Eden

"And that does not worry you in the least?"

"Would it help if it did?"

"I wouldn't know. I'm not the one married to an attractive woman!" 

Six year old William's unabashed honesty had the latest member of the family in splits, exposing the premature crowfeet around his eyes. His laugh resounded soft and genial with a nervous ring to it as he drew and clutched his palms together in a mock clap. The other children were delighted and began to warm up to their curious Uncle Joe. 

"Looks like Uncle Joe is all shy to go on!" piped Evelyn, which drew another round of laughter from all of them. Even deaf Nana who sat most days on the recliner muttering gibberish, found herself smiling slowly as if she understood everything that was happening in the room. 

Joe took his horn-rimmed spectacles off to wipe it clean. The baited silence in the room made him giggle in bursts, not entirely from amusement though. His palms were sweating profusely by now. 

"How would you little monsters like a story then?" he asked distractedly. The children furrowed their eyebrows, not entirely pleased at their question being waived aside for a story, but the gleam in their Uncle's eyes were unmistakable. His benevolent mischief was proving to be contagious. 

"In a foreign land far away from here, there was a high, misty-walled garden once; it stretched as far as the eye could see! The trees and plants that grew in there were magical; so much so that the legend about this mysterious garden drew visitors from far and wide. The expanse boasted of some of the finest evergreen magnolias interspersed among birches and poplars that lined the gravel pathway network of the garden. A few hardy elms and sappy baobabs dotted the landscape too. The Gardener was..."

"How come there were no flowers in this garden?!" interrupted the ever impatient William. 

Uncle Joe smiled patiently. He had his young tormentor exactly where he wanted, "Oh but the garden did have flowers! So many of them colored in the brightest of hues imaginable! The flowers were the Gardener's pride." 

"There was a Gardener?" 

"Of course!" 

"In a magical garden?" 

"Yes. He was left in charge of the premises at the behest of a strange and bizarre bearded wizard whom men had long forgotten. The magic that coursed through the land was of his doing." 

The children stared at him mesmerized. Uncle Joe had brought his A-game to the table. "And it was this very same magic that reared the blooms, Bill.. At night, one could see fireflies forming a quivering blanket along these flowers. They'd then spiral into the sky at the break of dawn." 

"Wow"

"Among the many marigolds, orchids and tulips that were grown in the garden, the caretaker had a favourite. Nestled within the heart of the garden, it was a... water lily by the pond. A family of frogs took care of it!" 

"A water lily?" questioned a nonplussed Richard, who was silent until now.

"Why yes, a water lily." chuckled the narrator. 

"But I don't like water lilies."    

"What flower do you like then?" 

"I love petunias!" chimed Evelyn.

"Oh!"

"Ooh ooh, I love chrysa-ant..chrysanthemamas!" stuttered Emma. 

"Haha, you love chrysanthemums eh?" 

"I like roses.. but.." replied Richard finally.

"But... they've got pointy thorns?" Uncle Joe cocked his head comically.

Richard nodded. "...but they are beautiful."

"Yes yes, and so it is with all things beautiful. What do you know, it was a rose and not a water lily back at the garden!"

"Really?"

"Yes! A lone coral bloom streaked with crimson in a wide expanse of shrubs, the enchanted visitors would find its shape and whorls mesmerizing. It was a rose like no other, reminiscent of the old garden variety yet blossoming like the floribundas - the scent, ever so calming, lingered on for miles together."

"And the family of frogs?"

"They guarded the rose from all forms of pests and insects. They would swell up their throats menacingly and croak faster when an intruder got too close for comfort!" Joe hunched his back, bulged his eyes and croaked for effect. 

"The tourists, however, failed to be intimidated by the frogs. They would callously trespass to click pictures and yet there were others who became desolate bards, singing its praises in yearning. Men and women, young and old alike, were drawn by the energy that the rose radiated. So much so that a few feverish ones would go beyond the barricade to try and pluck it, only to fall prey to the well concealed arrangement of thorns around it."

