Oops! This image does not follow our content guidelines. To continue publishing, please remove it or upload a different image.
赤いサルビア spring
The rain continued on for a couple more days, long enough to cause the sidewalk to get a decent flow of water rushing down it. It was hard to walk into the flower shop without getting their shoes and socks wet. The shop wasn't getting many customers either, and it was making Seokjin consider closing up until the rainy weather ended. There wasn't much point them being there anyway, not when their productivity had dropped to almost nothing. On one of the final days of rain, they almost had a customer. The man had opened the door as though to enter, but after a flood of water rushed past him he seemed to change his mind and quickly closed the door. He left behind a semi-flooded shop and three disappointed florists. They all stared at the water that was spreading across the floor, realising that one of them was going to have to clean that up.
By the end of the rain, the shop looked a mess. Seokjin had ended up closing early and sighed when he realised he was going to have to put off opening it back up. He looked at the dirt streaked floors in dismay. As he waited for the other two to arrive he went into their storeroom and pulled out the cleaning equipment, figuring it would be better to get started than wait around for them.
Taehyung and Jungkook arrived together. It had been a complete coincidence but the pair had bumped into each other at the same coffee shop. Jungkook had been in need of a coffee more than usual and had woken up late so he decided to stop by there on his way; Taehyung just always went there because it was close to the flower shop. Seokjin had just gotten everything out by the time they got there, much to his relief. Unfortunately for the younger two, they barely got a chance to settle in before they were set to work cleaning.
As they mopped the floor up, Taehyung tried to initiate a fight. He flicked Jungkook's shoes with his mop, the wet strands clinging to the younger's ankles. Jungkook frowned at him and stepped out of the road, moving away to mop a different area of the room. The lilac haired male sighed as he watched him, realising this was going to be less fun than he'd hoped.
After the cleaning was done, the shop was able to re-open and they were back in business. Things were still quiet though and Taehyung used this as an opportunity to continue teaching Jungkook. He took the younger around the shop, pointing out different flowers (generally the most requested ones) and telling Jungkook all about them.
"Now, when some people come in looking for flowers, it's sometimes easier just to give them roses or one of the other popular ones. Just because they probably don't care about the meanings of flowers and are choosing the flowers based off what they've heard." Taehyung explained as he stood in front of the rose section. "And usually they'll pick them based off their loved one's favourite colour or they'll just choose red because it's nice and romantic. But the problem with that is if you get someone coming in wanting to give their girlfriend a bunch of five yellow roses because they're cheap and yellow's her favourite colour then you've got some problems."
"Why?" Jungkook's curiosity put a smile on Taehyung's lips and he continued eagerly.
"Well because yellow roses are symbolic for friendship, and generally five red roses would mean I'm half-way in love with you, so that combination would mean something like, I'm kinda friends with you. So sometimes you've just got to hope the girlfriend doesn't google the flower meanings or you've got to convince the customer to buy something else."
"Like a bunch of red roses?"
"Yeah, you could. But they're cliche and overdone."
"Well then what else can we give them?"
"I've always thought, that if I was going to give flowers to someone as a romantic gift, I'd give them some red salvia or a bouquet with heliotrope and fern in them." Taehyung shrugged. "Oh! These flowers ― what are they?"
Taehyung pointed at the white flowers that were streaked with red. The apprentice had gotten rather good at recognising these ones, mainly because his teacher was constantly pointing them out to him and making him recite the name and meaning for them.
"Striped carnations, rejection." Jungkook responded almost reflexively, which made Taehyung's smile grow.
"Correct. You're getting good at this, Jungkook. Soon you won't need me teaching you." While this claim was unlikely, Jungkook couldn't help but feel proud when Taehyung praised him. He liked the thought that he was making progress, even though these skills probably wouldn't benefit him in the future after he'd left the flower shop. "And what are you never going to give someone as a birthday present again?"
"Black eyed susans." Jungkook received a thumbs up from Taehyung. The twinkling of the bell signalled the end of their lessons as a customer entered.
"I'll take this one." Taehyung said. The younger male nodded and retreated to the counter as he watched Taehyung approach the customer.
Taehyung seemed at ease as he spoke to the customer, smiling and chatting as though they were friends. Jungkook was envious of his ability to do so. He watched as his teacher began leading the customer around the small shop, pointing out all sorts of different flowers. Giving himself a test and challenge, Jungkook tried to guess what the customer was after based off Taehyung's suggestions. Peony, both red and white roses, lilies; after a few minutes of struggling to wrack his brain and a bit of googling, Jungkook had managed to conclude that there was probably a marriage taking place. This confused him, though, as he thought it was normally the woman organising this side of thing.
After figuring that out, the man's attention returned back to his rather animated co-worker. Taehyung had gotten rather excited as he suggested flowers to the customer, who looked rather out of his depth as he tried to keep up with the florist. Eventually, after a lot of chattering and little convincing, he chose the red and white roses. Taehyung looked mildly displeased at this probably 'cliche' choice but took the order down anyway. Jungkook organised payment while Taehyung wrote down the order in a little notebook. Soon they were alone again.
"Was that for a wedding?" Jungkook asked, wanting to get some form of clarification on his guess. The older male's proud smile returned as he nodded.
"Yep, he needed to find a bouquet. Nothing too difficult, but it does remind me ー with the weather improving it's likely we'll get some spring wedding jobs." Taehyung sighed as he put the notebook back in one of the drawers. "Shouldn't be too hard."
"What do we do, give them flowers for their weddings?"
"Well, yeah, but we also get put in charge of general decorations for the place. It's one of the things Seokjin advertises."
"Oh..." This sounded like a hard task for the new florist, who had only ever seen weddings on the television. If they did get one of these jobs, he was almost certain his reliance on the older two would only increase. Silently, he prayed they wouldn't get one.
ーー＊ーー
Jungkook sighed as he sat on his bed, pulling flower petals from his hair. Since the weather had improved the streets were now full of flowers. Fallen petals were now being blown around in the breeze, some of them tangling themselves in the man's hair. He wasn't even sure if he'd gotten them all out by the time he'd given up. A small pile of crumpled yellow petals lay in his palm.
He chucked them in the bin, which also contained the dead black eyed susan Taehyung had given him. It had long since wilted, but the older male had somehow guessed that and given Jungkook a replacement flower. That one now sat on his windowsill, beginning to die again. The plants never seemed to last long in Jungkook's vase.
