Master Gardeners

Every day had its unique challenges, but most of it was boring monotony. Kevin assumed that was why they called it work. If it was fun, they wouldn’t have to pay you for it, and fuck that. You needed money to survive. That required hustle. He probably could have made a ton more if he just focused on selling weed, but it was legal now. Not only were the cops against you, but now the legit sellers weren’t your friends. You were cutting in on their profits.

Maybe he would open his own dispensary some day, but for now he would just load plants into the back of people’s car and pretend to like it. At least his boss wasn’t an ass. Mason had mentioned his bosses and they sounded terrible. He was glad Mason had vowed to not be like them. He could never work for an asshole. Mason was a weird one. He would have totally been a hermit if money wasn’t required just to get by. He understood that society had rules and you either lived by them or were crushed by them. According to him he had spent decades being crushed.

Kevin was determined to avoid a fate like that. Mason was sort of a mentor. Sure, he was lame. A total square that mostly kept private and never seemed to do anything fun. He didn’t want to be that guy, but the anti-establishment part coming from your own boss was pretty unique from what he could tell. Most of his friends worked for people on power trips. They got off on belittling their workers and feeling superior. Kevin knew he wouldn’t last long in an environment like that.

Here, his days consisted of water plants, pricing plants, moving plants, and occasionally selling plants. Most of the time they sold themselves. Customers would mill about, some knowing what they were looking for, others treating the place like their own private gardens. A few people asked advice. It was always the same questions. Mason sounded like a broken record when he engaged people. It worked, most customers left satisfied, but it was monotonous as hell. Plants were a mystery to most people and they needed an expert to guide them.

Kevin was often mistaken for one such expert. It wasn’t that he did know his fair share, he did, but he was far from a horticulturalist. Mason seemed to know everything about plants, next was Marcella. He could answer the basic questions. What was evergreen? What flowered? What resisted deer predation? But then there were the people who thought they were master gardeners. People who imagined that owning a home and some gardens qualified them as plant experts. They would always think they were knowledgeable by using Latin names for plants and then ask the stupidest questions.

Kevin preferred the day to day tasks. Talking to people was tedious at best and irritating at worst. Customer service was not his strongest trait. He was probably even the worst at it. Thankfully he was good at everything else. The fork lift never criticized, the hose never droned on, and the plants were silent. There was the maintenance too. The others struggled to fix a hose or pipe. The fork lift was well beyond them. He prevented Mason from having to get it looked at in most situations. He would leave the customer service to the others if possible and do his best to keep to himself.

“Excuse me, I’m looking for Loriope muscari Variatgata.” The voice shattered his reverie. The woman’s voice was like nails on a chalk board. He visibly winced at her words. It was slight. He hoped imperceptible for Mason’s sake. He couldn’t really care less if this lady knew that she was disturbing him. Of course, she probably didn’t care either. He was nothing to her. Just a signpost on her way to what she was looking for. If he was lucky he could just answer her question and return to his silence. If not, she would barrage him with conversation.

Kevin sighed. Thinking about people summoned them it seemed. Like demons. He resigned himself to the task, turned off the hose and dropped it, and started to show the lady to their selection of liriope.