I couldn’t see, hear, or feel anything for a really long time. I really thought I was done for.
But then I started to feel warm.
It was a comforting warmth. It “tasted” good on my body.
I could hear a distant voice. “Yeah, it’s a shame the botanical garden rejected it. When I saw this thing on the middle of the road like a strayed puppy it seemed like an exotic species that’d sell for a pricey sum.”
“Dad, buy me ice cream!” I heard a little girl say. “There’s a ice cream van over there!”
“Just a sec, honey. I’m almost finished with this...”
I felt like I had been starving for a long time and someone was now feeding me.
I could see now. I saw a bright blue sky and the sun. Ah! The sun! I felt like I was directly drinking from its energy. It made me feel very good inside and it made me produce more of my scent.
“Dad, it just farted.” Said the little girl. “The flower farted. It’s a stinkbud.”
“Hahaha, that’s a good name.” Said the man tending me. “You should be thankful, Stinkbud. I could have just thrown you into the garbage, but thanks to my daughter’s persistence now you can have a second chance at life.”
“Uh...What...?” I was still groggy.
The man finished planting me on the ground. Then he went to kiss his daughter.
“So, who wants ice cream?”
“Yuck, dad! Your hands reek of Stinkbud!”
The pair got up and prepared to leave. That’s when I could get a good glimpse of where I was.
It was a park. A big one at that, there was green everywhere I turned to. It seemed like Paradise for a flower. There was an old man in a green uniform watering some waters on the distance.
It seemed beautiful, but...
“Where the fuck is Maria?! And where the hell is this park?! How far am I from downtown?!” I cried in desperation.
The man who had “saved” me waved to me from the distance with the little girl. It made me pissed.
“Come back here you fucker! Return me to where I was! Maria will never be able to find me here!”
The man just turned to his daughter. “Say goodbye to Stinkbud, honey!”
“Goodbye Stinkbud! I hope you can make lots of flowery friends here!” Said the little girl, waving to me.
“Second chance at life my stinky ass! You heard me?! I’d rather be rotting dead than living standing in here!”
By now the man and his little daughter were tiny dots on the distance, but I kept cursing their existence for a long, long time.