I love how all this lewd posting, rubymaru is no where to be found. So uhm “hi girls! How are you two? Doing good?”
"Good, zura!" Hanamaru smiled, taking a bite of her noppo bread. "Ruby and I are gonna go see a theater later! I haven't been to one in years, zura!" She cheered, throwing her hands up in excitement.
"U-Uu... Ruby is doing good, Anata..!" Ruby squeaked, hiding shyly behind Maru. "W-We're gonna see the show uhm... Legally Blonde, I think it was called..? Ma-Mari gave us the tickets..!"
"I can't wait, zura! I don't really get the title, but it sounds fun!" Hanamaru chimed in.
"Pigii!! M-Mmhm! Mari said it was about big fluffy yellow teddy bears!"
“Dawn, let meclue you in on something; ‘he’ll make dad flip’ is not a good basis for a relationship.”
Marianne’s sister was putting together another stupid bouquet or corsage or whatever it was this time, humming something boppy under her breath. She cut the song off and turned to glare at her. “That is not why I like him.”
“You just said so!” Marianne said.
“Nooo,” Dawn countered. “I said it was one reason – not the only one!”
Marianne lounged back against the cutting counter – both sisters were in the back room, with business fairly slow. The Valentine’s Day rush wouldn’t begin for another week or so, but they’d spent the morning decorating the window displays and preparing all the same. “Alright then, why else do you like him?”
She faltered, picking at a few white roses that lay cut on the table. “He’s – well I mean he’s so- he’s very-“
Marianne nodded her head seriously. “Ah.”
“You hush!” Dawn snapped. “He had amazing eyes.”
She blinked, a little taken aback. She hadn’t noticed that, but then, she hadn’t really cared to look too closely at him. She had just wanted to grab Dawn and get out. She tried to call his eyes to mind but only remembered them being in shadow. The whole shop had been in shadow it had felt like. “Eyes are not a good basis for a relationship either,” she finally retorted.
Dawn groaned. “Oh, Marianne, you are the least romantic person I’ve ever known. Is this because of the Roland thing?”
“Please don’t call it ‘the Roland thing,’” Marianne said, echoing her sister’s groan. “You sound like dad.”
Dawn cringed, an appropriate response to that comment; the girls both loved their father, but he was not particularly knowledgeable when it came to understanding his daughters – or females in general. She shrugged it off after a moment. “It doesn’t matter, anyways. I’ll think of other things I like when I see him again.”
Marianne went still. “When you see- when you see him again?” Dawn nodded, cheerfully and she shook her head. “Nuh-uh. No way. No, you are not seeing him again, Dawn.”
Her sister’s petulant scowl returned. “Now you sound like dad.”
“I do not!”
“You do so!”
“I’m just looking out for you-!” she protested.
“Ah, see! That’s exactly what dad would say.”
“It is not!”
“It is so!” Dawn cried, but she was laughing now. They both were. When the laughter faded Dawn added, “Marianne?”
“Yeah?”
She was looking again at the flowers she had been piecing together. “Am I still grounded for- you know…”
Marianne eyed her warily. “…Yes.”
“How grounded?” She asked.
“Why do you want to know?” She asked, already having the answer in mind.
Dawn was studiously not looking at her. “Well, there’s a hop tonight and I-“
She raked her fingers through her hair with a growl of frustration. “You drive me CRAZY, you know that?”
“Would it make you feel better if I took Sunny with me?”
“No,” she said shortly. “Besides, Dawn, you need to get your head out of the clouds and look at what’s going on around you – Sunny will do anything for you, but when you do something really silly someday who do you think is going to get punished for it?”
Dawn sobered instantly at the idea of anything happening to her best friend. Marianne sighed, feeling a twinge of guilt for sounding so harsh just then. “Look, go to your hop if you want. I know you love dancing.”
She brightened instantly. “Really? Oh, Marianne you’re tops, you really are!” She hugged her so tight Marianne squeaked. She held back another sigh. Dawn would not be so pleased to know that her older sister had more than half a mind of following her to this party. Who knew? Maybe it would be uneventful, maybe Dawn would fall for some golden jock and the tattoo parlor would finally be put behind them. She could hope at least.
Dawn flitted about, going to put a record on while she finished her newest gift. Marianne rubbed one temple as she worked out how her plans for the evening would go. Sunny would have to tell her where the party was, of course, and she’d have to wait at least half of an hour before following.
She woke out of these thoughts when the bell at the front door gave its tiny ring. Dawn started as well, but Marianne waved her off. “I’ll handle it – you just keep making your… is that a boutonniere?” Her sister nodded gleefully, and she sighed. “Right. I’ll be back in a bit.”
“Try not to scare anyone off this time!”
“I make no promises!” She called back, rounding a corner and pushing open the door to the shop floor.
