Page 70 of A Journey For Jasmine

“I hope she has a girl,” Lily said. “One just like her.”

She laughed. “That’s kind of mean.”

“Isn’t it? How are things in the shop? It’s the end of summer but it still seems so busy to me.”

“No work talk,” she said.

“Come on now,” Lily said, covering a yawn. “It’s just conversation.”

“You’re tired. We’ve got everything covered and you know it. You need to rest.”

“I do,” Lily said. “First, before my sisters get here, can I ask you something?”

“Anything,” she said.

“Did your sister find a job?”

“I’m not sure if she has started to look yet,” she said. “Or if she has, she hasn’t told me.”

“How would you feel about her working at Blossoms?” Lily asked.

“With me? At the flower shop?” She hadn’t thought much of it because she knew her sister wasn’t one to get her hands dirty. She didn’t like to garden as a kid.

“No,” Lily said. “Rose and Poppy told me how Ivy was talking to them about her strengths. The things she loves about her job. She has a work history in retail. That’s us. She likes to organize and train. Almost like office work?”

“Oh,” she said. “I didn’t know you were looking for someone in the office.” She didn’t always stay up on top of things when it came to those positions.

“My sisters and husband are on my case to get an assistant. Someone that will work primarily with me. Kind of a jack-of-all-trades, but it would be nice to get a person that was flexible to all we offer. Poppy is going to need help with some things when the baby comes too. Rose has Daisy at least. I wanted to hear your thoughts before I went any further. I haven’t even said anything to Poppy or Rose yet.”

She knew Lily was the type to think things through before making a decision.

“I’ve never worked with Ivy. I can’t give you a reference. And I’m sorry about that. I only really know what she was like as a kid and I’m not sure that is what you’re looking for.”

“I understand that. I get the feeling Ivy is a lot like Poppy in personality?” Lily asked.

She snorted. “They do have a lot of the same characteristics.”

“And Poppy is a hard worker,” Lily said.

“She is. I believe Ivy is too. She didn’t finish college, but she never liked school. I wonder if we had a more structured classroom setting if it would have made a difference for her. By the time she got to college she was more focused on living the life we missed out on than on the schoolwork. She’s a smart girl, just needs a hand. Or maybe guidance. She was the one that might have needed the attention more as a child for all sorts of things.”

“Those were the things I wanted to hear. We can guide her. We do that with everyone. She’s a retail manager. They work a lot of hours and crazy hours. They tend to get more crap dumped on them too. We aren’t like that with Blossoms, but if your sister likes her job, that means she is fine with the negative things that most don’t like about retail.”

“It’s a good point. And of course you aren’t the type to dump things on people,” she said.

“I don’t want to make things uncomfortable for you. Your sister might not even be interested.”

“She’ll be interested,” she said. “One of the conversations we had was that she was bummed I got everything she thought she wanted. A job I loved and people I worked with that treated me well. I fell into the pot of gold at the end of the rainbow when you hired me. I know that.”

“I think it’s us that fell into it,” Lily said. “We needed you more than you needed us.”

It was hearing things like that that made her realize maybe this was what her sister needed too.

“Why don’t you think it over some more? Talk to your sisters. It will be a few weeks before Ivy is here. We can talk about it more then. I won’t say a word to her.”

“I’ll do that,” Lily said. “It’s going to be hard to find someone to fit what I need and I get the feeling your sister is eager. Eager is a good thing.”

“And she has a flower name,” she said, smirking.

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