Page 34 of Bloom

I chuckled. “And the sweater, too.”

“Probably. They took me to a lot of stores.”

“Well, Robbie has great taste. They chose well for you.”

“I’ll tell him you said that.”

“Though to be fair and completely honest with you, I like your work clothes just fine too. Pretty sure it wouldn’t matter what you wear.”

His smile was shy, his cheeks pink. Then he gestured to me. “And you look great, but you always do.”

“Thanks.”

“It’s nice down here,” he said, looking up and down the wharf. “Busy.”

“It’s always busy here, but this is one of my favourite coffee places.” I pointed to the café nearby. “Are you familiar with Singaporean coffee?”

“Ah, no. But I’m down to try anything.”

I raised an eyebrow. “That’s good to know.”

He blushed again, then cleared his throat before he let out a rush of air. “Right. Oh, before I forget.” He reached into his pocket and pulled out a small, flat paper flower. “For you.”

Oh my word.

I took it, feeling its surprising weight in my palm. It was white and had four flat petals. “Keats, oh my god, it’s...”

“It’s a white pansy.”

My gaze shot to his. “White pansy. Is that a... a slur?”

His eyes went wide. “No!” Then he laughed. “No, no. Not at all. What?”

“Phew. I was having flashbacks to high school.”

He laughed but it was soon a frown as he put his hand on my arm. “No, I’m sorry. A white pansy... So my origami skills aren’t great and this one was kinda easy, and you said last night the paper flower I gave you was the best thing ever, so...”

“It was,” I said. “It is... it’s so pretty. And... I don’t know what a white pansy means. Does it have a meaning?”

His eyes went to the flower and his cheeks flushed with more colour. “Of course. It meansthink of me.”

“Think of you?”

His gaze shot up and he nodded. “As often as I think of you.”

Oh holy shit.

Maybe we could forego the coffee and just completely forget the shopping trip and just go straight back to his place.

“Uh, I already do,” I managed, my voice a whisper. “Think of you, I mean. I don’t know if it’s as often as you think of me, but I’d probably guess it’s equal to or more than. More than, probably. Definitely. I’m fairly sure it’s more than. I think of you a lot.” I offered him the flower. “Maybe you should take this and think of me more. So we can be even.”

He chuckled. “Keep it. I have about fifty back at work.”

“You do?”

“Yeah. I made a lot of practice ones. They weren’t good enough; most ended up in the bin. Like I said, my origami skills are a bit rusty. Lina wanted to strangle me, and she’d have probably got more work done if I wasn’t there at all today. But anyway, I finally made one that was good enough.”

I pressed it flat to my chest, careful not to damage it. “Good enough? It’s perfect. I’m going to keep it with the one from last night.” Then I thought about that. “Just out of curiosity, what kind of flower was that last night?”