The Florist | ✓ (#Wattys2016)

lilies

lilies

5 years, 1 month before.

The worst thing about working in a flower shop is probably the swans.

When he first took the job, swans weren't the first thing on Dev's mind. They rarely are. It obviously came as a surprise when at least five of them had tailed a customer in through the heavy door and began attacking Dev as he shrieked and thrashed helplessly. How were you even supposed to defeat a gang of swans? This was not information anyone had ever thought to bestow upon him.

"Oh, yeah," his manager had drawled disinterestedly, not taking his eyes off his phone. "Yeah, that just kind of happens."

It has taken exactly five months of constant swan invasions for Dev to reach that same level of jaded indifference. He has even fixed a handy 'NO SWANS' sign to the door (to warn customers, but also in the event that swans gained the cognitive capacity to read English. Who knew what those bastards were capable of?) For the most part, his job is now placid, fragrant, and blissfully swan-free. Occasionally the odd swan will slip in after a customer like a bundle of feathery hell, but winter is approaching so the majority of them are heading south to warmer regions.

Clearly this one has not received the memo.

"Sorry!" screeches a customer, seconds after the bell above the door jingled, and a white, feathery hurricane tears into the shop.

It crashes through the mountains of blooming marigolds and poppies, knocking down a large display of violets. Then it turns, its soulless eyes locking onto the centrepiece of the shop: a giant vase spilling with tender, paper-like camellias.

But Dev is prepared.

Seizing spray bottle filled with water, and an airhorn, he leaps over the counter and blocks the path of the cygnine devil. The spray bottle in his left and hand the airhorn in his right, he primes his fingers on their respective triggers and he aims.

The swan bundles backwards, repelled by the collective outbreak of loud sounds and inexplicable wetness. Catching on, the customer jumps to action and flings open the frost-fringed door. When the swan had finally retreats to the pavement outside, the customer slams the door shut and leans back against it with a confused grin.

"I think we're safe for now," says Dev seriously, twirling his weapons like a cowboy. He drops exactly both of them.

As he scrambles to pick them up, the customer beams. Scanning him, then peeking behind her shoulder through the glass of the icy door, she confesses, "I've...never helped fight a swan before."

"Really?" asks Dev, straightening up and slamming his attack canisters down on the countertop emphatically. "I couldn't tell. You're a natural."

"Clearly not as natural as you?"

"Oh this?" He nods to his airhorn-spray-bottle-combo and juts his chin. "This took five months of constant swan-based warfare to perfect. Turns out swans hate frustratingly loud sounds and mysterious sources of moisture."

"Don't we all?"

He laughs loudly. "Well," he declares in his best raspy impression of a miscellaneous superhero. "I'm just doing what I can to defend this town, one swan at a time."

Some internal critic in his brain despairs at the fact that the second Dev is confronted with a pretty girl, his first instinct is to rattle off embarrassing swan-themed superhero lines. He forces his smile wider in the hopes that she would pretend he's said something cooler.

Her big grin melts into an apologetic grimace, and she glances back at the door. "I'm sorry about...whatever that was, just now. I should've taken more notice of the sign."