Ben hands over a bouquet of flowers
placing them carefully into Julia’s hands
‘women like flowers right?
they remind you of death
but you don’t fear it like men do
women are real troopers like that’
Julia lifts them to her nose, takes an approving sniff
Ben remarks;
‘they say women like flowers because they like
to be reminded of their mortality, they don’t fear entropy,
not the way men do’
‘Who are they?’ she asks
‘you know, they, the people.
the cycle plays out, we all have a short time here
just the like the flowers, we can all be beautiful
expressions of life for a while, then we wither and die
just like the flowers
They say women like them for these reasons and more
they like the transience’
‘Thank you’ says Julia grimacing as she takes the flowers
‘least I can do’ Ben smiles and adds ‘you’re the ones who go
through giving birth, and menstruation, what warriors eh?
Least I can do, to express my appreciation for it all’ Julia places them in a vase with water
she sighs at the sight of a fallen petal
‘already beginning the end I see
Shoulda got me a bloody cactus instead’
Notepad Stories 