The Look of Love: A Novel (3 page)

“It’s fine,” Elaine says. “Tell him he’s welcome.”

Matthew nods, then turns to me. “Plans for Christmas? You know you’re always welcome too, Jane. And who knows, maybe you’ll hit it off with our new neighbor.”

I meet his wink with an eye roll. “
You
are incorrigible, Matthew.”

“Honey,” Elaine says. “Leave Janey alone. She doesn’t need the matchmaking services of Matthew Coleman.”

He grins.

“Besides,” Elaine continues with a grin of her own, “you forget that Christmas is Jane’s birthday.”

I grimace. “Yes, I have the poor luck of being cursed with a Christmas birthday. At least I get both out of the way on the same day.”

Elaine frowns. “You’re such a grump.”

I shrug. “I go into survival mode on December twenty-fifth. You know that. It’s brutal.”

“At least let me bring you survival rations, like a cake,” Elaine says. “You refuse every year.”

“Please don’t,” I say. “I’d honestly rather order takeout and have a
Scandal
marathon on Netflix.”

“That sounds depressing,” she says. “And what takeout place is open on Christmas Day?”

“Yummy Thai,” I reply with a grin. “They’re open every year. See? All covered.”

Elaine sighs. “At least give yourself a vase of flowers.”

I smile. “I can probably do that, yes.”

“How’s business going?” Matthew asks.

“Great,” I reply. “Booming, actually.”

If there is any constant in my life, it’s flowers. My grandmother Rosemary founded the Flower Lady, Pike Place Market’s original flower shop. It opened in 1945, shortly after the war, and when my grandmother’s fingers became arthritic in the 1980s, my mom, Annie, took it over until she passed away when I was eighteen. Mom’s assistant kept the place afloat until I finished college, and the baton was passed to me.

I grew up in the shop, where I’d sweep up leaves and petals and sit on the stool at the counter and eventually help Grandma arrange. “You’re a born florist,” she told me time and time again. “We have the special touch of knowing how to reach people, to make them feel.”

And I suppose she was right. Mom had it too. We knew—we were born knowing, perhaps—how the right blend of roses and freesia can help a man tell a woman he loves her; how a tasteful combination of chrysanthemums and yellow tulips can express a heartfelt apology.

I ache for my mother then, as I always do this time of year. Mom used to love Christmas, and she’d make it beautiful in every way, decorating every spare surface of the apartment with evergreen boughs and cedar garland. She’d never settle for a small tree either. Despite the space limitations, we’d lug home the biggest noble fir at the tree lot.

Mom’s cancer was sudden. A blessing, in some ways, as she didn’t suffer long. And yet, only weeks passed between the diagnosis and her death. It didn’t give me enough time to ask her the things I needed to ask her about life, and love. There I was, faced with losing the most important woman in my life, overwhelmed with the idea of cramming a lifetime’s worth of wisdom into a few final days.

On the morning of her death, I intended to bring her flowers, as I had done every few days. But the doctor called me at six a.m. He said to come quick, that Mom may not have many hours left. So I came empty-handed, tormented by the thought of losing my mother, and regretful that she didn’t have her beloved flowers beside her at the end.

But then I heard a faint knock on the door of Mom’s hospital room. A moment later, a young woman with a volunteer badge appeared, smiling tentatively. “Excuse me,” she whispered. “My boss said to deliver these flowers to your mother.”

At the time, I hadn’t stopped to consider how Mom knew this volunteer’s boss. It seemed an insignificant detail. And besides, Mom made a habit of befriending people at every turn, even at the end of her life. “Thank you,” I said, accepting the vase of flowers, with its gorgeous blend of blooms in stunning shades of pale green. “These are exquisite. Obviously your boss has excellent taste. Please, tell her thank you.”

Mom smiled when she saw the vase. Her voice had grown hoarse, and in a whisper, she said to me, “The last time I saw an arrangement like that, I was here, in this hospital. I had just given birth to you, honey.” Tears welled up in her eyes then. “But you know what? They didn’t come with a card. I never knew who sent them.”

I remember trying so hard to fight the tears as I watched Mom extend a shaking hand to touch one of the green roses in the vase, its petals as delicate as her pale skin.

When I think back to that cold morning in October when she took her last breath, I can still see her face: the look in her eye, her will to hold on, even a few minutes longer. And when the doctor entered the room and asked to have a word with me privately, I didn’t want to leave her. Every moment was precious.

