Flowers Aren't Delicate

I wake because of a sharp pain. Opening my petals and turning my stem, I see a fish chewing on the new lilly pad I started growing last week.

Before thinking, I swing the now barren stem and whack the fish across its face. Rather than staring at me with shock, like the birds that try to snack on me, the fish is quick to respond. It spins around and swims in the other direction. Before I can fully bloom and awaken, the fish turns around and starts heading back this way.

I prepare to attack again.

It must be staring. I can understand why, I'm the only thing growing in this small, shaded, shallow pond. I do pity it, but I won't let it kill me because of that.

I swat it away, noticing it seems much healthier than the other fish that have made their way into my secluded waterway. How did it even get here?

I look for where it came from. My first guess is that a storm blew it here, but that's impossible. Rain always wakes me up and the forest floor is dry. Looking closer I notice that my pond is almost twenty centimeters deeper than it was when I went to sleep; it's flooded. The water is flowing a bit quicker than usual and all my stems are taught.

Looking up, expecting the moon and stars to comfort me, I am faced with a burning, unforgiving sun. If I had shoulders, I would slouch. I'm supposed to be dormant during the day.

The sun's directly above me, so it's not close to dusk, meaning I'll have to go back to sleep before nightfall. When I do, the fish will probably attack me again. I've faced similar situations in the past, but I can't do the same today. The fish is big enough to cause me serious damage. The thing that's worse is that staying up won't help. The fish is strong and healthy, unlike the other fish I've encountered. Because of that, it will not die quickly, like the others did. Staying up for the rest of the day would make me weaker when it eventually attacks.

I have a choice to make. The first option is that I stay awake for as long as possible and try to outlast the fish. The second option is that I sleep, recover, and hope it doesn't attack me for the rest of the day. The last option is that I try to convince the fish to leave on its own. Since the pond is flooded, it still can. The last option is what I'm leaning towards, but I can't choose that without finding a way to talk to the fish. Another problem, for all the possible solutions, is that until the water level goes back to normal, more fish can swim here and try to take a bite out of me. If I'll be facing multiple fish, only option three is viable, but for that to happen I need to find a way to communicate with the swimming gill-having herbivores that keep trying to eat me!

I'm still looking up at the sky when I feel something approaching again. This thing is bigger than the fish and floating along the surface.

Trying not to freak out, I get my decapitated stem ready and turn towards what I think is gonna be a plant-hungry turtle.

…

That's not a turtle.

Floating towards me is a bed of luscious green leaves with a line of purple flowers.

It's another flower! I've never met another flower. I've never even seen one.

She's beautiful. Maybe that's why I react so quickly. I sense the fish as it lunges toward her dense roofs and I move before I think. I smack the fish with my decapitated stem, wrap it around her root clump and pull her to me.

Now that she's beside me, I look closer. Each leaf has a waxy coating and a thick stem. Each root is like as upside down tree; they branch and create a sense canopy. Each flower has a handful of periwinkle petals topped by a deep purple one with a well of yellow in the center. All the flowers are attached to the same thick, bent stem

Seeing the bend, not hearing her speak, and realizing that the flowers at the top of her are beginning to wilt, I freak out.

What do I do? What do I do! WHAT DO I DO?!

Back when I was still a seedling my first lily pad stem got bent. I cut it off, like my mother told me to, and I grew a new lily pad from the same stem.

Would that work? She's a different kind of flower. She might not grow back. Should I take the risk?

I use my decapitated stem to find where the bend is: it's about halfway up. There aren't any flowers underneath it, but there is the beginning of a bud.

In the time I've taken to freak out, three more of her flowers have started to wilt. It's time for a decision and I… I don't think anything above the stem can be revived.

I wrap my decapitated stem around the bend and pull.

Nothing happens.

I pull again.

Still nothing.

As I pull again, the thoughts start. If I can't get the dying part of the stem off, she’ll die and then I'll be alone again. I really need to-

The fish starts approaching.

The fish!

I manoeuvre her, trying to be quick. I drown her flowers, so that the bend is in front of the fish.

It bites down and chomps clean through.

I return the flower to my side as the fish runs away with the stem and the wilting flowers attached to it.

My last thought before exhausted overtakes me is that I hope she forgives me for breaking her stem.

*

I wake up when the soft, cool breeze blows against my bud. With it comes night and a fresh smell.

I bloom and start looking for the source of the smell, that’s when I hear a soft voice say, “Thank you for saving me,” from beside me.

I look. The voice came from a single purple flower blooming on a freshly cut-

It wasn’t a dream! There’s really another flower here!

Before I can think better of it, I try to pull her closer with my decapitated stem. When I do, I realize my makeshift limb is still wrapped around her, like it was when I went to sleep.

“I’m so sorry,” I practically squeal as I put some distance between us.

She chuckles. “No need to apologize. Before the storm shook me free, my family gave me a lot less space than you do.”

“You’re a seedling?” I say before thinking.

She laughs heartily. “I’m not.”

I’d blush if I had cheeks. “I’m sorry. I don’t know a lot about other plants.”

She cuddles me. “That’s okay. I can teach you.”

I pull away. “Wha-what? What are you-”

She stops me before I can get too worked up. “I saw what you did, how you saved me. I wanted to thank you then, but you fell asleep before I could get this flower grown enough to speak.”

“What does that have to do with teaching me things?” I’m so confused.

“You’re kind, strong, bloom during the night, and live in a secluded area that I couldn’t leave if I wanted to. What do you think it means?”

“You need my help…?” I offer.

She chuckles again. “Kind of.”

When she doesn’t say anything more, I prepare to ask my questions but then I remember. “The fish! Where is it? Did it hurt you? Are you okay?” I reach out to her with my leafless stem as I speak, but hesitate before touching her.

“It’s dead,” she says matter-of-factly.

I scan the pond looking for it, rather than dumbly saying ‘what’ again like I want to.

Before I spot the gill-having plant-eater, she explains, “A bird got it.”

“Oh.” I relax, but then I realize that the fish might have been here for a long time before I got caught. “Did it do any damage before then?”

“It was already dead.” Before I have to ask what she means, she explains, “I’m poisonous.”

I jerk away from her so violently I shake my roots. “Does that mean I’m gonna die?”

She laughs again, but this time she doesn’t stop.

“I’m serious! Some poisonous plants kill things just by touching them!”

“I’m not one of those,” she manages to say through giggles. “I’m a water Hyacinth.”

“What’s that?” I ask.

“We’ll know each other for the rest of our lives. You’ll figure it out.”

“What does that mean?” She’s confusing.

“You’ll figure it out.” She starts to close her petals.

“Are you really sleeping right now? I’m talking to you!”

“You can talk to me tomorrow.”

“I can't. I’m a night blooming flower!” I shout to her now closed flower bud.