And I stood in front of her house with a bunch of flowers clamped under my arm. I lit a cigarette and blew out a little smoke, even though I knew she didn’t like the ash aroma. She got ready upstairs, came out when she felt pretty and I spent time thinking about what I would say about her. I was going to put my cigarette out when I realized.
In the dustbin was a bunch of flowers with her name on them, written on the enclosed card. The handwriting resembled that of the girl in the flower shop. So there was one who couldn’t wait for her.
I steamed out the cigarette, threw it on the floor in front of the house, stepped on it and grinded out the embers on the stone, while she made herself pretty upstairs and I looked at the effort of her past lovers. I opened the lid of the metal bucket where the blue roses looked out and I lifted them up. Underneath was another bouquet of roses buried, on which her name stood and even more flowers underneath, which composted. I scratched my beard. Under my hair it itched as if a bug was crawling inside of it. The nail didn’t crush the insect. The impulse remained. Around the dust bin laid scattered flowers, I recognized many signatures, she hadn’t told me about some of them and I hadn’t even seen the leaked flower water on the ground of the bin. I could smell the stale water, but she was soon finished with her make-up, and I couldn’t just leave the shredded floral remains lying around when she finally came out, what kind of picture would that have created in her mind? I licked my chapped lips, scratched as many petals as I could in my hands and stuffed them all back into their metal grave.
While I was waiting, I started to smoke another cigarette. I wasted too much time. When she finally got out, I threw my cigarette to the League of Roses. From the bottom up I looked at her and I didn’t have the rights words. Only my arms I could stretch out and I asked her to join me quietly. The trash can was on fire. The shallow gorge spit smoke.
Oh, baby, what kind of fire and what kind of flower stink was there. From their cold hiding place the creatures crawled, I stomped cockroaches to death, myself made unaware of the floor, as we walked without a word tightly entwined to my car.
John D.Dexter 