Rating:
G
House:
Astronomy Tower
Ships:
Remus Lupin/Sirius Black
Characters:
Original Female Muggle
Genres:
Romance
Era:
The First War Against Voldemort (Cir. 1970-1981)
Spoilers:
Philosopher's Stone
Stats:
Published: 08/25/2006
Updated: 08/25/2006
Words: 1,822
Chapters: 1
Hits: 1,414

Flower Shop

Cinderella200

Story Summary:
Sirius and Remus help Lily choose flowers for the upcoming nuptials. The shop girl watches, and comes to an interesting conclusion. R/S pre-slash.

Chapter 01

Posted:
08/25/2006
Hits:
1,414

A/N-

I got the idea for this story after reading an Julian Barnes' "Talking It Over." which I recommend to everyone in the world. There's an excerpt with a flower girl that I fell in love with, and this was inspired by it. I don't know if it's any good, so feel free to let me know, yeah?

Loads and loads of thanks to NoScrubs12345 for possibly the fastest beta job in the history of beta-jobbing.

Flower Shop.

We get all sorts of customers in here. The typical ones, you know who I mean, spotty teenage schoolboys here to buy an (original!) red rose for their girlfriend, stodgy business types who clearly don't have a clue what they're doing, and leave me to do the choosing, and then the regulars, normally elderly, who come in and choose the same bouquet every week.

We get big orders too, obviously, like parties, weddings, funerals and the like. We've gotten pretty successful over the past couple of years, it's 'coz of that new manager up in Basingstoke. He's made all the shops really flash now, and it's thanks to him I've got my job, see.

When a place gets all flash, it gets more customers, and more customers mean more staff.

I had a funny group come in a few weeks ago, actually. Well, I say group, there was only three of them. This girl, and a couple of lads.

She was dead pretty actually, real lovely red hair, and proper nice eyes, green as anything. She'd rung ahead to arrange to come and have a look. She was getting married, see, and wanted to decide on centerpieces.

The lads...well. Sarah and I have this game we play, see, when we get bored. With the customers. If a lad walks in, we'll rate him.

Like, for example, someone might walk in, and Sarah'll say, "Ooh, he's a Tuesday."

That means he's not that special, she'd only keep one night of the week free for him. Do you get me?

Ok, another example yeah? Say some gorgeous, unbelievable guy walked in, I'd say, "He's a Seven days of the Week."

See, I'd be free for him whatever day he wanted?

Anyway, these two lads with the girl...well. One of 'em was friendly- looking like. It was a bit weird actually, his face didn't look any older than the other two, but he definitely had some gray in his hair.

I've heard of that happening, you know, premature graying. Apparently it's 'coz of stress or something. He had dead nice eyes, though. They deserve a mention, yeah, really strange.

I ain't ever seen eyes like that: they were normal brown, but they were speckled. Like gold dust, I thought.

Sorry, I ain't the most poetic of people, but that's what it looked like to me, little bits of gold. Dead nice eyes.

They almost made up for the state of his clothes.

He wasn't bad though, not bad. So, in my head, yeah, I'm thinking- "He's a Monday to Thursday."

The other lad... he was an absolute beaut, I'll tell you that for nothing. Dead nice hair, all black an a bit longer than normal, and he had something about him, you know? Dunno exactly, I ain't ever been good with words, but he was dead gorgeous. He was a Monday to Saturday I think.

So anyway, they come in, and she's dead sweet, comes over to the counter all polite and tells me who she is, a Miss Evans, she rang ahead, et cetera, and then she says is it alright if she just has a look around?

Course I said yeah, let the customers choose, don't be pushy, don't smother 'em. That's what Megan always says. That's the woman what runs the shop see, bit of a batty old thing, but she's right, people don't like to feel harassed when they're shopping.

So I carry on with the books at the counter, one eye on 'em always. Mainly on the black- haired lad if I'm honest, but, oh well. It's a pretty small shop, and I could hear them pretty clearly, although they were blatantly tryin' not to be heard.

"Lil, why this shop?"

"Mum loves it, she said they're quite reasonable as well."

"But couldn't you just charm--"

"Sirius, shush!"

"I'm just saying!"

"No." Miss Evans doesn't seem to really be paying much attention to the two guys; she's looking at some dead nice white roses we got in the other day. They both stop to look at her, and then the tired- looking one speaks,

"No what, Lily?"

"No, I don't want them charmed or anything.... I just want normal flowers."

