
Said it was just what you do.” He shook his head.
“But it wasn’t just what you do. Most people would have called for help and stayed on the sand.
He went in. That water was rough and cold.
He risked himself for a stranger and his dog.
I’ve wanted to do something for him but couldn’t think of what, and my daughter finally said, just send the man some flowers, Dad. ”
I stood behind my counter and felt something press against the wall of anger I’d spent the last two days building.
Grady had saved this man’s life. He’d pulled him out of the ocean and walked him to his car and never mentioned it.
He’d done it because it was the right thing to do, and then he’d gone on with his day.
That was who he was. Under the secret identity and the inheritance and all the things he’d hidden, this was his true character.
A man who went into rough water for a stranger.
“What kind of flowers does he like?” Arthur asked.
The question caught me off guard. In three years, I’d never sent Grady flowers.
He’d spent hundreds of hours in this shop helping and not once had I made an arrangement for him.
I’d never even asked him what his favorite flower was.
Maybe if I had, he would have been more likely to share his shame, his past. Who he really was.
“I’ll put something together,” I said, my voice not quite steady. “Something bright. He loves bold colors.”
“I trust your judgment.”
“Do you want it delivered?” I asked.
“No, I can take it to him in person,” Arthur said. “Leave it on the porch.”
“Give me thirty minutes and I’ll have it ready for you.”
“Wonderful. Charlie and I will head to the store and come back in a bit.”
The moment they were gone, I made the arrangement. Birds of paradise for boldness. Orange dahlias for warmth. Greenery for freshness.
What was I doing? Pushing Grady away when he needed me most? I’d thought of myself as such a giving, sensitive friend but maybe I was just selfish, taking and taking from Grady without giving back. And he was the kind of person who jumped into treacherous water to save a stranger.
I had to fix this.
Around midnight, after tossing and turning, thinking about Grady and the older man he’d saved and how I’d sent him away when I should have listened, I gave up trying to sleep and got out of bed.
The apartment was quiet. Madison had been asleep since eight-thirty, curled around her stuffed otter, her costume on the end of the bed.
She’d decided to go to Alex and Gillian’s Halloween party as Trevor, which made me laugh despite my anxiety over Grady.
We’d spent the evening putting the finishing touches on the costume.
I’d found a brown onesie from the thrift store and made a tail out of yarn and sewn ears from felt and stuffed it with cotton.
The collar was made from an old belt with a tag that said TREVOR.
She’d tried the costume on earlier and barked at herself in the mirror until Robbie told her that Trevor didn’t actually bark that much and suggested she take a book out of the library on Stanislavski’s Method so that she might improve her acting skills.
Madison had simply given him a bewildered look and then crawled around the living room trying to wag her tail. Trevor had not seemed amused, staring at her from under the kitchen table.
Robbie’s light had gone off at ten. His costume was already laid out on his desk.
He’d ordered a tee with the periodic symbol for silicon and a necktie covered in the entire periodic table, complete with illustrated laboratory equipment.
He’d even printed a small card with additional element facts in case anyone wanted more information about the role of silicon in semiconductor technology.
” I felt fairly certain no one would ask.
When Madison had asked him what he was supposed to be, he’d said, “The foundation of modern computing.” She’d said, “You look like a science teacher,” and he’d said, “Thank you, but I prefer to teach college students. Professor Taylor, PhD.”
I’d thought I’d simply wear the clown costume I’d worn the year before, but instead an idea had occurred to me. One that might be ridiculous or romantic, depending.
I would go as a sunflower.
Now, I stood at my worktable in the dark shop, wearing my bathrobe over pajamas, and stared at the materials I’d spread out that afternoon while the kids were at school.
Yellow felt. Floral wire I used for structural work in large arrangements.
A square of burlap. Scissors. My glue gun.
Green fabric I’d cut from a remnant I kept in the back for wrapping.
A spool of the same green floral tape I used every day.
Trevor padded down the stairs behind me, nails clicking, and went straight to his bed. He circled three times, collapsed with a sigh, and looked at me as if to say, You’re up in the middle of the night? How rude.
“I know,” I whispered. “Go to sleep.”
He put his chin on his paws but kept his eyes open. Watching my every movement like the long-suffering Trevor he was.
I turned on the light over my work counter, working on the frame first, shaping it into a circle, roughly two feet across, then bent smaller lengths into petal shapes radiating outward.
There were fourteen of them, evenly spaced.
I cut the felt into petal shapes—wide at the base, tapering to soft points with each one roughly the length of my forearm.
I wrapped them around the wire, gluing as I went, smoothing the fabric with my fingers until each petal held its shape.
The yellow was cheerful and defiant at the same time.
For the center, I stretched the burlap over a circle of cardboard and glued dried sunflower seeds in a Fibonacci spiral that appeared in every real sunflower head.
Robbie had discovered that years ago. I’d been arranging sunflowers for a fall display and he’d stood at the counter with a magnifying glass, counting seeds, thrilled to discover that nature was as precise as he was.
“It’s not random. It’s mathematics.” He’d been nine. That was my boy for you.
I glued the center to the frame and held it up. It was big and bright and more than a little ridiculous. The petals weren’t perfectly symmetrical. One was slightly longer than the others. The burlap was a shade darker than I’d wanted. But it looked like a sunflower. A real one.
The stem was easier. A long strip of green fabric, hand-stitched to run from the collar down the front of my black shirt, with two leaves I cut and wired so they’d stand out slightly from my body instead of lying flat. This was a florist trick. Everything looks more alive when it has dimension.
I laid the pieces out on the table and stood back.
Tomorrow night I would put this on and go to the party, where I would find Grady, and hand him a sunflower and tell him that I loved him. My stomach turned over at the thought.
What if he didn’t come? What if he’d already given up on me? What if he looked at me in this absurd costume and thought I was simply too much. Regardless, I had to do it. I had to put myself out there or I’d never know if he loved me too.
I turned off the work light, gathered the costume pieces carefully, and carried them upstairs. Trevor followed, his nails clicking on the stairs behind me.
The next evening, I stood in the bathroom, staring at myself in the mirror. The sunflower framed my face, petals radiating outward, bright and golden. The green stem ran down my front. The leaves stuck out at my hips. My hair was loose around my shoulders. Sneakers on my feet. I looked ridiculous.
On the counter beside me, wrapped in a damp paper towel and a ribbon of twine, was a single sunflower. A real one to give to Grady.
“Okay,” I said to the woman in the sunflower costume. “Let’s do this.”
Madison was already in her Trevor costume, standing by the front door, panting with her tongue out.
“Mommy, we’re going to be late. Grace said they have a haunted hallway, and I can’t wait to see it.”