B is for Bouquet

Splash. “What…” The flowers had all fallen asleep in the warm car on the way to the reception. And now they had just been plunged into a vase of cold water on a table.

There was noise and laughter all around. After the ceremony and the endless pictures at the park, the flowers had gotten bored and fallen asleep. But, this seemed like a party!

They could hear voices mixed together. “You look beautiful.” “What a great ceremony.” “Love the colors.” “Who wrote that poem?” “Where’s the booze?” “Look at that cake!” “Where’s Grandma?” “Stop running!”

It was all just so much to take in. The flowers were overwhelmed. A woman came up and sniffed them. “Oh, they are real. I wasn’t sure.”

Smells of food drifted across the room. Or at least they assumed it was food. Really, none of them had ever lived anywhere except a hothouse until they were unceremoniously attacked with shears and packaged in giant buckets. Then the jostling as they were taken somewhere else and sorted. Their friends went different places, although a few of them were all here. The person who put them all together had done more cutting and trimming and poking them in and squishing them all together.

It was quite undignified after their start.

The woman who had carried them around all afternoon sat at the table and ate something. It was brown and green and she seemed to like it. She seemed happy. So did the man who was next to her. People kept coming up and bumping the bouquet to talk to the two of them.

Music started and they went across the room and moved around together. Only a few of them could actually see because the rest were pointed the other way. “What is going on?” the others asked.

“They are standing together and moving around. Everyone else is watching them. Now, there are other people with them and they are doing the same thing with them.”

“Cake time!” someone called. The two people moved over to a table across the room and stood behind a table with a knife and more food. They cut it and fed it to each other and everyone cheered. They came back to sit down and more of the food was brought to them.

It smelled sweet, but not like flowers. It was a little like the fake flower smell that some of the people who had watered them in the hothouse smelled like. But it wasn’t at the same time. It was a strange smell.

Just then, a man came up to the table and reached over to hug the woman. As he passed the vase, he bumped it and it tipped over. They all fell over and some of them ended up on the floor.

“I do not like this place…” said one of the flowers being squished on the floor. “Can we leave now?”