Old Gold- eyes nods understandingly, and the dark- haired one pouts a bit, until Gold- eyes hits him round the head.

"Moony, the hair!"

"Moony" (what sorta name's that?) just rolls his eyes and grins. The other one (Serious?) grins back.

He had a proper nice smile, I'll tell you that.

God knows what they were on about "charmed" flowers...probably some flash gardening thing.

Anyway, she's walking about, and the tired-looking lad seems fairly interested as well. It's nice when you can see someone's genuinely interested, not just pretending they know about flowers.

You can get some right pretentious gits in here sometimes, acting like they know it all, screwing their noses up at the roses and lilies coz they're too common. Idiots, if you ask me. Half the time they don't have a clue what they're doing; they just want to look smart.

Anyway, I'm getting bored, so I'm watching the black-haired lad a bit more, and yes, all right, maybe trying to catch his eye a bit. I told you, didn't I, he was a Monday to Saturday?!

And I ain't the most perceptive of girls, I know, but my mother didn't raise a fool either, and this lad, yeah, he isn't looking at the flowers, oh no, 'coz he's too busy staring at the red head.

Or that's what I first thought. I thought, typical, he's besotted with this girl, and she's getting married soon. How tragic.

I knew he weren't the groom, see, 'coz she'd already explained her fiancé couldn't make it 'coz he was at work. She'd come with a couple of mates.

So I just sit there, feeling a bit sorry for this poor lad who's in love with his mate's soon- to- be wife.

I ain't the brightest pin in the cushion, it must be said.

Anyway, to get on with the story, after a minute or so, the bell goes, and another customer walks in.

This blonde girl, absolute stunner, legs up to my elbows, and dressed up, dead formal. She seemed in a bit of a rush. She had this pale gray suit jacket and shorts and this trilby hat. She looked ever so sophisticated; I was well jealous.

Anyway, she grabs a bouquet of pink lilies, and comes up to the counter to pay, all flustered, fumbling about for her purse.

She paid, and left quick as a flash, but not before she'd eyed up the black- haired guy, oh no, she had time to give him a look.

He didn't even seem to notice her. Glanced up when the bell rang, and then carried on staring.

Well.

I guessed this guy was besotted with the redhead, but I'm not a complete idiot, and I know boys, and boys can be as obsessed with someone as is possible, but it won't stop them eyeing up a tasty treat.

Unless they're gay, of course.

You laugh, I saw that, saw you start to smile, but don't laugh too soon. See, you haven't heard the whole story yet.

You've guessed though, haven't you? I'm so bad at building suspense and all that. I can never tell a good story.

Anyway, yeah, you know now but I may as well say it. I just suddenly realized it. He wasn't staring at the redhead at all.

He was staring at the other bloke.

The tired- looking one with the shabby jeans. The one who was too busy helping the girl look at flowers to even notice the poor guy.

It was all I could do not to laugh out loud. It was all too typical, weren't it?

Dead gorgeous guy, I forgot to mention how he had dead nice clothes too, all leather and denim, and he's not with a girl, so of course he's bloody gay.

Shoulda guessed really, shouldn't I?

That Miss Evans girl seemed to be pretty oblivious, if I'm honest. Too wrapped up in choosing the flowers I think. But anyway, after she'd made her order and everything, and paid the deposit, I watched them leave.

I was trying to be perceptive see? I was trying to see whether the tired guy was going to notice the staring. The gorgeous one held the door open, and he looked a bit awkward really, and he really couldn't tear his eyes away from the other guy.

You see a lot of things working in a flower shop.

That was about a month ago now, and not much has happened since. Old Mrs. Weatherwood died though, it was awful sad, she used to come in here every Tuesday.

She was quite old though, so it weren't a massive shock.

It's a bit odd though, the old tramp what lives down by the old boathouse... he said he saw green fireworks the night before they found her. He said he's sure of it, and that they was coming from her house.

He's known for being on the whisky a bit too much, but he did seem ever so sure.

And there's rumours- no one seems completely sure of how she died. It's all a bit dodgy if you ask me, and there's been other things as well, odd things. Something's not quite right.

But you don't want to know about that, do you? You want to know about those two young gents.

Truth be told, I haven't seen 'em since. Miss Evans came back a couple of days later, with her fiancé, to show him the flowers.

He weren't interested, I could tell, he was too busy staring at her; I'd be surprised if he can even remember what flowers they ordered.

He was giving her the same sort of look Mr. Gorgeous was giving Mr. Gold-eyes.

I wonder if those two ever got together?