Ed leapt forward and flung the door wide open. ‘OK, buddy, you’ve said enough. Out!’
‘But I…’
I moved to Ed’s side. ‘We’d like you to leave. Immediately, please.’
Philippe’s mouth opened, but nothing came out. His sapphire eyes flashed, his face flushed bright red and he let out an exasperated cry. Spinning round, he strode magnificently out, the two assistants scurrying in his wake. The door slammed and the shop was quiet. Ed and I exchanged glances.
‘Not a happy bunny,’ I grimaced.
‘Hmm,’ agreed Ed, thoughtfully. ‘I’m afraid Kowalski’s has just made a very dangerous enemy.’
‘Good morning!’ Marnie arrived, stopping abruptly in the doorway when she saw our worried expressions. ‘What? What happened?’
‘Philippe Devereau just called by to wish us well,’ Ed smiled nonchalantly.
Marnie’s eyes lit up. ‘Philippe? He’s so gorgeous. What did he want?’
Ed picked up a pile of order forms and moved towards the workroom. ‘Oh, you know, he was in the neighbourhood so he thought he’d say hi.’ He turned back at the door and gave a wide-eyed grin. ‘Oh, yeah, and he mentioned he was gonna drive Kowalski’s into the ground as soon as possible.’ He disappeared into the back room.
Marnie’s smile fell and she rushed over to hug me, her blue curls bouncing as she did so. ‘Oh, Rosie, that’s awful,’ she wailed. ‘What are we going to do?’
I didn’t know. But this was not, I resolved, the time for doom and gloom.
‘We’re perfectly OK,’ I said, hoping my voice matched my optimistic statement. ‘We’ll be fine. What does Philippe have to offer that we don’t?’
Marnie looked despondent. ‘He’s been Floral Artiste of the Year for the past ten years. His business is worth multimillions. He scouts the world for the best designers and gets them. Ooh, and he has the biggest range of tropicals and exotics to order—’
I interrupted her. Philippe was looking too invincible. ‘Yes, I know, OK, but he doesn’t spend time with his customers. Or provide free delivery. Or…’ I was struggling already, ‘…or…’
‘Offer them coffee?’ Marnie suggested, a little less hopefully than she’d intended.
I snapped my fingers. ‘Or offer them coffee. Exactly! But we do. We have,’ I continued, walking over to my beloved coffee machine and patting its cracked lid, ‘the ultimate advantage right here.’
‘Old F?’ asked Marnie, still unconvinced. ‘Old Faithful is our secret weapon?’
‘Absolutely. Philippe Devereau may be able to head-hunt the world’s finest for his business, but he’ll never be able to make a decent cup of coffee for his clients, will he?’
Ed appeared in the workroom doorway. ‘Maybe we should give Old F a raise,’ he suggested, ‘or promote him to CEO.’
I smiled confidently. ‘So, if we all stay positive and make sure Philippe doesn’t try to head-hunt our coffee machine, Kowalski’s will survive this!’
Ed and Marnie made a brave attempt at a helpful cheer, but their expressions spoke otherwise.
After the excitement of Monday, Tuesday arrived with little fanfare—so much so that I almost didn’t remember Celia had arranged my dreaded New York Times interview for later that day. In fact, when the young, ginger-haired reporter entered my shop, I initially mistook him for a student seeking parttime work. It was only when he produced his card that I saw who he was.
‘Josh Mercer, New York Times? Celia arranged an interview today?’
‘Yes, of course, I-I’m sorry,’ I stammered, extending my hand for him to shake. ‘I’m Rosie Duncan and this is my co-designer, Ed Steinmann.’
Ed and Josh shook hands. ‘You guys grab the sofa and I’ll make some coffee,’ Ed offered, much to Josh’s delight. It turned out that he’d spent the morning interviewing warring parties involved in a dispute over a controversial neighbourhood regeneration project in the East Village.
‘So, great news story but not so great if you’re expecting a decent cup of coffee,’ he explained, flopping down on the old leather sofa and rummaging through his canvas satchel for his notebook. ‘Disgruntled people aren’t predisposed to good hospitality, I’m afraid.’
