Intrusion

Jeanette Fields shielded her eyes with a vein rippled hand against a stream of sunlight cascading through the greenhouse window.  The sudden onslaught of rays left her defenseless, a shriveled raisin in a glass box.  She waddled toward an outstretched workbench, grasping the wide brimmed straw hat next to the lime green watering can.  Patting it onto her head, she stepped back to view her reflection in the greenhouse wall.  Her crinkled smile shone against a backdrop of ivory teeth and hair.  The hat ensconced her face in a yellow corona, an earthy halo.  Shifting the askew faux sunflower on the brim, she heard the strain of the screen door behind her. 
         "Mama, I'm gonna take a shower, so be sure to watch the door for me.  They said on the TV that the Publisher's Clearinghouse is coming through."
         Jeanette, still adjusting the hat, gave a dismissive wave of her hand, and replied. "Alright Leroy, just change your shirt will you?"
         Leroy freeing a dried noodle from its spaghetti stain prison, shifted in his canvas sneakers.  "I would if I had any laundry."
         "It's out on the line, and please don't smoke near my lilies!" Jeanette plaintively wailed. "I just planted them last week."
         Her son ground his right toe into the dirt, hands surreptitiously inside his pockets, eyes fixed on a nearby flowerbed.  "I wasn't smoking, mama.  I was just admiring those ruffled roses."
         "They're carnations, dear," Jeanette intoned. "but it's the thought that counts."
         Scanning his bedraggled attire, Jeanette finally found a thin epaulet of unsoiled t-shirt.  She gave it a gentle squeeze, and pushed and guided his lanky frame through the doorway.  With a final stoop of the shoulders and the greased black mullet's exit, Jeannette shut the screen door and sniffed at the greenhouse air.  Catching a nicotine whiff, she clucked her tongue, and picked up the crushed remains of Leroy's cigarette.
         "When will he learn?" She thought.  Six months out of High School and still no job.  He was a sweet boy, but he had his father's uneasiness; a restless malaise which permitted no responsibility, no concerns.  After he left, Leroy withdrew into fantastic dreams of unearned wealth: visions of lottery winnings, sweepstakes checks, and a life of comfort and ease.  Jeanette turned to the pleasures of ordinary life, joining church clubs, playing scrabble games at the Nursing home, raising Leroy, and in the spring: gardening.
         Gardening was her elemental pleasure, her intrinsic delight.  Here she spent countless hours, gloved hands coated in the black soil, planting tulip bulbs, watering marigolds, and pruning peonies.  The peonies were especially vibrant, wafting their soft aroma into Jeanette's nostrils.  Taking a small fertilizer pellet from her apron, she pried a small hole with her trowel, delicately sliding the pellet into the dark recesses, then filling and smoothing the soil.  She paused, hearing the soft hiss of the shower from the house.
          "I should take some flowers inside for lunch.  They'll cheer Leroy up after all the inevitable sweepstakes rejection letters come in the mail." She mused.          
         Taking the shears with a trembling hand, she searched for the perfect blossom.  Seconds later she discovered a voluptuous petal, gorged on a verdant stem.  Clinching the shears with a deft pull, she twirled the flower between her bony fingers.  The flower radiated a soft ivory light, the color of bath soap.  Its cut stem oozed a watery sap, caught in its final death throes.  Eager to prolong its remaining vitality, she rushed into the kitchen and grabbed a round glass vase.  She filled it with cold tap water, and slid the flower inside, stepping back to admire her handiwork.  The mouth of the vase was too wide, making the peony tilt tipsily toward the outer edge.  It needed the steadying force second flower.  Setting the vase on the table, she strode back towards the greenhouse, ignoring the black van parked outside.
         A pink rose would be the perfect compliment to the peony.  The texture and subtle contrast would create a floral embrace, two stems entwined in a common pool.  Jeannette joyously contemplated Leroy's mutual admiration for the centerpiece.  How could he not appreciate the tender artistry of her flowers?  Ignoring the knocks on the door, she knelt beside the hunched rose bush.  The three branches were furrowed with thorns, a protective hedge against potential intruders.  The treasure the thorns guarded, however, was virtually nonexistent, a paltry prize of two roses.  The first rose, an older robust strain, marshaled stately magnificence in its upright august repose.  A repose which concealed the second rose, a sickly sucking bulbous growth, stealing the stem's lifeblood.  A young offspring, choking out the life of the old.  Jeanette opened the shears, readying for the killing snip . . .
         She closed down as a panicked cry of "NO!" came from the house.  Leroy, bath towel held in check by a balled fist, raced from the bathroom, and slammed the front door.  His feet flapped against the asphalt, and his free arm flailed at the retreating black van.  Curious, Jeanette finished cutting the healthy rose, threw the parasitic bud in the trash, and exited the greenhouse.
         When she reached the kitchen, she found Leroy, huddled over the sink, shivering with rage.
         "What's wrong honey?" she queried.
         "What's wrong?!" Leroy yelled "YOU COST ME A MILLION DOLLARS!"
         "What do you mean, Leroy?"
         "That was the PUBLISHER'S CLEARINGHOUSE VAN!!" He snapped. "The van I told you to watch for.  You can't do anything right!"
         "I'm sorry, Leroy." She replied tremulously, taking a seat on a nearby stool.  "I couldn't remember." 
         "Of course you couldn't remember, you stupid cow.  Always fiddling with your flowers!  I give up.  I'm not losing any more opportunities because of you!"
         He strode out to his room, slamming the door, cutting off contact.  Jeanette, in stunned silence, processed the immensity of her mistake.  Leroy did slough off the chores, rarely remembered to say ‘thank you', and never came to help her deliver food to the shut ins.  It wasn't his fault though.  He was trying.  He would have earned those millions if only she hadn't decided to add a rose to the vase.  She should be punished for the enormous blunder, or at the very least apologize to Leroy.  She would go to his room, bring him lunch and a new lotto ticket, and listen to his grandiose schemes for riches, all the while bearing the insults of how she had wronged him.  Life would resume its domestic flow.
         For now, though, she would wait.  She skimmed through her recipe book, listlessly turning pages in hopes of finding a dish that would mollify her disgruntled son.  She flicked the rose, neglected by recent events, into the vase.  It swooned and spiraled to the glass base, then popped upright, resplendent beside the imperious peony.  Jeanette admired the blossom's majestic fragility.  In their brief defiant display, they exuded independent strength, something the trashed parasitic bud could never aspire to.