But Mom smiled and called me to her a final time. “Your eyes, my dear Janey, have always been the color of new growth,” she said, placing her hand on my cheek. “Like the green shoots of spring on all the trees, like the flowers in this vase. You’re special, my beautiful daughter. So special.”

The tears came then. I couldn’t fight them any longer. “Go talk to the doctor,” she said, shooing me out the door. “And bring me back a coffee.” She smiled to herself. “And not instant or drip. Espresso. I want to taste espresso a final time.”

“I’ll be right back,” I said. “I’ll only be a moment.” I touched her cheek lightly. When I returned, with a double-shot Americano, Mom was gone.

My phone buzzes in my pocket as Matthew kisses Elaine good-bye and waves to me. “Merry Christmas,” he says, heading to the door.

“Merry Christmas,” I say with a smile as I reach for my phone. It’s my older brother, Flynn.

“Hey,” I say.

“Hey.” He sounds down, which is typical of my big brother. He’s melancholic, the way Mom described our father. While I have my flowers, Flynn has his art. A painter, with reasonable acclaim in the Northwest, he opened his own gallery a few years ago, as a way to surround himself with artists. The venture has paid off, both in being a successful stream of income and also in cementing him as a leader in the Seattle art community.

His good looks don’t hurt either. And if you ask me, Flynn has always been much too handsome for his own good. All of my friends had crushes on him when we were growing up. And they still do. He’s devilishly handsome, with his thick dark hair and light stubble on his chin. But at thirty-five, he still has no interest in settling down. Come to think of it, I’m not even sure if he’s ever truly loved a woman. But, oh, have there been
a lot
of women in Flynn’s life.

“What’s going on?”

“Oh, I was calling to say happy birthday in case I forget to call tomorrow to say happy birthday.”

I grin. “You are
such
a guy.”

“I am. But at least I remembered, even if I’m a day early.”

“Well, thank you, big brother.”

“Are you going to come to my New Year’s party?”

I sigh. Flynn hosts a raging party in his Belltown loft every year, and I make it my mission to do my absolute best to avoid it. Flynn’s scene is one that, well, I tend to feel a bit obtuse in: anorexic-looking women in skintight dresses, men with fully tattooed arms, and loads of smokers crowded on the balcony.

“I don’t know, Flynn.”

“Oh, come on,” he says. “You have to come. Maybe you’ll meet someone.”

“Meet someone? That’s the last thing I need.”

“Jane, have you ever considered the fact that a relationship could do you some good?” he says. “It’s just you and Sam. Don’t you get lonely sometimes?”

“My dear big brother,” I reply, “we may be related, but I am not wired the way you are. I do not need another person to make me happy.”

“You’re bluffing,” he says. “Everyone needs someone.”

“And apparently some of us need a new person every night of the week.”

“Please,” he says.

“Well, who are we dating now? Did things work out with what’s-her-name?”

“Lisa?”

I watch as Elaine fills the pastry case with lemon tarts, each with a sprig of lavender on top. “I thought her name was Rachel,” I say.

“That was before Lisa.”

“See?” I say with a laugh.

“Just come to my party, Janey, please?”

“I’ll think about it,” I reply.

“Good.”

I blow a kiss to Elaine, and Sam and I walk out to the street and round the corner. The Flower Lady is in the distance. The sight of it still warms me, just as it always has, with its old grid-style windows and emerald-green awning. Loayza—Lo—my assistant, has rolled out the carts to the curb. Barrels of festive holiday bouquets beckon passersby, and I watch as a woman lifts an arrangement of red roses and boughs of fir to her nose. I smile to myself. Who needs love when you have rewarding work?

“Morning,” I say to Lo, who looks up from the counter and pushes her dark-rimmed glasses higher on the bridge of her nose. We met in a college geology class and bonded over the fact that rocks made us drowsy. And so we took turns keeping each other awake on Tuesdays and Thursdays after lunch, at one o’clock, which is the very worst time to take a course that’s focused entirely on limestone and tectonic plates. Miraculously, we both managed to finish the semester with a pair of B minuses.

“I hate poinsettias,” she says with dramatic flair.

I hang my coat on the hook in the back room and reach for my apron. “So do I,” I say, glancing at the orders on the computer screen behind the counter. “But look at this. This may be our highest-grossing holiday season yet.” I roll up my sleeves. “Let’s do this thing.”

