Monday: Covent Garden Flowers

[mylandmyrules]

Nell and the kittens were here. There'd been a huge order from someone wanting bright colored gerbera daisies, hundreds of them. Nell set to work, arranging them into bouquets and vases to be ready for pick up by noontime.

After that, she and her tired fingers were going to rest for a bit with a nice cup of tea.

Comments

[sword_chocobro]

It was a bit before that noontime pickup when Gladio stopped by the shop, giving him a good look at the fruits of all of Nell's labors that day, with a quirk of his brow.

"Hey, Nell," he greeted, then nodded toward all the daisies. "Busy day?"

[mylandmyrules]

Nell finished tying the last ribbon around the last vase and let out a sigh of relief. "Someone wanted 800 daisies - bouquets, vase arrangements, some with ribbons, some without..."

She shook her head, "Glad I don't have to try and deliver 'em. But at least," she checked the clock and smiled, "I got 'em all done on time and the rest of my day should be pretty quiet."

She smiled at him. "Nice to see you, Gladio."

[sword_chocobro]

"By the sound of it," Gladio remarked with a short huff of a laugh, "would have been even nicer to see me maybe an hour or two ago, then maybe I could've helped. Though I don't really think floral arrangement is really in my range of skills.

"What does anyone even need that many daisies for, anyway?" he added, because now he really kind of had to ask.

[mylandmyrules]

"You could have kept me company," she suggested, "but it would probably have been very boring for you to watch me arranging and maybe even occasionally saying a bad word under my breath."

Nell looked at the room full of flowers and shook her head. "No idea. Maybe some sort of banquet with flowers on all the tables? They didn't tell me anything except how many and what way they wanted 'em put together and that they had to be ready for noon."

[sword_chocobro]

The faint grin on Gladio's face suggested that hearing Nell uttering a bad word under her breath would be the complete opposite of boring, really.

"Well," he said, taking a moment to appraise the flowers with his own, very untrained eye. "Mission accomplished, and with time to spare. Almost makes me feel a little bad, coming in with more work for you, but I'm pretty sure what I've got won't be as difficult as 800 daisies. I hope!"

[mylandmyrules]

"799 daisies?" Nell teased. "No worries, I'm sure I can help you out with whatever you need."

[sword_chocobro]

"Maybe 798," Gladio allowed, "if that's what you'd recommend for a guy with the brownest thumb ever looking to get something easy to care for to bring maybe a little bit of life to his drab old bachelor pad."

The aesthetics in the apartment had gone down substantially when the roomate who actually cared about that kind of thing couldn't even see it anymore.

"I figured today would be a good day to come in and ask an expert."

[mylandmyrules]

"Hmmm..." Nell considered for a moment. "I have some easy to care for succulents that are bright and colorful. They are vibrant and hard to kill."

[sword_chocobro]

"Hard to kill," Gladio said, with a bit of a laugh, "I like the sound of that. That way, I can feel accomplished, no matter which way it goes."

Plus, maybe he felt a bit like that reflected on him personally, but he wouldn't want to brag.

[mylandmyrules]

He was very vibrant and presumably hard to kill, so it fit!

Nell hesitated, chewing on the corner of her mouth. "Mmmm... do you trust me, Gladio?"

[sword_chocobro]

Verifiably had to kill. There had been numerous efforts!

"When it comes to plants?' Gladio asked, both brows lifted. "Unquestionably."

Probably in a lot of other things, too, but. Anyway.

[mylandmyrules]

"All right. I don't want to steal a customer from Covent Garden, so I'll pick your succulents from here and then bring them home to plant them in soil from Soulwood. That will give them a boost and a bit of an advantage in growth and health," she said. "Then I can bring it to you tomorrow at the gyn."

[sword_chocobro]

"Oh, come on," said Gladio, giving Nell a little bit of a grateful look, but a skeptical one. "You don't have to do that. Don't you need that soil? To do all your plant healing stuff?"

[mylandmyrules]

Nell smiled at him. "I have more than enough to use some for a plant for a friend. Now a whole garden would be a problem, but this is fine. And I want to make sure it's the best it can be for you."

[sword_chocobro]

And Gladio smiled back, a complicated smile, and a grateful one. "Definitely not a garden," he assured Nell, "although now I guess I really will have to make sure I take good care of it."

[mylandmyrules]

"The Soulwood soil will make that much easier," Nell said. "And if it starts not doing well you can always bring it to me and I'll fix it. See? Easy."

[sword_chocobro]

"With my tail between my legs," said Gladio, with a faint smirk, "and my head hanging in shame. But we can't all be natural horticulturists, right?"

[mylandmyrules]

Nell laughed. "No judgment, I promise. Unless you've fed it orange juice or something in which case all bets are off."

[sword_chocobro]

"Wait, so you're telling me orange juice isn't good for plants?" Gladio asked, feigning minor shock....and probably failing at it, what with that smirk. He then shool his head dismally. "See? And that's how I know it was a good thing, coming to see you first."

[mylandmyrules]

Nell laughed again. "Maybe I'd better check to make sure you're not on the national 'Banned From Plants' list before I sell you anything."

[sword_chocobro]

"Would kind of make the whole 'named after a plant' thing even more ironic if I was," Gladio mused, "huh?"

[mylandmyrules]

"I suppose it would," Nell said. "Were you truly named after the plant? I assumed it was the Latin for sword."

[sword_chocobro]

"Well, I don't know anything about Latin," Gladio admitted, although that wasn't entirely trie; the coincidences between Eosian names and Latin as a language had been too fascinating to just leave unresearched, "but I'd be pretty inclined to agree with you there...if my sister wasn't also named Iris."

It should be noted, however, that it was distinctly said as EAR-ris, rather than EYE-ris.

"Besides," he added, "the flower's funnier. The sword is just too on the nose."

[mylandmyrules]

"Eyes," Nell said musingly. "But yes, I admit, the flowers are funnier."