The Gardener would watch all of this from afar with a smirk on his face. When the sun bid adieu for her daily repose, he would amble into the park and stop by the perimeter of the prime attraction in his garden. The frogs would stare at him unblinking, their croaks absent, as he would reach out gently, caressing the outer petals of the majestic flower ever so gently. 
"You are mine. Keep growing strong." 
Almost on cue, the fireflies around the rose shrub would glow in bright pulses and the air would be filled with a deep, invigorating scent." Uncle Joe had his eyes shut as if he ceased to exist in the living room and had materialized elsewhere. 

He opened his eyes, "...the kinds with which you get goosebumps!" he said with a lazy smile.     

The children had wonderstruck eyes as they hung onto every word their Uncle had to say. They looked at one another and smiled when they recognized the same dazed expression in each other's faces.

"Did he have a name for the rose?" William asked.

"Juliet. The rose was named Juliet." Everybody turned to the person having a good time in her recliner. Her smile was guileless from the absence of teeth.

 "How did you know Nana?" Evelyn stared at her grandmother agape. But the nonagenarian kept laughing oblivious to all the gazes fixed on her. 

"Is this true?" all of them looked at Uncle Joe accusingly. "The rose in the magical garden... had the same name as our Aunt?!" 

"What a strange coincidence." shrugged Uncle Joe as he lifted his hands up in mock surrender. 

There was an excited uproar in the flock. 

Surreptitiously, the botanist winked at his spying wife. 

The Wallflower

The rain had never felt so annoying. Stranded in the middle of the bus depot, huddled under the refuge of a rusty roof, he silently cursed everything from the Weatherman in the Heavens to his charge-starved mobile phone. With no means to challenge the slow, painful onset of boredom, he kept his calm and decided to while away time with an unintelligent and primal hobby he had developed some time ago. Across him on the bench was a girl roughly his age with an average face and a giggle that annoyed him as definitely as the rain did. He was quick to avert his eyes as he said ‘One’, distastefully to himself. The eyes went back to scanning the vicinity. 

The trick was to make an impulsive judgement in under five seconds using the subtlety of a cursory, fleeing glance; anything more or less would be biased or creepy, depending on how he felt about it. The presence and choice of indirect vision was justified if it helped the cause, though best avoided as far as possible. Yet another crossed him in an unattractive pink chudidhar, hair tied in long, unflattering braids. The copious oiling of it did not help either. ‘Two’ he said as the mental counter climbed up. A hawker by the roadside grinned at him to reveal several missing and broken teeth; all in an earnest bid to coax him to buy vegetables from her. He politely shook his head negatively, “three”…  

The count had reached 153 within a span of a half hour and was still going strong, even as he added another to the counter of unattractive ladies pervading his city habitat. 154. When the restless twiddling of his thumbs had started, he consciously broke the habit to scratch his scraggly beard and adjust his posture impatiently.. 154! ‘Where is everybody?’ he thought, only to cynically answer his own question ‘This is your town. Everybody is right here.’ The thought amused and irritated him equally.

Around the same time, he spotted a garrulous bunch making a beeline for the bus depot. It was a perfect stereotype of a gang of friends as popularly seen everywhere, he thought to himself - The fatso, the loud one, the wannabe-hunk, the flaky skin-and-bones (ugh, 155!), the nerd, the shorty and… the wallflower… The dark blue framed wayfarer glasses were perched gently on a button nose, shielding a pair of bright, brown, almond eyes against a warm complexioned face he would find hard to forget anytime soon. Nestled within a hoodie, her face seemed equally irritated at the downpour; furrowing her brows in a comic expression as she looked up at the bleak skies. The gum she had been chewing on, blew into a bubble and burst on her mouth. The tongue quickly stole it back to where it belonged and he had a good look at her bare yet full, shapely lips. Veiled in a rare charm of plainness, they seemed just about right. He could not help the wry smile playing around the corners of his mouth as mild trepidation of his lingering gaze took over. He looked away and beamed like a complete idiot as several sensations swept over him terminating in a familiar tingling along the nape of his neck.  
‘Counter reset to zero’ he announced to himself softly. 
155 on a rainy day in this wretched town. 
Not a bad day after all.