26

"What are you doing?" I ask, eyeing Soph as she photographed every nook and cranny of the store.

"We need before pictures," she says excitedly.

"So... your mom agreed to renovate the shop?" I raise my eyebrows, there's no way Mrs. Abebe would allow us to modify a single tile of this antique piece of Phoenix's history, with all its 80s glory, pink tiles and all.

"Uhm, it's a process."

"Well, I think we should start with that, unless you want to find out if gays really do go to hell — I've only seen your mom angry once, and once is enough for me."

"Oh, she wasn't even that angry, you've seen nothing."

"Yeah and I don't want to see it, so we're not doing any renovations until she says we can," I cross my arms. "Do you want us to lose our jobs?"

"Who'd want to work here otherwise, have you seen these?" she says pointing at her pink apron. "Plus it takes a fine and well-practiced hand to deal with flowers, you'd have to be either a lesbian or an ex-hoe."

"Why an ex-hoe specifically? And you're single-handedly insulting your mom and yourself."

"You won't find a hoe that is so desperate that she'd take a job as a florist these days, have you seen how popular OnlyFans is?"

"Oh."

"Where is she finding this kinda talent in this city?"

"I feel like she'd still fire us."

"One hundred percent, we'd more easily open a shop of our own..." she trails off. "That's not a bad idea actually."

"It's not but what about the money?"

"We can figure that out," she smirks.

"I'm sorry, I'm still hooked up on the fact that you called your mom a hoe."

"That was ages ago, Anna, move on," she says, side-eyeing me. "She was hot as a teen, you can't tell me she didn't have it good."

I simply hum, not wanting that kind of mental image in my mind. Mrs. Abebe is a nice overweight lady that bakes nice meat pies, cute ladies are born as cute ladies, period. "Are we really about to plan on becoming your mom's flower rivals? Because she has a solid client base, we'd be crushed."

"Obviously we won't be opening a store next door, we'll succeed out of demand, we must find a place with absolutely no competition, people will have no other option than to come to us."

"Sounds good in theory but most people will still drive the extra mile to go to someone they trust," I sigh. "And before anything, we need the money to invest, we'll have to save up for a good while."

"Ugh, when are you winning the lottery," she groans, letting her face fall on the counter.

"Lottery tickets are expensive, and chances of winning are pretty low. We're better off saving those lottery ticket money if we want to see that shop up and running in our late forties," I mimic her position.

"We both landed hot rich women, we can't be the failure wives."

"I'm sure neither Daniella nor Jenny thinks of us as failures, and I'm not saying Daniella hasn't conquered her own money but both of them were already born rich, it's not a very fair comparison."

"I know that," she sighs. "It's just that... I don't want to feel like I'm not on her level, imagine — Jeniffer Waterson, the greatest and hottest CEO, marrying a minimum-wage florist... Ah, I regret not caring about school, I've always said it didn't matter because I'd be marrying a rich guy but look at me now wanting to be the rich guy to treat a woman instead."

"Are you giving up already?" I raise my eyebrows.

"You just said it'd take ages," she raises her head.

"So what? I think we can do it if we play the right cards," I grin as a new customer walks into the shop. "Let's do our best."

⁂

"It's annoying, they're too well behaved — in the classroom at least — I hate it," Daniella groans.

"How come? You were always annoyed at us for not behaving in class and now you're annoyed because your new students are too well-behaved? Pick a fight," I chuckle, taking a spoonful of my lasagna. "How is this place always empty? This is so good!"

"I was annoyed back then but it was at least a little bit interesting, it gave me purpose as a teacher, trying to help students with no future such as yourself — it would rarely work but I could sit at my desk at the end of the year and tell myself I tried my best," she rests her back on the chair. "All of these kids have private tutors, they don't even need me."

"Oh, so this is an ego problem, I see," I joke, making her roll her eyes. "As you said, they're well-behaved as far as you can see. They're rich, they live out of keeping up appearances, and this isn't a normal private school."

She hums, a small pout on her lips that she tried to hide with a spoonful. "It's strange that this place is always empty but it's good for us on the other hand, until it closes at least."

"Makes me a bit sad, it's our lunch spot," I say, looking around, sure it's an outdated restaurant, it's small and you could probably walk past it in the street and not realize it's there, even though it's not very far from the center. "Maybe there are roaches in the kitchen... I'm ok with that as long as they're not in the food though."

"Don't say that," she squints her eyes at me. "It just needs renovation, people nowadays are all about the aesthetics of a place rather than the taste of the food."

"Talking about renovations..."

"Did she agree to it?"

"Not really, no," I sigh. "The flower shop is outdated but it has its charm, and customers know it for it so I understand that she wouldn't want us to change what was once something she fought really hard to conquer."

"How is Sophie reacting to that?"

"Not very well, she wants us to open our own flower shop."

"Seems... a bit overactive if the reason she wants to do it is because of renovations but I think it's doable."

"Is it? We are fresh from high school, we have no money," I chuckle.

"I'm not going to propose being an investor to your business because I feel like you'd kill me if I do, you have way too much pride in you, but you have my support, let me know if I can help you with anything — shops for rent, renovators, business advisors, I do have a lot of contacts," she says, reaching out for my hand over the table.

"Thank you," I interlock my fingers with hers.

"Sleep over tonight," she murmurs.

"I feel like you're slowly making me move, I'm sure 90% of my clothes are at your house already," I joke, giving her a smile that she doesn't quite reciprocate, her eyes are stuck on mine with a certain fire within them that tells me she wants more than just a few cuddles tonight. I'm not sure if it was the business talk but the look in her eyes is leaving me both excited and terrified. "I-I will."

"I'm feeling a bit selfish today as well."

"Uhm," I open my mouth but my throat is completely dry, and she only makes it worse by running her heeled foot up my leg, licking her lips in the process, leaving me like a complete dumbass staring at her with my mouth open. "I'll take care of that," I say after nearly gulping down my whole glass of water which just seemed to amuse her even more.

"Good," she says simply, retrieving her foot and focusing back on her food.

"You're terrible."

"You're just too easy to tease, that's why I love you so much," she grins.

I can feel a deep blush creeping up my face as she stares down at me but before I could so much as formulate something to say, a familiar face walks past me from the back and out of the door, so quickly that I could have missed it entirely.

Daniella follows my eyes, the playfulness from earlier dissipation into worry. "Who was that? Do you know her?"

"That's Mrs. Bardot, the lady that gets her flowers from us... she just came from the back of the restaurant?"

"Is it someone we should worry about?"

"I don't think so, no."

"What's with that face then?"

"I just think she's an interesting person, I've met her at the cemetery, she spoke to me," I say as if it was something extraordinary to which Daniella only raised her eyebrows. "She never speaks."

"Are you a senior citizen whisperer?" she deadpans. "She came from the back, doesn't it mean she either works here, which I doubt by her age, or is the owner?"