Flower Girl

I fell asleep beneath the mud.

I woke up reborn.

Buttercup-colored canaries flutter overhead, their soft songs tickling her ears like feathers. Cicadas brighten the melodic tweedles with rhythmic chirps, pausing only when the sun dips behind the trees. Dewy grass sends a springtime scent through her nose, crisp and sweet like the first bite into a plump apple. Cool mist kisses her lips and wets her eyelashes. Water from a faraway fall gently flows downstream, caressing slick rocks and softening the edges of the bank. The stream stills only when it finds its destination: the pond in which she floats.

She is floating.

She can smell.

She can feel.

She is in pain.

Last night, she was a seed, planted somewhere beneath the mud. Today, she is surprised to find she has arms—two of them. And legs to match. 

Sharp pains zing through her shoulders down to her wrist. Her lower back pinches and her stomach bloats, full of air and nothing more. She wriggles her fingers, only to find they’re as brittle as the leaves on the forest floor. And her hips—they crunch as though someone is knocking on them with a hammer.

“Oh,” she says, interrupting the orchestra of the forest. The simple word tastes like cinnamon on her tongue.

Like a child learns from their parents, she has learned the English language from humans, now her brethren. Those hikers who stepped on her, trollopsing to some finish line uphill, have given her vocabulary. 

I am human now, she thinks.

Never has she wondered what being human was like. Never has she wondered, period. 

Seeds only grow.

Being a human…it hurts. She has bones, blood, muscle, and a thousand other parts she has not yet met.

She inhales, her belly and chest expanding like a balloon. She exhales, deflating below the pond’s surface.

Her breaths turn to bubbles as she realizes there is no oxygen here—and she does not know how to swim. She’s a riot of limbs as she flails her arms and kicks her legs. A thankful sigh leaving her lips when she comes up for air. Eventually, she manages to scramble to the bank, using stones as steps and roots as as ropes. 

As the sun shifts between the trees, she sits by the shore and waits for her flesh to dry. She breathes deep as the water returns to stillness, ripples melting into the surface to become one. 

Slowly, her reflection comes into view. The pain is eminent in the crooks and creases of her new face, but she is unafraid. She breathes in, and she breathes out.

Cross-legged, she sits and peers into the glass-like surface of the pond. She begins to recognize her face, gently touching her cheeks, her brows, her nose. Her unblemished skin gleams like the smooth surface of a marble. She widens her eyes and notices they’re a cloudy shade of blue—just like the sky that’s blotted out by the emerald trees.

I wonder what the sky looks like unmarred, she thinks. I suppose I can find out.

She follows the path so many before her have wandered before. The plants and trees and flowers whisper in her ear. They request that she return.

“I promise,” she says, the first words that emerge from her human mouth. Her voice is cracked, raspy, in need of practice. Practice which she promises to provide.

Promises.

She can make those now.

Eventually, the forest opens up to reveal a beautiful—albeit overwhelming—city. Flashing silver skyscrapers and concrete roads soar and twist above one another, a sharp contrast to the natural landscape that surrounds her. The city is like her new body: unlike anything she has ever seen before.

Honking cars pass by as bustling humans swarm around crosswalks, smooshed up against one another but ignoring each other all the same. She views the city at a distance before deciding to approach.

Eager as she is to walk into the city, everyone who passes by is clothed, and she is naked. She is new, after all. 

Inhaling deeply, she looks to her right and notices a small meadow just at the edge of the forest. She whispers a thank you to the flowers as she gently tugs them from their roots. A handful of yellow daisies, a bundle of blush roses, a smattering of blue hydrangeas, and a few tangerine lilies. The sweet scents fill her nose as she strings them together with roots and fashions herself a dress. 

“There,” she says. “It fits just right.”

Setting an intention to remember who she is and where she came from, she rolls her shoulders back and courageously strides into the city full of humans. There are many, and she is but one. This thought scares her, but she practices mindfulness with every step.

The sounds of the city are a mob of mosquitos in her ears, and she thinks for a moment that she may just return to her comfort zone in the forest. But then, maybe there is beauty here as well. Maybe there is happiness.

And so I go. 

As she weaves and wobbles through crowds and chaotic throngs, she spots a small building off the beaten path. 

This, she decides. This is the first place I should go. 

It is calling her. 

“Aria’s Gallery” is scrawled in hot pink on the small sign hanging off the building. A chime jingles as she pushes open the wooden door. Inside, the walls are covered in beautiful photographs and paintings of all shapes and sizes. She is about to express her delight to the woman at the front counter, but the woman speaks first.

“Holy guacamole,” the woman says. Her hair is strewn into a messy bun held together with chopsticks. She wears a smock covered in acrylic and oil splotches. With fuchsia-colored lips and bright green eyes, the woman is a whirlwind of colors. “I love your dress. I’m Aria, by the way.”

“Guacamole,” she responds. “What is that?”

The woman gasps. “You’ve never had guacamole? Here, try some!” She reaches below the counter and pulls out a cold, green tub. 

“That was convenient.”

“I get snacky.”

“Do you just…eat it with your finger?”

“I mean, you do you—but no. Here,” Aria passes her a bag of tortilla chips.

“I am starved,” she says, her belly rumbling as if on cue. 

I didn’t know ears could crunch, Flora thinks as she takes a bite. 

“Mmm..salty.”

“Made it myself.”

“You should be proud.”

“I am. And you—just where did you get that dress?”

“Made it myself.”

Aria’s jaw drops to reveal a glimmering tongue ring. “How much would you sell it for?”

“I hadn’t thought of that.”

“I’ll give you one hundred and eight dollars for it. I want to display it on my walls.”