Standing at the very edge of the shop, tall and dark and wholly out of place, was the greaser from the tattoo parlor.
Marianne stared at him, aware she was openly gaping in horror. Her mind spun through several thoughts in the space of a few seconds.
First, that Dawn certainly had not remembered him clearly because this was not some silver screen worthy James Dean bad boy as she had been rhapsodizing near constantly. He was sharp angles and an expression like a thundercloud at all times. He was too far away for her to see his eyes clearly but she couldn’t imagine them making that look any more appealing.
Second, why on earth was he there? Two options were presented before her; that he hadn’t taken kindly to her impulsive present of a rotting bouquet, or, worse, that Dawn’s gifts had by some magic won him over. Dawn having a short-lived crush on a greaser was frustrating, but manageable. Him returning the feelings was out of the question.
Third, Dawn could NOT know he was there.
“What are you doing here?” She hissed at last.
Whatever her expressions had been doing during her thoughts, it did nothing to discourage him. “You show all your customers this courtesy?” He asked.
She ground her teeth, remembering Dawn’s words about scaring people away and wished in vain for the ability in that moment. “Customer?” She said. “Well, aren’t you lighting up the tilt sign.”
He raised his eyebrows, raising his hands in an ironic surrender. “Got no reason to lie, princess.” She growled, before she could stop herself, at his form of address. “Last I knew, florists are where you go when you want flowers.”
She said nothing, crossing her arms before her, the best ferocious scowl on her face. She caught a flicker of a smirk, as if her stubborn unwillingness to surrender somehow pleased him. It was her luck; the one person she wanted to scare away found her entertaining.
Finally she glanced around and added, “How’d you find this place, then?”
“You writin’ a book?” When she only held his gaze levelly he added, somewhat exasperated. “My aunt owns the perfume shop on this stretch.”
Marianne blinked. She knew the place perfectly, everyone knew the place. The Primrose Perfume Emporium was something of an oddity that no one quite knew what to do with. The shop’s owner, a woman known exclusively as Plum, was an oddity herself. No one knew her age or anything about her family and she changed her appearance more often than anyone considered natural or healthy. She found she wasn’t surprised at the relation.
“You still haven’t answered why you want them.”
“You still haven’t asked.”
“I did, too!” She snapped. “When you came in!”
“Lovely greeting, that was,” he said. She noticed he had an accent, just on certain words. It interested her. She didn’t like being interested. She didn’t like that he was still there – Dawn would come out any minute and the sight of him would rekindle all her romantic daydreams.
Thankfully her prayers were answered, though not the way she expected. The door slammed open again, nearly smacking him in the back of the head – he had not once stepped away from the door during their conversation. He turned, “What?” He snapped, his voice suddenly several shades harsher.
It was one of the two… employees, she had seen the week before. The shorter one, wringing their hands. “Should we be… going, now, boss?”
“What?” He asked again.
The voice dropped to a whisper, “Well, you said to come and say so if you were in here longer than-“
“I know what I said, now get out!”
“Yes, King, sir.” The greaser said, quickly ducking his head out as quickly as he’d come.
He looked back at Marianne who, in spite of herself, could feel a smirk of her own on her face. So that’s how it was. She’d continuously been more than he was expecting – no need to stop now.
“’King'?” She asked, casually gazing at her fingernails. “Very humble.”
He cleared his throat. “It is my last name.”
“Ah,” she said. He shifted again. He was uncomfortable now; it delighted her. As did the realization of how to get rid of him. “Well, if you’re going to be going…” She smirked, fishing around under her desk. She had found the rotted remains of a failed boutonniere the day before and had planed to hide it in Dawn’s wrapping as she had before – but she was flexible.
Coming from around the counter she walked confidently up to him, pleased by the way he stiffened, an expression of discomfiture and interest on his face as she stepped nearly toe-to-toe with him. His eyes – blue, Marianne noticed, a clear, nearly impossible shade of blue – widened a little. She took the disgusting thing and with sure movements pinned it to the lapel of his leather jacket.
“There. Suits you,” she said, smiling mockingly into his face. “You got what you came for – now get out.”
His crony seemed to have heard because the door opened again and now two pairs of hands dragged the man out. The door gave a satisfying bang as it closed, the bell ringing for a few extra seconds. Marianne stared at it for a moment, not really seeing it as the somewhat surreal quality of their second conversation – second argument – really sunk in. She had no idea what to make of him – she still didn’t really know why he had even come.
“Mari?” Dawn poked her head out after… well, she wasn’t sure how much time had passed. “Who was it?”
Marianne turned to her sister. “I- uh- ahh-“ she waved a hand vaguely, not sure what to say, what not to say, what had just happened.
Dawn looked at her for a long moment. Then shrugged. “Weelll, okay! I’m going to go get ready for the hop, okay?” With that she disappeared again.
