Chapter Text
Dorian checked the text conversation, foot tapping anxiously. It was exactly the same. His long apology, last night, when he had to stay late at work. His shorter apology, this morning. “Read: 10:32.”
Aveline gave him a disapproving look, and he forced himself to put his phone down and sit still.
He picked it back up and texted Sera. What’s the best way to apologize?
It buzzed a minute later, making everyone in the room look at him. He had to wait until Josephine turned back to her presentation before he touched it again. for dumb shit or like actually say ur sorry?
Genuine apology. For missing a date.
like a boyfriend date? defintely sex Aveline cleared her throat pointedly. Josephine talked about the latest development in the trade agreements between Kirkwall and Rivain.
Dorian sighed. He hadn’t wanted to go into detail, but Sera did have a way of forcing it out of him. Not boyfriend. I missed a second date.
Sera responded with a keysmash and a mostly incomprehensible string of emojis that Dorian took to mean she was laughing at him. After a minute she added, accept ur a fuckup & wont ever see him again. who cares abt 2nd date guy???
I should clarify; I missed a second date with Vivienne’s dear friend, to whom she recommended me highly.
Sera took a long time to respond, possibly because she was doing some actual work, but most likely because she was laughing at him. lololololol u fucked up. u fucked up. Ummm flowrs, i guess?? theres a good shop called whoopsie daisies on 9th
That’s so cliche.
YOUR cliche
Dorian sighed loudly enough for Josephine to give him a sharp look. Sera had a point.
--
Whoopsie Daisy’s was, on first glance, an aggressively charming place. A cheerful green door flanked by windows of colorful bouquets and potted plants, along with the obligatory holiday wreaths and poinsettias. Just looking in the window made Dorian feel warmer than he had in the past month.
A spinning stand of ornaments, covered in glitter, was the first thing he saw when he stepped in, but the rest of the shop seemed generally untouched by excessive holiday cheer. The air was pleasantly warm, a merciful contrast to the freezing wind outside. There was no one at the counter.
Dorian wandered cautiously further into the small room, carefully avoiding the fragile looking plants bedecking every surface. “Hello?”
“Oh hey,” a deep voice responded. Dorian turned to see an enormous pair of horns poking out of a doorway to the side of the shop. “Sorry, everyone’s a bit busy at the moment, but I can probably help you out. Come through here.”
The horns disappeared. Dorian supposed he didn’t really have much of a choice.
Following the voice through the door, Dorian was immediately struck by the temperature difference. It was not the freezing Fereldan cold he might have expected, but instead a temperate, breezy day. It reminded him a bit of autumns back in Tevinter, or perhaps a warm Fereldan spring. It reminded him also of an Orlesian pleasure garden, gravel paths winding between beds of flowers growing everything from mosses to morning glories on ten-foot trellises, delicate wrought-iron tables and chairs dotting the spaces between covered hothouses. The one closest to him was labeled “Poison Gardens of Halamshiral, 9:30 Dragon.”
The horns were attached to a person, which made sense, but he was apparently in the middle of a children’s story about enchanted doorways to magical worlds, so he felt within his rights to be suspicious. The person was a mountain of a man in a neat teal button-down, over which he was tying a florist’s apron as Dorian approached him.
“Merrill’s running some flowers over to the hospital. Her usual delivery driver is sick, but tell me what you’re looking for and we’ll see what we can do.”
“Um, well, I...” Dorian swallowed, trying not to look as though he was staring and failing to remember how to speak in the process.
The Qunari smiled encouragingly at him, waiting patiently for Doiran to regain his wits. “I’m, um, looking for...flowers.” Dorian finished lamely.
The man’s smile broadened into a slow grin that Dorian was tempted to think of as flirtatious. “I think I can definitely help you out with that, big guy. What kind of flowers are we looking for, here? Sexy flowers? First date flowers? Flowers for your mom?”
“Flowers for an apology? I missed a second date.” Dorian risked a glance at the man’s apron-covered chest, but couldn’t find a nametag. He dragged his eyes back to the clerk’s... eye. Well that was fascinating. “It was because of an emergency at work, I’m not an asshole--”
The smile was abruptly no longer flirty, but just as bright and the perfect expression for a salesperson. “You came to the right place,” he told Dorian conspiratorially. “Legend has it that the first bouquet Merrill ever sold was for an apology, and the name has stuck ever since.”
“Legend?” Dorian inquired.
“A place like this needs a legend, don’t you think?” He started walking down one of the gravel paths. “First time I came here, it was like walking into a fairy tale.”
“It does give off that feeling, yes.” The smell of nearby honeysuckle wafted to Dorian on the breeze as he spoke. It was distractingly perfect.
Along the wall, behind a bed of towering rose bushes, was a long table lined with vases, ribbons, wires, and colored paper. A pair of massive flower coolers, packed to bursting with a riot of colors, beside it. The bottom two shelves of the left-hand cooler was filled with blue and yellow flowers, and that was the door Dorian’s guide opened.
“Potted or cut?” he asked as he set up. “Cut bouquets don’t last as long but are easier. Less commitment.”
Dorian huffed. “That’s a low blow, coming from someone I’ve just met.”
Flowerman fumbled the daffodils he was retrieving from the bottom shelf. “On their part, I mean. Not everyone wants to be given something to be responsible for. What if they have to leave town a lot? Or just don’t have a green thumb?”
It was a good point.
“Are they a big gardener?”
Dorian thought about it. “I don’t… think so. We’ve only met once before.”
“Right, you did say second date.” He placed a pair of trimming shears on the table beside his flowers. “Bouquet then?”
Dorian nodded.
“Right.” He rolled up his sleeves, which was rude, and took a breath. “Daffodils are the kind of the big thing in this arrangement. They represent new beginnings, and they’re cute.” He wrapped a thin piece of wire around a solid handful of stems, then carefully turned the flowers so they all face outward.
“Flowers have meanings?” Dorian asked.
“Oh tons. It was a whole thing a few ages ago, especially in courts. You could send a whole secret message in a bouquet by choosing the right flowers. It’s kind of an academic interest of mine.” Flowerman surveyed his daffodils and nodded to himself. “I like to put the greenery in next, around the outside, to make a base, and then add the accents. Merrill goes from the top down.”
Dorian nodded, uncomprehending of the particulars.
“The purple hyacinths go in the middle-- three to five stalks, or it looks really phallic. They’re the ones that actually mean “I’m sorry.” And then bluebells dotted through the daffodils, which stand for humility.”
Dorian watched as for the next ten minutes, a man with biceps the size of his waist, a roguish grin and an eyepatch, fussed over the placement of individual bluebells and the height of the different hyacinth stalks. It was a little surreal, to be sure, but that fit the strange half-enchanted air of this place.
“And that’s the Whoopsie Daisy. It means, “I’m really sorry, I was an idiot, can we start over?” He handed it across the table to Dorian with another one of his bright smiles. Dorian missed the flirty one.
“You’re very good at your job,” he said.
Flowerman laughed and tucked a business card between the hyacinths. “You can leave a review on the website, if you want. I’m sure Merrill would love to hear what you have to say.”
Dorian smiled with him. “I’ll be sure to mention you by name. Which you never told me, by the way.”
“The Iron Bull.”
Dorian took that in. “I certainly won’t forget that. I’m Dorian.”
“That’s the idea,” The Iron Bull replied, giving him something Dorian assumed to be a one-eyed wink. “Come back soon, Dorian.”
“I will.” He would find a reason, he was sure of it.