Potted Lillies

Potted Lillies

“Potted lilies” is what Tommy Flanagan heard from his beau Monica as she pulled back from him in her quiet sort of way. She stared at the front window logo of Rustic Garden shop, and then pushed open the door. “I’ll be a moment.” 

Enjoying a cool June in Pittsburgh, away from summer’s humidity, they strolled Walnut Street through the chic Shady Side neighborhood, home to brand name shops like Green Leaf Vegan, Mud House Coffee, and Victoria’s Secret. He plopped himself on an outside bench. While he felt redeemed by his mother’s approval of his new girl, he scanned the street: a smug lady in red held a white poodle; giggling teenagers held reflective shiny vintage bag, a tuxedoed man fixed his string tie in the front seat of a Ferrari at curbside. 

He almost felt out of place. Not a familiar face from his late nights of hanging out, except—except for that slight built female crossing Walnut Street, her urging a cheap baby stroller through traffic, the drivers braking and waving her on. 

Tommy Flanagan hoped she didn’t see him. What was her name? Two years prior they had drifted apart after a few disastrous nights of drinking. What’s-her-name now  looked out of place in the chic neighborhood: a smudge on her cheek, torn jeans, and stringy hair. She had worked as a nurse at a local hospital, he remembered, and spent weekends cleaning her apartment. She hated dirt, as he learned, but she drank liquor heavily as she enjoyed flirting at local taverns in Oakland.

Tommy kept on guessing at her name. He resorted to a mind game that a buddy taught him when he worked at a convenience store before landing a sales clerk job at Macy’s downtown. Go through the alphabet, his friend advised, and sound out names by letters.

He began with the first letter A and got to G but no obvious names fit what’s-her-name who, he recalled, enjoyed lounging half-naked on a cold concrete porch landing outside her apartment. She’d stare at a dark sky full of stars, her head on a pillow, her body wrapped in a heavy blue hospital blanket.  

He skipped letters H and I and got to J, recalling a few old names—Jessica, no; Jennifer, no; Jackie, no. He thought of K for Karen, no. 

A bunch of honking cars on Walnut Street disrupted Tommy’s name game at the letter L—at the same time that what’s-her-name passed blindly between cars. She then hitched the stroller wheels up and onto the sidewalk, barely twelve feet from Tommy on the bench. 

She started off in the opposite direction only to pause at a hardware store on the corner. Leaning over, she tied the stroller straps to a wooden bench against the wall and pulled open the door, the tingle of a tiny bell startling her.  He stayed put on the bench. Not Meranda, no, and surely not Teresa, as in Mother Teresa. 

Tommy glanced at his letter M—Monica inside the flower shop. He lit a cigarette. He considered that blue stroller parked on the sidewalk but the first drag of smoke gave him a rush, spinning his mind to that last night he dated what’s-her-name.

                                                            ***

They had driven to South Side, a neighborhood once known for steel mills and bars full of steelworkers. They attended a novo arts exhibit on the third floor loft over an old theater. He helped with her jean jacket, unveiling a flowery blouse, and noticed his mother there sipping a  glass of red wine.

She took him aside. “Where’d you find that one? She’s pale—all skin and bones. What, she don’t like corn beef and cabbage?”

“She’s okay,” he said. “Works at a hospital.”

“A nurse, eh? Back when you came visiting me, when I was sick at the hospital,” she said, “you disappeared on me, as soon as a nurse came in, attending to a sick girl in the next bed.”

“I can’t stay long,” Tommy said. “We’ve got plans tonight.”

His mother’s eyes narrowed as she sipped her wine. In the adjacent room, what’s-her-name laughed out loud at a comment from a visiting older artist of classical nude painting. “Just you mind your P’s and Q’s,” his mother said as she moved to the bar table of the reception. “We don’t want any little ones with blue eyes running around—now do we?”

What’s-her-name wrapped up her chat with the older artist; she nodded and gave him a goodbye hug. She grabbed her jacket, ready to leave.

Tommy drove his old Plymouth Chevy over the bridge spanning Monongahela River. They stopped at the Decade Lounge where Tommy started in on cuba libres of Bacardi 151 rum and coke. What’s-her-name drank draft beer and shots of Smirnoff vodka. Their intake of rum and vodka, he recalled, injected an edginess into the night. He expected the worst. 

At midnight, she began dancing, first with the Decade bar owner, then his frisky twenty-something son. He headed barside where he laid his head on the counter until he felt droplets in his face. She had come back, dipping her hand in a warm draft beer and sprinkling him awake.

