June 2023 Flash Lit 9 - On the Up and Up

 

But the Red Queen drew herself up rather stiffly, and said “Queens never make bargains.” Through the Looking Glass, Chapter 9

 

 

 

Rowan looked at the rose bush doubtfully.  “Is it even, you know, alive?” she asked.

 

“Would I lie to you?” Ellis responded, holding his hands out wide.  Rowan thought he looked exactly like a magician showing that there was nothing up his sleeves.

 

“Yes,” she said.

 

Ellis pouted theatrically.  “I go to all this trouble to pick out a very special red rose bush just for you, and it is on sale and you act like I’m trying to pull a fast one.”

 

Rowan sighed.  “Fine.  I’ll take it.”  She picked up the suspiciously light plastic pot with the suspiciously gray-brown prickle of a plant in it and gave Ellis some cash.  Then she stuck the pot in the passenger seat of her car and drove away, mostly convinced she had just given Ellis money for nothing, and money that was about to go up in smoke.

 

The plant crouched there defensively.

 

“It’s not your fault,” she told the plant.  “And, you never know, you might be fine if we get you some water.”

 

Rowan dug a hole for the plant next to the mailbox.  An ancient trellis arch, rusty, spanned the gate in Rowan’s fence.  “In case you need support,” she told the plant.

 

Over the next weeks, the plant did need support.  Also water, fertilizer, and a pint tub of ladybug friends to protect it from aphids.  Rowan chatted to the plant when she came to collect the mail.  She told it about her sister’s trip to Europe as the postcards came in and about how annoying it was to be getting bills eight months later for the cable service she cancelled at Thanksgiving.  Sometimes she just stroked a leaf on the way to her car.  The leaves multiplied and the stems lengthened.  It even produced a few buds.  Rowan watched them curiously, wondering what sort of roses she might have.

 

One dewy morning in June, she walked out her front door to find red and white striped roses on the trellis, stretching up and up.

 

Rowan laughed.  “Ellis was only half lying,” she said.