dead poets society oneshots

the flowers that we'd grown together died of thirst

Working in a flower shop had one major edvance that neil loved. It made him meet lots and lots of interesting people with interesting stories and reasons and occasions they were buying flowers for. Weddings, proposals, apologies or as for this guy, funerals.
It had been a rainy Monday afternoon, Neil had just come back from lunch break, when he came in. The guy had been soaking wet from head to toe, he was shaking and heartbreaking tears were running down his reddened cheeks.
It wasn't the first time people had cried in here, it happend all the time when parents came in that had to pick out their child's favorite flower for their little grave or older people who were burring their last companion, Neil was used to it by now, but something about the way the guy had stood there, totally helpless, made his heart shatter.

The door bell rang when the door closed behind the stranger and he slowley walked up to the counter, creating tiny paddles everywhere in the little shop.
He gave Neil a puzzeld look for a moment as if he had forgotten why he had entered in the first place and then whiped his face.

"Uhm, I'm looking for flowers for a funeral." He started, his voice weak.

Neil held in a sigh. He could've guessed that was coming. "I'm very sorry for your loss. May I ask what kind of flowers you're looking for?"

Again, the guy looked around the shop very confused and then slightly shrugged.
"I don't- I have no idea." He mutterd flattly and before Neil knew he just started crying so hard, he was sure they could've heard it in the bookshop a few streets away.
"I'm so sorry.",he choked out and shook his head, "This is so embarrassing."

"No, no! Don't worry about it. I have loads of time we can figure everything out together, alright?" He walked around the counter and gave the guy a friendly pat on the shoulder, "I'm just gonna close the shop for a little and we can go to the office. You don't have to stress about it."
The guy shook his head quickly.
"You don't have to close the shop!" But Neil was already turning the sign in the door that now read 'closed' for everyone who passed it on the street.

"It's nothing, really" He came back to the crying stranger and carefully guided him to the office.
It was mid February so it was freezing even inside and Neil went to heat up the room.

"You can sit down there." He pointed to the chair in front of the desk that was fazing the window and the guy sat down, "Would you like some tea?" Neil always kept a box with different variations of teas since he had discovered that it often somewhat calmed the crying costumers.

"Sure, uh peppermint if you got it."

After a few minutes of akward silence, as Neil was making the tea he sat down across of his new costumer and smiled a little.

"So, you're hear for a funeral Mr-"

"Todd. Uh you can just call me Todd." He sort of akwardly rubbed his neck and Neil thought that Todd was a very anxious person.

"Alright Todd, may I ask for who you're preparing the funeral?"

Todd's eyes went to the floor for a brief moment and then back up immediately, except he wasn't exaclty looking at Neil but a spot in the window right behind him.

"It's for my best friend. He- He died a few weeks ago in a car crash and I'm sort of responsible for the funeral 'cause his boyfriend can't handle it."
Neil drew his eyebrows together. He knew it wasn't his part to speak on it, but it honestly didn't seem like Todd could handle this either and it made him feel sort of sad. He knew how it was when someone died, most people cared for their partners the most, who obviously deserved it but he knew how it was to be the left behind best friend and it didn't seem fair that they had just put this weight onto Todd. Neil didn't know Todd, but he didn't have to to know when someone was struggeling and he knew how hard it was to heal when you were all on your own.