Chapter Text
Flora loved Alfea and most of the memories she made there.
Emphasis on the word most.
Not to misunderstand–she had such a great time fighting alongside her friends, befriending the pixies, selkies, animals, and achieving all of her fairy forms. There was just a teensy problem.
She had a massive crush on one of the specialists, Helia, that she never got over. It’s not like she never tried confessing to him! Just…things would get in the way. Letters, flowers, big confessions–those were all things she tried doing with the support of Aisha and Chatta. Pretty much all of them failed due to Flora’s cowardice, or just plain unluckiness. She really hates recalling an especially humiliating time, when she was on the verge of confessing to Helia. The specialists were in a rush; their battleship engine made it so windy and ran so loudly in that forest. She could barely hear him as she tried to keep her hair from being blown in every direction—yet Helia still waited for her to say whatever she needed to say before really having to leave. She wasn’t able to get her words out in time, leaving her with silent stutters falling out of her mouth and her eyes unable to look away from the dirt beneath her heels. Chatta scolded her pretty badly that day. That, with the fact that it took a lot longer for her to get her Charmix than her friends, made her sophomore year the worst one by far.
But that’s all in the past! Her days of running away from any interaction with him are over! Now she’s really far away, so now she won’t even have to interact with him.
Great progress.
Flora always wanted to open a garden shop after she left Alfea. Thankfully, people paid good money to have a high schooler fight random monsters. She saved up a lot of money in no time for her dreams. With the help of the winx, she’s been steadily setting up the shop.
…
Flora sets the talking plant beside the front door. “Do you remember what we rehearsed?” Flora asks, adjusting the pot of the plant on the bistro table. “When the bell rings, you say…”
“Welcome to Foliage and Florals!” The plant croaks out.
“Yes! Great job!” Flora can’t help but grin and rub the plant’s head. She turned around, moving to rummage through the last two boxes. She felt proud of herself, having nearly finished furnishing the small shop. Whilst she was digging through one of the boxes, the bell rang and the plant exclaimed, “Welcome to Foliage and Florals!”. Flora turned around, seeing Aisha with another box on her shoulder. She smiles slightly, laughing at the unique doorman.
“Where do you want me to put this?” Aisha asks.
“Over by the ivies, please.” Flora goes back to the boxes, setting a few plants down on the register counter. Aisha steps over the ivies, which have already made themselves comfortable in the shop. She plops down the box and takes a box cutter out. With a quick swoop, she peeks into the box. “More hanging plants…” Aisha takes one of the plants out.
“You can just set them on the counter for now.” Flora stands up, “Thank you again for helping with this. I know you’ve been busy ruling an entire kingdom with Nabu, so I really appreciate you coming here.”
“Of course, it’s the least I can do.” Aisha floats the plants over to the counter.
“How is Nabu, by the way?”
“He’s his usual self,” she shrugs before reaching into her back pocket, “Actually, he and I agreed that we wanted to be your first customer.”
“Aw, Aisha.” She smiled adoringly, stifling a laugh, “You know I only have lilies in stock right now.”
“I’ll take some of those then,” She placed $20 in Flora’s hand, “Keep the change.” Flora smiles as she grabs a few bags of peace lily seeds from the counter, reaching over the plants to give Aisha the seeds.
“Some more of the flower seeds should be coming in soon,” Flora scoots over some of the plants to prop her arms. “You know how to take care of them, right?”
“Don’t worry,” she glances at the seed bags in her hands, “You went on and on about them whenever they first arrived…but maybe write it down, for Nabu.”
“Let me go and get my notebook,” Flora went up a spiral staircase in the back of the shop that led to where she’d be staying. It was a bit squished, to say the least. Especially with all of the boxes strewn about. Regretting her decision to focus solely on the downstairs, Flora digs through a few boxes and grabs an old notebook with a pen attached to the side.
“Hey, Flora!” Aisha calls out.
“Yes?” Flora halts at the top of the stairs.
“Have you thought about that double date we talked about?”
Flora lightly grumbled. Aisha rolled her eyes, “Come on! I told you he’s a nice wizard who Nabu’s friends with. Apparently, he focuses on nature magic too!”
Flora walks down the stairs, “I don’t know…I’m sure he’s a nice guy, but…” She couldn’t find the words to describe how much her heart ached whenever she thought about opening up to a guy.
“...Is this still about Helia?” Flora flinches. She places the notebook on the counter.