“I’m going to be busy,” she said. “Go on home to your mother. Call me later.” 

She picked up her handpurse and walked out of the lounge, the bar owner’s son in tow on her arm.

                                                            ***

While waiting on Monica in the flower shop, Tommy Flanagan searched through the alphabet, testing names. He had gotten to N, O and P but skipped Q, and came to the letter R. No luck, no name came to mind. 

When he drew on his cigarette, an ember stung his finger. He stubbed the butt in a dirt bucket when Monica came out of the garden shop. She held two flower pots: a small one holding budded lilies; the other, a large pot displaying long stemmed large green leaves.

“Grab this one, will you please?” She handed him the pot holding five-foot large green leaves. “Aren’t these great, the lilies will open in a few days. I’ll put the big pot on my parents’ front porch or maybe in their living room. Or, would your mother like that one?”

Behind the green leves, Tommy only heard Monica’s words as he grappled with the large pot up against his summer jacket. He peeked around the pot of stems he held in his palms. Monica held one plant against her round face; the potted lillies in her arms seemed like a pearl necklace framed by her bobby cut hair and green sweater.

“Whatever you say.” Tommy began walking away from the nearby corner.

“Where you going,” she said. “The car’s that way.”

“Distance is about the same.”

“Let’s go to that corner,” she said. “Turn down the alley to the lot.”

A breeze caught the large leaves and the urn off skewed off balance in Tommy’s arms. He recovered and shuffled along the sidewalk, following Monica’s gloating in finding potted lilies. Before turning into the alley, she paused at the hardware store on the corner with near the blue baby stroller outside.

Monica scoured the street, before addresing Tommy with the question: why did someone leave a baby on the sidewalk.

“This pot is getting heavy,” Tommy said.

“Why on earth—?” Monica put her hand to her chin. “Why leave a baby alone?”

“None of our business.”

“It is our business.”

The tiny bell tinkled when the shop door opened and what’s-her-name came out onto the sidewalk. She placed a brown paper bag in the stroller’s rear pocket netting when she noticed Monica staring at the baby.

“Oh, sister, I know what you’re thinking—someone left a baby here,” she said. “I know exactly what I’m doing.”

“I wondered if—”

“If little baby’s left abandoned—right?” She crooked her arm on her hip.

“I’m so sorry, I thought—“ Monica’s face blushed as she glanced back at Tommy behind the pot of large green leaves. Then she handed off the other pot to him, too.

“You can bet your ass, honey—I’m not losing this baby to no one.” She leaned in over the stroller. “Want a look-see?”

“She’s a beauty.” Monica leaned over the stroller. “Lovely blue eyes.”

“Her father’s eyes. Well, I’m not sure who—get my meaning? I dropped that chump before I knew this little one was on the way. Might be another’s.”

“ I see.”

“Like I say, I do have my ways with men—like you do, I see.”

“How sweet to say that.”

“Pretty lilies, you have there.” She freed the stroller of its lock at the bench. “Today I’m cleaning house and needed cleanser and window wash. It’s a bitch cleaning house.”

“We have to go.” Monica deliberately stepped back to the pot of large leaves hiding Tommy and then kept on going down the alley.

What’s-her-name caught sight of the green plant that camouflaged Tommy. “You better keep on your toes with that one. Dot your I’s and cross your T’s—if you want to keep her pleased.”

He didn’t say a word as he began treading backwards into the alley. 

A gust of wind fluttered the large green leaves and Tommy grappled with the second pot of lilies. He turned facing toward the alley parking lot only after he saw what’s-her-name crossing back over Walnut Street. He caught up to Monica at the open car door.

“That woman’s young, and so frail,” Monica said. “She does everything alone—like cleaning house and raising a baby—so fragile like lillies.”

“That’s life, I’m sure she gets by,” Tommy said. “Buckle up.”

Before getting into the car, he came to the next letter of the alphabet game. He ignored the letter T, for he knew Teresa didn’t fit, and surely not Mother Teresa. He jumped to S when he recalled a TV show about a witch named Semantha.

“I didn’t catch her name.” Monica closed her passenger door. “Wonder how she lives and what she does without the baby’s father around?” 

Tommy Flanagan backed the car out of the parking space and hit the turn signal. He still had to traverse Walnut Street but dropped letters U through Z—and he never looked back until he realized he skipped the letter L, for Lilly.

—-