Burning Flowers by June Beyoki

this is a source of a
lot of negative feelings for you, but if we’re going to be
pretending to date, then you’re going to have to learn to relax and
let go just a little and do something a little more care free and
less planned once in a while.”
    She was about to snap at him again, but it
wasn’t really him she was mad at. He was almost a stranger, and
he’d come to her rescue. The least she could do is give him the
benefit of the doubt. “Fine. I’m sorry. It’s just that for the last
33 years she’s been making me feel inadequate, and she’ll tear you
down just the same if we aren’t ready for this.”
    “She’s really hurt you, hasn’t she? And yet
you still care what she thinks. It’s funny how that works, isn’t
it?” She nodded at his statement. It was her harsh reality. “So,
what’s so bad about her?”
    “Nothing’s good enough, and she doesn’t
believe I’m truly capable of anything. I thought the shop would
prove her wrong, but it hasn’t so far.” Clarke shrugged. “Anyway,
she’s a lawyer and is all about perfection and arguing the winning
side and all that. She has made a lot of really high society
friends over the years, but don’t ask me how. She goes to these
parties with them. They’re really formal and stuffy with lots of
weird and expensive food and banter about money and vacation homes.
Sometimes they talk about their children, bragging about their
accomplishments. She tends to compensate for the fact that I don’t
have any by having some thinly veiled insults passed across the
table. Anyway, I think she invited you because she was calling my
bluff. She knows I don’t really date like that. She wants to expose
us in front of everyone somehow; make one of us break and tell the
truth maybe.”
    “We have two choices, the
way I see it. Either we prove her wrong and make our dating for
real, or at the
end of all this we can declare ourselves Best Actor and Actress at
this year’s Academy Award,” Vince said while looking at her in a
strange way and continued,  “ What exactly do you mean by you
don’t really date like that?” Vince asked curiously.
    “That’s not important,” she shot back,
feeling too vulnerable already.
    “If I know nothing about you, especially
about your dating history, then that is really going to make it
obvious that we’re lying. I’d say it’s very important.” She knew he
was right, but explaining her love life to someone else suddenly
made it sound worse than it had always seemed to her.
    “I don’t date at all, okay? I find a certain
comfort of having the occasional, sometimes more than occasional,
man in my bed, but that’s where it ends. I generally never see the
person again unless I need something.”
    “That actually sounds kind of sad, Clarke.
You’re really missing out.”
    “You’re crazy,” she scoffed. “Most men dream
of finding a woman that can give them what they want without any
attachment. The only thing I’m missing out on is being stuck with
someone; being tied down or being heart broken.” She leaned back in
her seat and crossed her arms.
    “Those are not men; they are boys. And they
are liars. Deep down, we all want more but are too afraid to go for
it. Guys are bad at failing. You’re missing out on the adventure of
being in love. That is a tragedy, Clarke.” Clarke glanced up into
his eyes for a moment and then looked away.
    “Love is a joke; something made up. It
doesn’t last,” she responded, matter-of-factly.
    “How do you know? Have you ever been in
love?”
    “No, but I know someone who was.” Her mind
drifted back to the picture of the blonde man with the pretty eyes
who had his arm around her mother. Love had turned her mother into
a bitter perfectionist when she used to be this beautiful care free
young woman.
    “Well, I know that if love came along for
me, I wouldn’t want to miss it even if I knew I’d only lose them in
the end. But I’ve always wanted to experience everything