“No! What would make you think that?” Aisha looks at her dubiously, then looks at the notebook. She lifts up the corner of the notebook slightly, flipping through before abruptly flipping one page wide open. It was a page with Helia’s name, small patterns surrounding it. Flora’s face flushed a deep shade of red. “That was in high school!” She whispers defensively. Aisha flips through a few pages, landing on one similar to the previous page.
“Oh, how funny. This one has a date on it.” Aisha points to the top right corner, tilting her head to read Flora’s handwriting. “Hm, yes…eight months ago.”
Flora quickly flipped to a random, empty page and began writing down peace lily care instructions frantically. “I’ve changed a lot in eight months!”
“Flora, I love you, but you need to get your love life together.” Aisha leans on the counter, glancing at the notes. “If you can’t ask him out, you have to move on.”
“I know, I know,” Flora whines, "But you know I’ve tried! Maybe my bad luck is…a sign from the universe we aren’t meant to be.” She sighs. Aisha wants to tell Flora how they’re both shy, oblivious idiots that are so obviously in love with one another that it makes everyone around them have heartburn, but all she can do is sigh along with Flora.
“I saw an ice cream shop on the way over here that looked really nice. I was thinking that all of us could get some when we had the time.” Aisha smiles.
“That sounds really nice,” Flora says quietly, “Could you text the group chat to see when they’re free?”
Aisha pulls out her phone, staring at it with a concerned look before unlocking it. Flora rips the piece of paper from the notebook, looking at her curiously. Aisha grabs the piece of paper and puts it in her back pocket, along with the seeds. “Nabu said something came up in the kingdom. I’ll have to head back.” She smiles, “Thanks for the lilies. Remember, you’re always welcome to visit Andros.”
“Thank you so much for helping me. I owe you one.”
“Hm, then how about getting a date before Tuesday?”
“What?”
“See you then!”
Aisha left, with the bell chiming behind her and the talking plant chirping, “Welcome to Foliage and Florals!”. Flora stood there dumbfounded, one hand reaching out in a weak attempt to stop Aisha.
Was she serious?
Flora huffed, turning her gaze upwards. She stared at the sunset through her shop’s windows, the sun peeking just above the shops on the other side of the street. “You’re only supposed to welcome someone in when they’re walking in.” Flora walks over and pats the plant’s head. “That’s my fault.” She smiles defeatedly. She makes the hanging plants float off the counter and carefully hang themselves on hooks in the middle of the store, just above another array of plants. Flora hums; she’d love some sort of music in here. Maybe she could ask Musa for a speaker she could spare.
Looking around the shop, she felt proud of its completed look. Now all she had to do was wait for the inventory to make its way here. She stretches her arms, which were growing slightly sore from carrying the boxes inside all day. “Hm, I should start unpacking my room,” She murmurs, peeking upstairs.
While she was in a rush earlier, the reality of her room settled in among the boxes she’d packed–The room was…quaint. The upper floor had enough space for the basics: a bathroom, oven, fridge, enough counterspace to place a cutting board, and a bed. She had even made some space for a sofa under her loft bed and a coffee table with her television on it. She takes off her sneakers and slips into her pink slippers. She was able to unpack a few things and form a path without boxes. Flora turned off the overhead lights and reached for the switch on her fairy lights. The lights began slowly dancing around near the ceiling, flickering in and out. Just before she turned on her television, Flora could hear a knock on the door. She glances out her window, shrouded in a deep blue. At this time of night? She slowly walked down the stairs, sighing in relief upon seeing it was just another package. Hastily, she went outside and picked up the box. It was moderately heavy as she observed the packaging. When the outside stickers gave her no clue to what it was, she ripped the taping of the package with surprising ease. Flora thought about what it could possibly be–Maybe those gardening gloves? Or the bulk pack of assorted orchids? Flipping the box flap revealed…
…yellow notebooks?
She flips through one of the notebooks. The paper was thick, and she could sense it was made from fern leaves. Tracing the tooth of the thick paper, she could almost make an outline of said leaves. It reminded her a lot of–
The store’s door beside her shop opened. Glancing around, she first notices the bright, warm lights emitting from that shop despite most shops being pitch black at this time of night. The light spilled onto the sidewalk, leading to what she noticed next. She couldn’t mistake it, not even in the low light.
It was the blue-haired boy she was so desperately running away from.
“Flora?”
Somewhere, in the back of her mind, she could almost hear metal gears clang as they began turning once more.