‘Well, you won’t find disgruntled locals here,’ I joked as Ed arrived with two mugs of coffee. ‘Just friends, flowers and a great cup of medium roast.’
‘I love the vibe in your store,’ Josh smiled, sipping his coffee and looking around as if he was mentally photographing every angle, feature and detail. ‘I mean, Kowalski’s is so different from the other Upper West Side florists—like Devereau Design. This isn’t a boutique—it’s…more personal, I guess. How do you keep it that way?’
‘We have a long tradition of serving the neighbourhood,’ I replied—and right on cue the silver bell over the door tinkled cheerily as a lady in her eighties entered, laden with shopping bags. Ed rushed over to her, gathering the bags from her as she feigned protest.
‘I’m fine, Edward. Quit fussing so!’
‘Now, Mrs Schuster, what kind of gentleman would I be if I didn’t assist you?’ Ed smiled, offering his arm, which she accepted, her hand the colour of rose-tinted tissue paper daintily placed on his sleeve as he escorted her to a small white wicker chair by the counter.
‘You’re just like my late husband, God rest his soul,’ she smiled. ‘Upright and uptight—that was Henry. And I’ve told you before, young man, you must call me Delores.’
Josh was watching Delores Schuster with intense interest, his ballpoint pen hovering thoughtfully over his notepad as his reporter’s eyes drank in every detail.
‘She’s a regular?’
‘Oh yes. Mrs Schuster’s been coming to Kowalski’s since her family got their apartment on West 71st Street, over forty years ago. She was one of Mr Kowalski’s first customers and she’s been coming here ever since.’
‘Do you find it difficult to balance the day-to-day side of the business with the growing number of large-scale commissions you’re now taking on?’
It was a good question, but one I hadn’t really considered before. We don’t have to make a special effort to keep both the day-to-day and the event stuff running. It is just what we do—and something I love my business for. Yes, sometimes we are so busy I can’t even tell you what day of the week it is and, equally, in our quieter times, there are sometimes days on end where you can count the customers venturing into the shop on the fingers of one hand. But that’s the nature of the business: you can only work with what you have available at the time. The unpredictability would scare many, but I enjoy it.
‘Despite my shop now increasingly catering for larger events, we’ve never lost the neighbourhood business—and that’s what I love,’ I explained. ‘One minute you’re sitting with a prospective bride discussing thousand-dollar arrangements; the next you’re chatting with someone like Betty Myers, who’s been a Kowalski’s customer for over twenty years, and is a former waitress in Buck’s diner just round the block from my house, designing a $25 gift basket for her niece. It’s all part of the mix.’
‘Unlike places like Devereau Design,’ Josh repeated, raising a telling eyebrow.
I couldn’t resist a smile. Philippe is the kind of florist that my mother despises. ‘All fuss and bluster,’ she’d proclaim with trademark disdain. ‘Nonsense and showmanship are no substitutes for real talent. Swanning about in their designer suits and stapling banana leaves together like it’s the height of skill—charging a King’s ransom for greenery, I ask you! Any idiot can do that!’
‘Devereau Design caters for a very different market from Kowalski’s,’ I smiled, deciding to be diplomatic. ‘Their customers expect something a little—’
‘Who is this young man?’ Delores suddenly appeared beside me, making Josh jump.
‘This is Josh Mercer, from the New York Times. Josh, let me introduce you to Mrs Delores Schuster, one of Kowalski’s most distinguished customers.’
Josh shot to his feet, respectf
ully offering his hand to Delores. ‘It’s a pleasure to meet you, Mrs—’
‘Call me Delores, please,’ she answered, her cheeks flushing slightly. ‘You’re here to interview Rosie?’
‘I am indeed.’
‘Oh well, in that case,’ Delores began, bustling in between us and lowering herself shakily onto the sofa, gripping our arms for support as she did so, ‘let me tell you all about Kowalski’s and why it’s the greatest florist’s in the whole of New York.’
For the next thirty-five minutes, Delores regaled Josh with long, rambling accounts of her many visits to the store, each one accompanied by generous helpings of Schuster family trivia along the way.
