Part 1
I was twenty when I first started working at the florists' shop on Broadway. It was a cold, wet, clinging sort of winter, and I was hardly thrilled to be out pounding pavement, knocking on doors at business after business. It seemed as though the strip was already full of dishwashers, greasers, and clerks. When I pushed the glass door back, ringing the little brass bell above, I sighed, expecting yet another refusal. And I didn't particularly care -- flowers held little fascination for me.
"Come in," I heard a musical voice say, ringing like the bell above the door.
Inside the walls were wrapped with greenery and flowers of all colors. Even the countertop was covered. A few old sticky notes clung helplessly to the cash register. The place was quiet, and a little dusty, but it smelled like -- well, like a bouquet of flowers. As I stood awkwardly in the center of the room, hands jammed in my pockets, I looked around for the source of that sweet, song-like voice.
She stepped out from the back room and instantly a shiver ran through my body, instinctively. I had expected the florist would be a woman, but not one like this.
From head to toe she radiated warmth. Thick, wavy black hair fell to her shoulders, a few streaks of gray betraying the years that her nearly perfect skin kept hidden. She had large, dark brown eyes, accented with a bit of liner, a delicate nose, and full, red lips. In stark contrast to the colorful walls of her shop, she was dressed entirely in black, wearing a turtleneck sweater and a skirt, both of which hugged the curves of her body. And what curves! She had a generous hourglass figure that woke stirrings in my heart -- and other places. I was speechless.
"Well," she said, arching her eyebrows amusedly at my silence. "Can I help you?"
"I -- I'm looking for a job," I said, hoping I wasn't blushing.
"Oh, really?" she asked. "Not here picking out roses for your girlfriend?"
"No, ma'am," I stuttered. "I, er, don't have one."
"Well there's no need to call me 'ma'am,'" she answered, stepping behind the counter and placing both hands atop it, wrists turned out to reveal beautiful white forearms. Her eyes narrowed, and her luscious lips pulled slowly into a smile. "I'll have you fill out an application, but that's really just for show. You seem like a nice boy. I assume you don't have an arrest record or any sort of ugly things I need to know about?"
"No," I replied.
"And what kind of hours can you work?"
"Oh, any," I said. It was true -- I had hardly anything going on.
"Great," she answered. "I'm Angela Valletta, by the way. You can call me Angela -- there's no need to be formal around here. As a matter of fact, you'll be the only employee. I don't suppose you mind being left alone from time to time?"
"No, that's fine," I said.
"Wonderful." She reached out and took my hand, pressing it between her narrow fingers. Shivers ran through my arms again, and I hoped it didn't show.
"I have a distinct feeling," she said, "that you're going to work out very well."
Part 2
The weeks dragged on and turned into months as the long, rainy winter kept up its miserable routine. Outside, the storefronts were streaked with sleet and salt from the roads, but inside Valletta's on Broadway, it was always warm. Angela taught me the names of the various flowers, how to cut the wires and arrange them, and dropped useful hints about the sort of things that women liked, no matter how many times I insisted that I had no one to buy flowers for. She seemed convinced that I must have a girlfriend hidden away somewhere and that I was just to shy to bring her around. I couldn't see why -- I didn't think of myself as particularly attractive. I was five-eight, brown-haired, with the sort of non-descript features that any kid from any old Catholic family in this town seems to have. Sure, I kept myself in shape well enough, bicycling to work and visiting the neighborhood gym on weekends, but in social situations I just faded into the background.
February came -- the busiest season of the year -- and as we dashed around the shop filling orders and answering the phone, time and time again I would have to slip past Angela in the narrow space between the counter and the door to the back room. Each time, her tightly sweatered breasts or her full, soft ass would brush against me with excruciating pleasure. I was terrified that one day she would catch me glancing at her curves -- most of all because, despite her overflowing sensuality, she seemed entirely innocent. She never swore, never even raised her voice, and the closest she came to talk of sex was the mushy, overdramatic sentimentality of the cards that we placed in each floral arrangement. Somehow, in her musical voice, it didn't seem so sappy.
When the final customer left -- ten minutes after official closing hours on the night of the 14th -- we both breathed an enormous sigh of relief. I locked the door before any more hapless bachelors could come knocking. Angela brushed a few stray strands of hair away from her eyes and looked at me.
"You've done a wonderful job," she said. "I couldn't have gotten through the season without you. I'd offer you a celebratory drink, but I imagine you've got a date to get to."
"I don't, actually," I muttered, hardly thrilled. Being at the shop had cruelly driven home the point that I was permanently single.
"Well, that's just terrible," she said. "But in that case, why don't you stay a while? I've got a nice bottle of wine upstairs and no one to share it with."
My heart pounded. Angela had never invited me up to her apartment before.
"OK," I replied. As I followed her up the stairs, nervousness took hold of me. What was going on? I imagined her offering to 'slip into something more comfortable.' Of course, that wasn't going to happen. What would, then? What if, in a moment of veritas in vino, I said something offensive?
Needless to say, I was petrified. The apartment was plain enough, just a quiet living room hidden behind a nondescript white door. The decaying shag carpet was an amusing relic of the seventies; aside from that, the furniture consisted of a small leather sofa, a few lamps, and shelves full of books and other odds and ends. The kitchenette was tiny, the bathroom tinier. With the blinds tightly drawn, the lamps bathed the entire room is a fuzzy, yellowish glow. A single closed door indicated where the bedroom must be. So this was where Angela spent her nights -- alone, though I couldn't see how.
"Don't be so stressed," she laughed. "Singles Awareness Week is over. Have a seat, I'll get the wine."
I sank into the couch as she stepped briskly over to the kitchenette and poured two glasses of dark red wine from a bottle on the counter. Taking a seat beside me, she crossed her legs and offered me the second glass. As I nodded appreciatively, I stole a furtive glance at her thigh, slowly revealed to me as her skirt rode a little higher.
Then it happened.
"What are you looking at?"