“I have no use for money.”

Aria scoffs. “What’s your name?”

What is my name? 

“Flora,” she answers, surprising herself when the word springs from her lips. 

“Flora,” Aria repeats, reaching beneath the counter once again. Only this time she pulls out a wad of bills. She gestures for Flora to open her hand, and when she does, Aria places the cash atop the lines that etch her palm. Aria closes her hands over Flora’s. “You can’t do anything in this world without money. Take it.”

Flora is about to hand the money back when a resounding boom echoes in her ears.

“What was that?” Flora asks.

Aria points to a door to her right. Flora hadn’t noticed it before, though she is not sure how. A massive photograph of a woman twisted like a pretzel is plastered to an arched door painted peacock blue.

“My yoga studio—there’s a class going on, and Jinnie—the teacher—loves a song with a strong bass. Would you care to go in?”

“I do not want to disturb the class.”

Aria waves a hand. “You won’t disturb them. They’re deep in their practice; the students will not notice a thing. Oh!” Aria bends behind the counter yet again and, like a modern-day Mary Poppins, hands Flora a yoga mat. “Forgot I had this old thing. Go on in, try the class!”

“Alright then,” Flora says, curious to see what lies beyond the blue door.

Her jaw drops when the door opens, the sounds of “Free Falling” by Tom Petty filling her ears. She’s never heard the song, of course, but it gives her a sense of nostalgia. 

The walls of the room are exposed brick but painted over in cream. Vibrant green Spider plants hang from the ceiling, adding oxygen to the airy room. There are—one, two, three…nine —students in the class, and a teacher at the front.

Incredible, Flora thinks, the extension of her spine is incredible.

The students are in Supta Baddha Konasana, knees butterflied open, feet in prayer, and hands in a lotus mudra. They pay Flora no mind as she sets her mat down to join them. She is impressed with their mindfulness, with their balance, with their breath.

“Inhale,” the teacher says. “And exhale.”

Class comes to a conclusion, and Flora feels more herself than ever before. She feels connected to her breath and body, in community with the strangers that surround her, and wholly present.

Sweaty as a glass of iced tea on a summer’s day, Flora’s hand twists the knob to open the door to Aria’s gallery. She wants to thank Aria for the gift of yoga. But as the door creaks open, the gallery is gone. The space is now a juice bar.

In a long line leading to a clean white countertop is a beautiful woman with long, thick hair. She 

orders a Celery Juice. Flora does the same.

She spits out her first sip.

The salt-and-pepper-haired woman turns to Flora and smiles. “It’s nourishing,” she says. “There can be joy, and nourishment, in things we find unpleasant.”

Flora takes another sip. There is no denying it: the juice tastes gross. But it is not causing her harm, nor is it causing her pain. Flora decides to push her edge, to find the joy in the juice. 

She closes her eyes and thinks deeply.

Earth. I taste Mother Earth. We are connected.

As Flora slurps down the viscous liquid, a husky voice behind Flora spits out violent words. 

“Why would you order that?” 

Flora turns and looks inquisitively at the burly man, standing nearly six feet tall. Veins protrude from his neck, and his eyes bulge from their sockets. His hands, Flora notices, are gripped in fists at his sides.

“That is disgusting. You are disgusting.”

“I am not.”

The man slaps the drink from Flora’s hands. Green liquid spews on the ground, soaking Flora’s feet and the man’s Nike Air Force ones. 

“You don’t belong here. Get out.”

“Why are you so angry?”

“Because you are stupid, in my way, and you just got disgusting juice on my new shoes. How dare you?”

Flora says nothing. She gazes into his eyes and holds space for his pain.

After cleaning the spilled juice, Flora desires fresh air, so she leaves the juice shop and finds a bustling sidewalk. Across the street, a man draws Caricatures for twenty dollars. Flora thinks she would like to use the rest of her money on one for herself—the rest of the one hundred and eight dollars were spent on the celery juice. It’s true.

With eyes focused on the man hunched behind a canvas, Flora crosses the street. She barely processes what is happening as a taxi crashes into her side. Flora soars into the air and plummets to the hard asphalt. She feels a spark of pain, and then nothing.

The world goes black.

Flora wakes up in the hospital three days later. The doctor tells her she is wheelchair-bound for the next four weeks. She has broken three ribs and sprained her ankle. She will be fine, but she must rest.

She must sit. 

She has a visitor in the hospital: a woman who looks oddly familiar.

Flora asks, “Have we met before?”

“Yes,” the woman says, handing her a bag labeled ‘Tostidos’ and a small carton of green, mushy dip. “We have.” 

The moment the salty chips touch Flora’s tongue, she remembers. She remembers everything.

Weeks later, Flora heals. And for the next sixty-four years, she lives as a human. Along the way, she makes friends.

A woman with laughter so contagious Flora wished to be a monkey on her shoulder, who taught her tears were a sign of strength.

A woman with rings decorating her fingers, who whispered joyous poems and overflowed with grace.

A woman whose dark outsides were both at war and aligned with her deep, fearsome, yet delicate soul. 

A woman so wise yet full of so much wonder, with hair that flowed down like a dress to keep her children safe beneath her skirts.

When Flora is old, crippled, and ready to return to the mud, she enters the forest from where she first emerged. Walking on feeble knees and swollen feet is no easy feat. It takes Flora a while to travel to the pond, but her determination is strong. After two days, she finds her destination.

And she floats.

Flora takes her last breath as a human and sinks into the mud.

She is whole. She is happy. She is at peace.

She falls asleep beneath the mud.

She awakes a flower.

To life, she has returned.

A lotus flower blooms.