“Best-case scenario,” Lo says, “we finish up by five so I can meet my date at six.”

“A date on Christmas Eve? Lo!”

“Why not?” she says. “Who wants to be alone on Christmas Eve?”

To the average assessor, Lo could be (a) a hopeless romantic, (b) a dating genius, or (c) addicted to love. The number of men in her life is staggering, and she, not unlike Flynn, never seems to find any kind of lasting satisfaction with any of her conquests. Over time, I’ve begun to see that it’s the game, the pursuit of love, that Lo enjoys. I have decided that she does not love
love
, but rather the idea of love.

“Oh, come on, Lo,” I say. “There’s nothing wrong with being alone on Christmas Eve. And besides, you could always come over to my house.”

She grins coyly. “If all goes as I hope, I’ll be spending the evening at Eric’s house.”

“You know,” I say, shaking my head, “you’re going to get coal in your stocking this year.”

She smiles. “Oh, I’m tight with Santa.”

I open the cash register and eye the till, then say with unabashed sarcasm, “Yeah, because he’s an
ex-boyfriend
.”

Lo lets out a laugh. “He couldn’t be. I don’t date men older than forty-two, remember?”

“Oh, yeah,” I say, smiling. “I forgot about your rules.” I sort through a stack of checks from yesterday. “You like to write—you should write a book about dating.”

“Like a memoir, you mean?”

“Yeah,” I reply. “Or maybe you need a talk radio show. It could be called Lo on Love.”

She nods. “I’ve thought about that. I mean, I do have a lot of material.”

The bells on the shop door jingle. An older man walks in and pauses to look at the arrangements in the window. At first I don’t recognize him, but when he turns around, Lo and I exchange glances. “It’s Creepy Christmas Customer,” she whispers to me. I nod.

And, to be fair,
creepy
might not be the best word.
Unusual
, maybe, for his presence is a bit of a mystery. He comes in every year on Christmas Eve and orders the most expensive arrangement in the shop, utters no more than five words, and tips heavily.

“He looks like the kind of person who killed his wife and keeps her body parts in his basement freezer,” Lo had said once.

“No,” I’d said. “He just looks lonely.”

“I don’t know,” she had replied. “I don’t like the way he looks at you.”

And, I suppose, it’s what gives me pause this morning, and every Christmas Eve before this. This man pays attention only to me, not to Lo.

I take a deep breath and smile at him as he approaches the counter with a slight limp. He wears a pair of khaki pants and a rain slicker. “Hello again,” I say cautiously. “Another Christmas Eve.”

He nods.

“Will it be your usual arrangement?”

He nods again, and I immediately get to work on his flowers, snipping and blending until I have just the right mix.

“Will this do?” I ask, holding the vase out to him.

“It’s perfect,” he replies, eyes fixed on me.

“Good,” I say, ringing him up.

“Merry Christmas.” He hands me a wad of cash. He doesn’t smile, just stares at me for a long moment, and for a tiny second, I can see a flicker of feeling in his eyes. Sadness? Regret? Flowers have a way of stirring up emotion in people. Memories of love found and lost, Christmases past, new beginnings and finish lines—all can be conjured up by petals and greenery. Perhaps that’s why he comes every year. To remember.

“Merry Christmas,” I reply as he walks out the door, bells jingling as it closes behind him.

Lo leans over my shoulder as I count out the one-hundred-dollar bills on the counter. “One thousand dollars?” she says, annoyed. “The dude is weird.”

I shrug. “He’s definitely odd—but hey, I’m not complaining.” I tuck the cash in the till. “This will pay for those two windowpanes that need fixing up front.”

Our mysterious customer is forgotten the moment a man in his midforties enters the shop. He’s tall, with slightly graying hair and a strong-looking face, a bit weathered, as if he’s spent too many summers at the beach, but the look suits him somehow.

“Can I help you?” Lo asks, walking toward him. He pauses, the way most men pause when in Lo’s presence. She’s beautiful in an old-fashioned way: porcelain skin; dark, perfectly straight hair (a unique combination passed down from her relatives in the Basque region of Spain); an ample chest and tiny waist.

The man rubs his forehead. “Yes,” he says quickly. “I’m stopping in to pick up an arrangement of flowers for . . . Christmas. My . . . we . . . we have a lot of family in town. I thought we could use something for the table.”