Flower by Shea Olsen
“The only way to get rid of a temptation is to yield to it.”
—Oscar Wilde
BEFORE
I WAS TWELVE YEARS OLD when I made the promise to myself.
It was the same year my mother died. She had always been reckless. Impulsive. Abandoning me and my sister, Mia, whenever a new boyfriend appeared in her life. I had watched my mother fall in love so often it was like she was desperate for it, like it was air and she was suffocating. She left us for one more breath, and in the end it killed her.
Love can undo you. It can take everything away.
And so I promised myself: no boys, no prom, no parties on Saturday nights. I would stay home, I would get straight As, I would go to college and make a different kind of future for myself. I wouldn’t let anything stop me. I wouldn’t let anyone stop me.
But that was before everything changed.
That was before him.
AFTER
HIS GAZE DROPS TO MY lips and lingers there, just before he places his mouth on mine. I kiss him back fiercely, my wrists bound by his fingers, his body pressed into mine.
I want more.
He breaks away to kiss along my jaw, my neck. His mouth is hot, his teeth nibbling on my skin. When he lifts his head to look at me, I see the dark need in his gaze. Our eyes remain locked as he kisses me. A simple kiss, a mere brush of lips against lips. Again.
And again.
Until our eyes close at the same time and our tongues meet, his hand gripping my hip. I reach for the zipper on his hoodie and undo it. He moans against my lips and a thrill shudders through me.
In this terrifying, wondrous, overwhelming moment, I would let him do anything.
Anything at all.
ONE
Two months earlier...
MY CELL DINGS IN MY purse, a high-pitched whistle that sounds like a faraway train. I dig through tubes of lip balm, receipts, and a Lone Bean napkin, finally extricating the phone.
It’s a text from Carlos, my best friend since middle school. What are you up to?
Top secret, I reply, with two flower emojis for emphasis. Carlos knows I’m at work—I’ve worked at the Bloom Room, an upscale flower shop, every Monday after school for the last three years.
Don’t you want to see ONE of Farrah’s parties before we graduate? Carlos sends back.
Farrah Sullivan throws a party every time her dad leaves town, which is usually once a month. And even if it’s a school night, most of the Pacific Heights student body shows up to get trashed. Farrah has a pool and a Ping-Pong table in her backyard. And her fridge is always stocked with free beer—or so I’ve heard. Carlos just doesn’t want to go by himself because his crush will be there: Alan Gregory, the boy with two first names who goes to Worther Prep in Beverly Hills and who has been flirting with Carlos since they met at some indie concert in West Hollywood last month.
I sigh and lean my elbows on the front counter. Sorry, I type. You’ll do great without me, like always. I miss out on all of the social functions: the parties, the clubs, the trips down to Venice Beach to watch the sunset while sipping rum from a flask. Sometimes I think it’s a miracle our friendship has survived this long. But Carlos and I are soul mates, in the most platonic way. I am the predictable, dependable half, the one he calls whenever his latest relationship implodes, or when he gets sick and needs a mountain of gossip mags and a revolving selection of soup from his favorite restaurant in Santa Monica. And in return, he drags me to see bands I’ve never heard of in hole-in-the-wall basement venues on the rare night I’m not working or studying. He forces me to stay awake half the night talking to him on the phone and giggling until we fall asleep with our phones still connected. He makes me laugh. And I keep him from spiraling whenever he falls face-first in love with the wrong guy or panics that he’ll never get accepted into a good college. We balance each other out. I can’t imagine my life without him.
My phone chimes again: I NEED MY CHARLOTTE.
I laugh, blowing my choppy bangs away from my eyelashes.
Alas, your Charlotte told Holly she’d close tonight. Go have fun for both of us. You got this, I type.
This is my life: school; work four days a week at the flower shop; research internship at UCLA on Thursdays; then home to study at the tiny house I share with my grandmother, older sister, and baby nephew. Lather. Rinse. Repeat. It’s not that I’ve set out to be the biggest social outcast in all of Los Angeles. But I have set out to be the first woman in my family to go to college, and I don’t want to get derailed the way my mom and sister did—pregnant before they were twenty, and a trail of ex-boyfriends in their wake. Which is why, at eighteen, I’ve never kissed a boy, never held hands in the hallway between classes, never even been to a school dance.
Carlos texts a series of weeping emoji.
I reply with a kissy face.
Feeling like the loser friend who never gets to do anything fun, I open up the music app on my phone and hit START on a random playlist. An oldies song comes on—something my grandma would listen to—“My Girl” by the Temptations. I crank it up, surprisingly into it, and then turn my attention to decorating several bouquets for an eight-year-old’s princess-themed birthday party. As the music crescendos, I twirl in circles, feeling a little silly, but determined to forget how structured and precise my life is. How it leaves zero room for anything spontaneous. I grab pink and white and yellow ribbon; I toss glitter onto the tulip petals and glue sequins to the vases; I sing along to the lyrics blaring through my phone. I dance like a total dork. I completely forget I’m at work.