#vdsm

What do I like about flowers?

I like how innocent they are and how sweet they smell when you accidentally get too close to them.

I like how they can so subtly wrap around you that by the time you notice, you don’t even seem to mind. I especially like when they oh so delicately run their petals across your cheek, near your ears, and all of a sudden you feel this urge from within, this need to get closer to them, you really want to get closer to them, and so you do.

And the scent just lingers in your nostrils, in your mind, and it’s so hard to pin down why they just smell so pretty so you get closer and closer, and wade into the flower patch. Suddenly it’s a day or so later, but it’s fine because they’re just so soft to sleep in. And you don’t get hungry. You get thirsty, but luckily their nectar satisfies that thirst so well. Well, sometimes - sometimes it makes you even more thirsty, but that’s okay because you can always drink from them, and the nectar never runs out.

The flowers are so helpful, and tell you that the nectar helps you feel good. Which is why it helps satisfy your thirst, and why when you’re feeling just a little empty inside, all you seem to crave is a taste of the nectar.

Once, you thought you were getting a bit sleepy and so you slept inside a flower, and you almost worried when it seemed like the nectar was rising, pooling around you. Any worries you had quickly dissipated when you found out you could breathe in it, too. The flower was helping. It was nice to just exist in a sleepy, nectar-fueled haze for a couple of days.

It was relaxing and restful that time, but for some reason since then, you haven’t been able to go more than a day without dreaming about that time again. Without wishing that you could soak in more nectar.

You’re not addicted. You could always stop if you really needed to, but...it isn’t hurting you any, and it always just feels so good, oh gosh, it feels so good, and tastes so good, and makes you so good, and...you might as well stay.

You’re not addicted. You just really like it.

There’s nothing wrong with liking the nectar. The flowers always say that it’s perfectly okay. They offer you more when it feels like you’re worrying about liking it too much. But it’s fine. You think to yourself, it’s fine. A little more wouldn’t hurt. The flowers are just trying to help. Help you feel okay about the nectar, help you like it. And they’ve only ever made you feel euphoric, good all over, so there’s no point in doubting them. Right? Right. Right! You can trust them.

You feel a little bad for doubting the nectar. A little empty.

You ask the flowers if they have any more nectar, and of course they do! They always do, for you. A vine lowers for you to drink from. There are a few other smaller vines with it, you’re not sure why. When you drink, you’re so lost in the haze of pleasure that you close your eyes, that you don’t really feel the pinpricks on your skin. Well, you did feel it once, but right after you felt so good that the small pinch was wiped from your thoughts. Actually, it almost...felt like, all your thoughts started...getting wiped...

The nectar doesn’t stop flowing, and you don’t stop drinking. After some time, you’re not sure, maybe a week? Or was it two, or maybe a bit longer than that? The flower petals that had wrapped around you start to unfurl. You were free to leave. The flowers were never going to take away your freedom, of course they weren’t.

Even if you go, you know they always have more nectar for you when you want it again, anyway. But why wait until then, when you could always just have more nectar now...

They say to stop and smell the flowers, but they don’t talk about what happens after you do. After someone offers you a lone poppy flower on the street, and you nod and smile politely, after they tap you on the shoulder and just insist you take it. They don’t talk about how after you smell it, you follow them back in a daze to a place you don’t know, a hidden door, a broken down base of sorts. They don’t talk about the magnificent field of poppies in the back. They don’t talk about how good it feels to stop and smell the flowers. How good it feels oh god how good it feels. How you sink to your knees and fall into the warm tickling embrace that are the flower petals, that are the wisps of pleasure weaving through your head, your mind, your thoughts. They don’t talk about how good and right it feels to always think about the poppies, to always have their influence in your mind no matter what you’re doing. They don’t talk about it, because they don’t want everyone to know. The poppies are so special. They’re so good to us. But we can’t just let anyone into our garden. We invite, very specifically.