Page 13 of Hot Tea & Bird Calls

Thalia emerged from the closet-break room, tucking her phone into her apron pocket. “Hello, you. Oh, you’re so burnt?—”

June shushed her, a calloused finger to her own lips. “Quick. Skye met a woman!”

“What, are you in love? Is she your true love?” Thalia asked in a pivot so hard, Skye choked on air.

“Skye, spit it out!” June hollered as soon as a customer stepped in.

The three of them smiled sweetly, throwing in a wave and a welcome. Then they huddled again. Skye caught Thalia up with what she’d told June, and continued. “I drove behind her to head back into town, and we went the same route, all the way tomyneighborhood. She’s staying at a mostly unused house, and I’m sure she’s my old friend.” Skye fanned her face with a brochure; her friends’ stares were intense. “Well. Friend may be too strong a word. We hung out for a few summers as kids.”

“Is she beautiful?” Thalia cupped her hands over her mouth. “Is she gay?”

“Isshe gay?” June echoed.

Skye shook her head; she hadn’t considered, really. “How would I know? It was dark.”

June blinked once. “You can see gay in the dark.”

In all seriousness, Thalia agreed. “It glows.”

The customer interrupted their laughter with fanboy questions about the artist. After doing the Big Reveal (“Skye’s the famous artist’s granddaughter, woooow.”), Skye and June left.

“I’m craving a juicy, rare burger.” June clicked her seatbelt into place as she backed a celadon green van out of the parking lot. She would order a cold, raw beef patty if restaurant codes allowed; the pinker the better. “Should I go to a drive-thru, and we eat on the way to the plant nursery? It’s about a fifteen-minute drive.”

“Sure. I’ll take a black bean burger with everything on it,” Skye murmured, peering out the window at two women strapping a massive painting onto the back of a pickup.

If only she could send that customer flowers for interrupting her friends’ speculation. Talking about Celene’s beauty, so obvious even in the darkness, knotted Skye’s stomach so terribly that she denied June’s offer of fries.

After an on-the-road lunch, she followed June’s directions in properly packing the van with pallets and wooden crates of radiant flowers, many of them still in the tender bulb state. She breathed in the greenhouse’s loamy soil scent, traipsing abundant rows of foliage, like verdant hands reaching for her.

June shut the van’s double doors, dramatizing labored breath. While the work exerted energy, it had been pleasant. A nice way to get their blood pumping. “All done. I could have done that alone, but it’d take double the time. This nursery breeds really healthy plants.” She lowered her voice as if the owners would hear her from inside. “Their distribution, however, is inconsistent.”

Skye returned her grin, tugging her dirty gloves off finger by finger. She felt eyes so familiar and once intimate on her. Avoiding the stare, Skye searched the ground. A shiny pill bug detoured over the toe of her shoe, dark gray scurrying over the scuffed tan. She waited for him to make his way to the dirt before responding to the tap on her arm.

With a timid smile, June proffered a potted fuchsia. “For you. You’re off in the clouds more than usual.”

The fuchsia’s unopened blooms drooped as they should, pale magenta buds hanging like paper lanterns. “An adorable new friend. I’m okay, though.”

“You sure?”

She lit her phone for the time. Thalia wanted a full shift today; nevertheless, Skye would rather not leave her alone for too long. “Let’s get back to the shop.”

June caught Skye by the arm, brows low. “Hey, yousure?”

Skye gripped the flower’s container. If only she knew why nothing felt quite right. “I’m sure.”

On the ride home, June synced her phone to bob her head to the trending songs. When they’d dated, she’d do this. Fill the silence. June grew up with four older brothers and oneyounger sister, so it made sense that a lack of noise bored her. Cosmo, Skye’s older brother by four years, occupied himself with handheld games growing up, so they learned to exist in wordless accord. When she wasn’t off in a forest, his babysitting consisted of cycling through his assortment of gaming systems while Skye played at his feet, narrating stories for her daily bounty of angular rocks and leaves.

As they passed the stone ‘Welcome to Yielding’ sign, Skye breathed a little easier. Although her sensitive fuchsia shook with every hard-hitting beat from June’s playlist.

“Look at ’er dance,” June cheered, imitating the tremors in her seat. “She loves music.”

Skye wasn’t so sure. She turned the volume down, so she wouldn’t have to shout out, “More like trembling. Or pulsing.”

“Bah-bum, bah-bum. Call her something like that—Bah-bum.”

Luckily, June’s partner named their dog, or else she’d be called Arf-arf. “We can go whimsical with Heart Palpington Germinatta, first of her name. Heart for short.”

“Heart. Good choice.” June shared a smile before jumping like, “Oh shit.” Seconds later, the Bluetooth speaker played a dial tone, and Zinnia answered.