‘…So then there was the time my late husband, Henry—may God rest his soul—forgot his aunt Bertha’s Golden Wedding Anniversary. Well, you would not believe the commotion in the family. I tell you, it was like the day they elected Nixon and my grandmother swore she wouldn’t leave the house again while he was in the White House. Aunt Bertha was the kind of woman you don’t forget, take my word for it, young man—she had a holler that would scare a werewolf—and she comes storming into our apartment, face all red like a tomato, and skirts flapping like laundry in a tornado, and she yells, “Fifty years of marriage to the same dumb putz and all I wanted to make my sorry life happy was for my one and only nephew to remember!” But my Henry was fast at thinking, if nothing else. He took her hand and he walked her all the way to Kowalski’s—three whole blocks he walked her—and he walked straight up to Mr Kowalski and he said, “Franz, would you please tell my beloved aunt Bertha about the surprise arrangement we’re planning for her Golden Wedding Anniversary, which she thinks I forgot?” And—would you believe it—Mr Kowalski stands there, bold as buttons, and calmly describes the most beautiful basket of flowers you ever heard of. Well, Aunt Bertha was not a woman to be lost for words—I mean, even when her husband, Charlie, proposed to her he had to endure a ten-minute lecture on her expectations of marriage, you know—but two minutes of listening to Mr Kowalski and she was a changed woman. And then—to finish it all—Mr Kowalski explains that the reason for the unfortunate delay is that the flower warehouse was all out of pink lilac, which he knew was her favourite flower—which it was—but there’s no way he could’ve known that because, right up until my Henry marched in there, he hadn’t even known Aunt Bertha existed at all! So that’s why we come to Kowalski’s—even though Mr Kowalski is long gone, probably laughing about the whole Aunt Bertha scenario with my Henry right now. Young Rosie here is a woman after his heart; he taught her well, you know. Have you got all that down in your book now, Joshua?’
Josh nodded dumbly, his eyes glazing over.
‘You’ll forgive me if I don’t pose for a photograph,’ Delores said, nodding at the camera in Josh’s lap. ‘I’m not one for publicity, you see. Well, I can’t stay here chatting all day. I got things to do, people to see. Edward! Help me up, please!’
Ed stifled his mirth as he assisted Delores back to the counter.
‘Like I said, Kowalski’s is first and foremost a neighbourhood florist,’ I smiled, shaking my head at Josh’s amused expression.
He checked his list of questions. ‘So, how did an English rose like yourself come to be blooming in New York?’
Somehow, I knew this phrase would end up in the article—being friends with Celia has prepared me well for the ways of journalists.
‘I moved here from Boston just over six years ago, worked for a while with Mr Kowalski and then took over the business when he retired,’ I replied, hoping that this would be enough information. Of course, it wasn’t.
‘And were you a florist in Boston?’
‘No.’
‘Oh? What was your previous profession?’
My heart began to thud as my defences prickled. ‘I was creative director for a small advertising firm.’
‘Which one?’
‘It doesn’t exist any more.’
I could tell Josh could sense my discomfort. He looked up from his pad. ‘All the same, it would be good to have some background…’
‘My mother is a florist, so I learned the trade from watching her and helping out in her shop when I was young. Then after university I chose to enter advertising and—wound up here, eventually.’
‘Forgive me, but I’m curious: why leave your country behind to come to the States?’
‘Well, look around you: New York is fabulous. What girl wouldn’t want to live here? The shops, the restaurants…’ I answered breezily, trying without success to deflect his train of thought.
‘I see. But England—it’s so…so…infinitely more interesting than here, don’t you think?’
‘Well, I—’
‘I mean, all that history and literature and amazing countryside; to be able to walk daily in the steps of Shakespeare, Byron and Keats; to visit the great places of learning like Oxford and Cambridge; to revel in the generations of royalty and stand in the birthplace of the Industrial Revolution—surely there was enough to keep you there?’
Josh’s monologue on the greatness of my home country took me aback and I—like Aunt Bertha, many years before—found myself lost for words.
A crimson flush spread over his pale cheeks and he ran a hand self-consciously through his mop of copper-coloured curls. ‘Wow. I am so sorry, Ms Duncan. I kinda got carried away there. I adore your country, as you may have gathered.’
