The Leafy Feast – A Short Story

If you will give this story-teller a chance, she will spoil you with her stories! 

So, I had been reading Beatriz Portela‘s A Green Monster last day (and I commented on the post, too! See? I am a great neighbour!). Her short post literally grabbed my attention. It reminded me of this one time when I had a bug (a real bug, no electronics here, folks!) on one of my plants. Today’s story is roughly based on that experience, with added spices of humour. I have never tried humour in my stories before, so I have no idea if I suck at it. If I do, kindly jump to the comments section and fry me alive. Here we go, then!

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The Leafy Feast

Arpita Pramanick

I am the most whimsical person I know. You don’t trust? Well, let me tell you a story.

When I was… umm… wait… no, sorry, I don’t remember how young I was then (I’m still young in case you’re wondering, just passed my engineering, dude). So, anyways, watching all my neighbours raise potted roses on their terraces, I decided to pet few rose plants too. My house is too small for a dog or a cat, anyway. A plant is the closest thing I can have to a pet! Plus, it doesn’t bite. Or scratch. Or poop in the most convenient of places.

My family isn’t really enthusiastic about gardening and all. Neither am I, except when I am whimsical. We are those morbid creatures that take pleasure by looking at things from a distance.

So back to my whimsical story, or you’ll call me a digressing crazy woman, too!

This one time, I told my mother, “Mom, I want to grow roses.”

Mother grunted.

“I am serious,” I made my teacher-face, which meant looking at my mother intensely through my spectacles, and keeping my lips tightly sealed. My hands rested on my thigh.

“Yeah, right! Who’s going to take care of the plant once your ‘I’m a gardener’ phase is over?”

“Well, I wouldn’t worry about that if I were you. If you raised me this well, I am sure a harmless plant is no big deal!”

“Whatever,” my mother rolled her eyes and stomped off into the kitchen.

The next day, I brought home a fragile rose plant. It had a single leafy stem that ended in a big, yellow rose. I kept it in the balcony.

The next few days I showered my love on the plant. I watered it regularly (now that I come to think of it, I guess I watered it a little too often). Slowly, the lone flower grew old. Its petals dried up and started to fall off one by one.

“If you’ve been born, you have to die! That’s the law of nature.” I told myself. Yeah, I know. I sound so deep, right? Yes, I am always like that.

One week passed since the first rose died. No new bud.

Second week. New shoots sprang up.

Third week. More leaves. No bud yet.

By the fourth week I had had enough. I asked one of the neighbours – the one whose roof was strewn with pots of huge dahlias and tens of varieties of roses – to come and check my plant. What was wrong with it, anyway? Was it lacking nutrition or something?

“Hmmmmmmm…” The neighbour sighed. He looked like a doctor examining a patient. At last, he said, “I don’t think it’ll ever grow any flowers. See this?” he pointed at the plant’s leaves, “Most rose plants have five leaflets. This one has seven. Highly unusual! Highly unusual! I am sure that is the reason why it’s not blooming anymore.”

 “But Mr. Pal, when I bought it, it had a flower, remember? So, sure as the sun rises in the east, this pretty lady can bear flowers too.”

“Yeah, well,” Mr. Pal was hardly taken aback, “Exception proves the law. Now, if you will excuse me, my plants are waiting for me.”

Exception proves the law? Duh!

Pretty much after this my whim decided to take interest in origami. The awesome art of making things with papers, you know? I could have a thousand roses and more with that. So, the watering can and my stubborn rose plant stopped getting my loving touch.

The next time I checked on the rose plant, accidentally, it had been half-eaten by a caterpillar. Yes, I did find the little criminal. I was wondering what punishment would justify its heinous crime, when I was suddenly hungry.

“Mom! Food. I am starving.”

Perhaps my green foe here was starving too? As kind as my big heart is, it decided not to rob the little bug its wholesome leafy feast.

Yeah, yeah, you can clap now. I know I am really sweet.

© 2015 Arpita Pramanick