Not Too Late

After a while, I stopped working so hard.

I returned to my old profession.

Sitting in front of the flower shop.

Doing nothing.

Enjoying life.

Arthur prepared tea, but I no longer waited for him to serve it.

I poured it myself.

I also discovered the second floor where he rested.

He had many handmade trinkets up there.

Little wooden birds.

Tiny houses.

Flower-shaped paperweights.

Whenever I liked one, I brought it downstairs and placed it near the counter to attract fortune.

Arthur knew I was waiting again.

But this time, I knew too.

I was waiting for him.

Did he know?

Men are sometimes slow.

One afternoon, when the shop was quiet, Arthur sat beside me.

“Miss,” he said, not using my name, “are you waiting for someone?”

I looked straight ahead.

If he did not get to the point soon, I would not come tomorrow.

Probably.

Maybe.

“Have you waited long?”

He answered himself.

“It seems you haven’t found him yet.”

I turned to glare.

Then he finally said,

“How about you stop waiting?”

My heart beat strangely.

“Look at me instead.”

He sat very straight, as if making a formal proposal before a court.

“I’m capable. Healthy. I should live a few more decades.”

I looked at him.

His silver hair.

The wrinkles beside his eyes.

The hands that arranged flowers so tenderly.

“Sir,” I said, “I am waiting for someone. Are you him?”

Arthur’s eyes held my reflection.

“I am now,” he said. “And I can be from now on.”

For a moment, I saw myself young.

Then old.

Then simply alive.

“All right,” I said. “I’ll keep you company.”

Arthur brought out a box.

Inside were property papers, savings documents, keys.

His whole fortune.

Then he gave me the most beautiful bouquet I had ever seen.

I almost laughed.

Was he not afraid I would take everything and run?

No.

I would not.

I had found the person I was waiting for.

Later, I told Daniel and Grace.

I expected Daniel to resist.

He did not.

He looked at me for a long moment, then smiled.

“I knew.”

“You knew?”

“When Arthur called me from the flower shop the first time, I could tell.”

“Tell what?”

“That he cared.”

Daniel looked embarrassed.

“I felt uncomfortable at first. Then I realized what matters most is how you feel now.”

My silly son had grown up.

Arthur and I visited Thomas together.

I brought flowers.

Of course.

“Don’t worry,” I told Thomas. “I haven’t forgotten you. I’m just still living.”

Arthur also took me to see his wife.

I told her,

“Rest easy. I’ll keep him company.”

In the end, Arthur and I registered our marriage on the same day Daniel and Grace did.

The clerk was shocked.

“A mother and son registering marriage on the same day? That’s rare.”

I laughed.

“Rare things happen.”

At my age, I still had a second spring.

Why not?

People think age decides what life can give.

Nonsense.

Every stage has its own flowers.

Mine bloomed silver.