Relieved that the interview had strayed from my past, I smiled. ‘Not a problem. Yes, I love all of that about England. Although Stone Langley—the small town where I grew up—is nothing like the regal England you’d expect. But New York stole my heart and this is where I want to be, more than anything.’
After the interview was concluded and Josh had taken all the photographs that he needed, I saw him to the door.
Ed, now a gentleman-at-ease following the departure of Delores Schuster, watched me with intensity. ‘Good interview?’
‘I think it went OK.’
‘Like I said it would.’
‘Yes, like you said it would, O Wise and Noble One.’ I gave a small bow.
‘Good,’ Ed replied with a self-satisfied air. ‘So how come he grilled you about ending up here then? Checking you had your Green Card?’
‘He seems to be a bit of a serious Anglophile. Couldn’t understand why I wanted to live here.’
‘Hmm—rainy middle England, where the beer is warm and the summers are wet, versus glorious New York with Mrs Delores Schuster and her not-so-potted family histories? Tough call,’ he grinned. ‘Go figure.’
A few hours later, as Marnie and I were replacing the large displays in the window, the workroom door swung open and Ed entered, battered brown leather jacket slung over one arm.
‘So long, sad single people,’ he breezed over his shoulder as he strode through the store.
Marnie and I exchanged glances.
‘Where are you going?’ asked Marnie.
‘I have a date. A hot one.’
‘But it’s a Tuesday night. Who goes out for a date on a Tuesday night?’
‘I do,’ Ed replied, supremely pleased with himself. ‘I admit, a Tuesday date is a first for me in quite some time, but—to quote the lovely young thing in whose delicious company I will be spending this unusual night—“I just can’t wait till Friday.” So who am I to keep the lady waiting, eh?’
I winked at Marnie. ‘She’s due in court on Friday for a heinous crime.’
Marnie’s eyes lit up. ‘Or her parole officer visits on a Friday.’
‘Or maybe she’s fleeing the country on Friday after a bank heist she’s doing on the Thursday…’
‘…Which she’s planning on Wednesday…’
‘…So it has to be Tuesday night!’
Ed stared at the pair of us, shaking his head slowly. ‘Well, thank you for your support, ladies.’
‘Aw, Ed, ignore us and just go and have a lovely time.’
‘Thanks, Rosie.’
‘…with
the crazy jailbird master criminal!’ Marnie squeaked, sending us both into hysterical giggles once again.
Ed groaned and opened the door. ‘Fine. Laugh all you want, but I will be loved up and happy tonight,’ he turned in the doorway to deliver his parting shot, ‘unlike you guys.’
Ouch.
I had to laugh. Ed claimed not to be seeking relationships, preferring the delights of general non-commitment dating instead.
‘I’m young, I’m in no rush to meet The One—whatever that means—or settle down, or have kids. I just like to date. So sue me.’
Meeting people was something Ed was incredibly adept at. His cousin’s lawyer a few weeks back was nothing compared to some of his dates. It was almost as if everywhere he went he would fall across eligible women: ‘I was out last week and I stopped for a paper and right next to the newsstand was this woman…I swear, I was just walking down Amsterdam Avenue when this beautiful girl stops me and asks me for a date…I took my dry-cleaning to Mrs Ling’s and got chatting to this babe…’ I never met any of the ladies in question (or should that be ‘questionable ladies’?), but that was probably because most of Ed’s dates lasted only a few weeks, so far too short a time to introduce them to the Kowalski’s family.
Next morning, the Ed who walked into the store was very different from the Ed who had walked out of it the night before.
‘So, how did the date with Tuesday girl go?’ I asked eventually, after Ed’s uncommon, unshaven and decidedly dishevelled silence had reigned supreme for nearly half an hour.
Ed stripped the leaves from a long-stemmed red rose in one swift motion, adding it to the bouquet forming in his left hand. ‘Fine.’
‘Right…’
I surveyed him carefully as he moved along the flower buckets, choosing, sizing and stripping leaves off the selected blooms as he went. Turning the untied bunch in his hand to check the arrangement, he then dropped his head and slunk back to the counter. ‘Oh, who am I kidding? It was a disaster.’
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