Page 11 of The Guy Who Became My Grumpy Boss

“Not sure,” I muttered as I perused the other options. “How many bouquets do we need?”

“At least six. I’ll get you the list.”

I grunted in affirmation.

Mrs. Santos muttered a few words in Filipino and walked to the front of the shop. She’d tried to get me to explain my process, but it wasn’t something I could quantify, qualify, or make a checklist of. The shapes, sizes, and colors of flowers simply made sense to me. Some went together. Others didn’t. That was that.

I grabbed a few more options and dropped them in my bucket, then moved to the small corner Mrs. Santos let me use to arrange bouquets.

After five days in the office and one at home in which I worked another four to six hours then did all my chores for the week, I needed this. This was the one thing outside of work I didn’t merely tolerate but looked forward to.

A tiny table, the size of a large pizza box, stood on a tripod of wobbly legs next to an equally precarious wood stool that had to be at least fifty years old.

The entire place smelled like both death and life. Flowers and rot. I let the scents infiltrate my nostrils and wash away thetension of dealing with people and work and Jessica.

Her face always tried to invade my personal time. I gently pushed her out of my mind. I had work to do, and bouquets didn’t arrange themselves.

And yet, Jessica was always there. It didn’t help that I’d watched each and every one of her and her friends’ YouTube videos multiple times. I should have stopped, but I couldn’t help it.

At work, Jessica was an organizational force to be reckoned with, and it stood as a testament to her ability to get along with just about everyone that she’d been my assistant for a year. Those I’d had before her had been promoted to other positions after six or eight months, which I’d finally made my boss, Tyrell, confess was their way of getting out of working with me.

With her friends, Jessica was a ray of sunshine like I’d never seen before. She wasn’t naïve or simple in any way. Instead, she saw the world through a lens that I had a difficult time processing.

For her, people were good. People were opportunities to learn or experience new things. To Jessica, meeting someone meant a chance to help them. To have fun with them.

To me, people were intrusive. People were problems that I had to work through. For me, people meant having to expend energy that I didn’t possess on those that I didn’t care to have a connection with.

I’d often wondered if there was something wrong with me, but this was my personality. I couldn’t exactly rewrite the way my brain worked.

Mrs. Santos came back through the thick plastic flaps that led to the front of the store with a hot pink square of paper in her hand. “They need seven.” The woman held the note out. I took it. She turned and walked away.

Some people might think the exchange rude.

I found it refreshing.

There was never a shortage of terminal patients at the nearby hospital. One of the nurses had worked there since my mother had died, and she was the one who sent the list of people she thought could use an extra boost.

Some patients might not have family who visited, and others may have family there all the time. Every patient was different, and each of their grieving cycles varied. Pamela, the nurse, had a gift for knowing who would most benefit from an anonymously donated bouquet of flowers.

At first, it had been a quiet endeavor. I’d come here, to Mrs. Santos’ shop, to get flowers for my mother, and after she’d died, I’d continued to come by and ask if I could have some of the leftover flowers. When Mrs. Santos had figured out what I was up to, the woman had dragged me in the back, pointed to this corner, and ordered me to work in here. I’d been eleven at the time.

I’d been sending between two and eight bouquets to the hospital at least one Sunday a month ever since.

“I had another reporter asking about you,” Mrs. Santos said loudly from the front.

I didn’t answer. She liked to talk, and I was fine listening until a response was absolutely necessary.

“This one was persistent. Lurked around for a couple of days.”

The bouquets had become a sort of legend at the hospital, and many people had tried to find the source. Lucky for me, I could get in and out of here unseen, and Mrs. Santos loved to egg reporters on. She’d sent them on wild goose chases all through the city looking for the mysterious arranger. All anyone knew was that this shop delivered the flowers, but they didn’t take responsibility for them.

Someday my secret would be out, but not anytime soon. Notwhile Mrs. Santos had a dramatic bone left in her body.

“I sent him across town,” Mrs. Santos cackled. “Sucker.”

I smiled as I scanned the list and chose a woman in her forties who was losing in her third round of cancer. Pamela said she loved bright colors.

I began pulling flowers from my bucket to put into a Mason jar. I started with a beautiful orange Gerber daisy and began to fill in the space around it. Some yellow there. Red here. More greenery. A spray of white. Another hue of orange.

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