Mending Broken Flowers

The biggest shock of all, however, had been when Sixteen year old Daisy Gauchet cornered him in the library, held up two tickets to the Sweetheart Dance, and told him what time to pick her up.

"Thanks, but no thanks," Gabriel had finally mustered the courage to say before beating a hasty retreat.

"Come on; it's eight o'clock," Annie huffed tiredly. "Let's go home."

"Yes ma'am," Gabriel said and patted his shirt pocket.

There was nearly two hundred dollars in his pocket; all tip money he'd received today from the numerous deliveries he'd had to make that day. He and his mother had an agreement; tips were his to do with as he saw fit. His wages were put into two savings accounts; a college account and mutual funds accounts. But tips were his.

At home, Gabriel happily looked at the packet from Louisiana Tech. The college had welcomed him with open arms and had gladly agreed that he could start attendance in the summer, rather than wait until the fall semester to begin his studies.

He'd picked Louisiana Tech for two reasons. One, it was far enough away from home to give him some freedom, but close enough that if his mother did ever need him, he was less than four hours away. And two, Louisiana Tech offered him a full scholarship. The seven other colleges and universities had offered him partial scholarships. The less money he had to pull out of his college savings account, the more money he would have to invest in any other projects he might wish to look into.

And three, every time Paw-paw saw Terry Bradshaw on television, he would turn to Gabriel and say "And do you know where that boy went to school?"

"So, Paw-paw," Gabriel said and smiled. "Now, you can tell your friends there in Heaven, 'Guess where my boy's going to school? That's right, where Terry Bradshaw went,' okay?"

----

Sister Andrea pursed her lips in consternation; like many of her peers, Lily Gauchet had waited until the last minute to begin the application process.

"Seriously, Miss Gauchet, Mr. Florez had already applied and had his acceptance for Louisiana Tech in his hand now for months," Sister Andrea said and sighed.

"Louisiana, aw great!" Lily spat with contempt.

"What?" Sister Andrea looked up.

"Well, that's where I wanted to go!" Lily complained. "But if HE'S going there, then..."

"Miss Gauchet, there are twelve thousand students in attendance," Sister Andrea hid her smile. "Believe me; you two would probably never see one another the whole time you're there."

"Fine, fine, let's fill this out," Lily sighed.

----

The flowers around the stage and the podium looked beautiful and Annie smiled with pride as she and the other parents watched the graduation procession.

Gabriel was named the valedictorian and gave a speech that certainly spoke of his pride to dedicate his graduation to the man that he called father that had died thirteen years earlier, to the beautiful little sister that had been torn from his life thirteen years ago, his love and pride in the grandfather that he had lost less than a year ago.

None of the people that knew Gabriel thought it odd that the ten minute speech was delivered in an almost monotone voice.

No one, except Gabriel, noticed that, while he thanked his father, his sister, his grandfather, and the staff of St. Thomas Aquinas, there was not one word mentioned about his mother, Annette Florez.

----

"Hey, um, you know, um, this might be the last time we ever see each other," Jeanette mumbled, toying with the buttons of Gabriel's shirt.

"Might be," he agreed.

"You um, you want to...?" Jeanette asked and gestured with her head toward the rear of the Campion house where the graduation party was being held.

Gabriel looked around and saw Steve, Jeanette's boyfriend. Steve was in the midst of his friends, trying to see who could out-drink one another.

"Sure," he finally said and smiled warmly into Jeanette's eyes.

Jeanette found her pussy growing wet just from Gabriel's smile.

Jeanette saw Lily's ugly sneer just as she grabbed Gabriel's hand and led him down the hall toward Peggy's bedroom.

She looked around and located Steve and elbowed her way through the drunken throng.

Jeanette sighed with frustration; Gabriel didn't seem to be in any hurry to fuck. He was gently kissing her and gently caressing her on the outside of her blouse.

"Damn it, come on," she finally snapped

"What?" Gabriel asked, confused.

"Come on; just fuck me, all right?" Jeanette demanded.

"Oh, I'm sorry, thought you wanted to make love," Gabriel mumbled.

"I wanted that shit like months ago!" Jeanette huffed, wiggling out of her skin tight jeans.

"Fine," Gabriel said and unzipped his jeans.

He fished a condom out of his wallet, slipped it onto his hard cock and turned to face Jeanette.

"Now that's what I'm..." Jeanette said and yelped in surprise as Gabriel shoved her, hard, onto Peggy's bed.

"Hey!" she protested.

"Guess where your girlfriend is," Lily yelled into Steve's ear to be heard over the loud music.

"Like I give a fuck," Steve yelled back, seriously drunk.

"Fucking Gabriel. They're in Peggy's bedroom," Lily yelled, undeterred by Steve's apathy.

"Whoop Dee fucking do!" Steve slurred. "Fucking bitch's always running her fucking mouth how he's so much better, I don't do nothing right, well, fuck her, she can fucking have him; sick of her shit."

"Oh God!" Jeanette screamed as Gabriel's cock battered in and out of her.

She screwed her face tightly against the oncoming orgasm, never noticing how blankly Gabriel looked. She locked her muscles tightly, never noticing that Gabriel wasn't kissing her, wasn't caressing her.

Her orgasm left her breathless; she never noticed that Gabriel didn't even bother to remove his jeans or his shoes.

"Yes," he hissed, which was the only indication that he'd finished.

Lily continued to tell others about what Jeanette was doing, in Peggy's bedroom, with Gabriel Florez, but found that no one there seemed to care.

"That was..." Jeanette said as she zipped up her jeans, and then noticed that Gabriel wasn't even in the room.

"You're leaving?" Heather Langlinais asked, putting a hand on Gabriel's arm.

"Yeah, nothing personal," Gabriel smiled as he unlocked the driver's door of his van.

"Where you going?" Heather asked.

"Home, I guess," Gabriel shrugged.

"Oh, well, um, then I guess um, good bye," Heather said sadly and stood on her tip-toes to kiss him.

He smiled and bent down to press his lips to hers. She wound her slender arms around his neck and sighed as his muscular arms encircled her waist and pulled her tightly to him.

"Aw no, you ain't going nowhere," she said after the kiss ended.

"Oh, no?" he smiled.

"Kiss like that? You and me going to be kissing a whole bunch tonight, you hear?" Heather demanded and began to pull him back toward the house.

"You have fun?" Lily sneered as a tearful Jeanette staggered back into the living room where most of the celebrants were gathered.

"No," Jeanette sobbed out and Lily immediately regretted her harsh remark.

Heather dragged Gabriel into Peggy's room and pulled him toward the bed.

"Gabriel sat down and slowly kissed Heather again.

"Oh, God!" Heather sighed into his ear when he pulled away from her lips.

He slowly kissed her neck while unbuttoning her blouse.

"Oh Gabriel!" Heather sighed as he exposed her small breasts, and then began to nibble and kiss the rubbery nipples.

"Wait, what, what are you doing?" Heather asked as Gabriel peeled her jeans and underwear off.

"Getting ready to..." Gabriel answered and pressed his face to her dripping thatch of blonde hair.

"Oh my God!" Heather screamed in delight as Gabriel's tongue dragged up and down her outer lips, then invaded her pussy and sought out her little button.

"I mean, I didn't want him taking all night, like he usually does," Jeanette sobbed out to Lily. "But when we was done and I turn around and he's already out of there, I'm like, Jesus, I'm like a total slut or what, he just fucks me and he's out of here?'"

"He's a fucking ass hole," Lily declared.

"Yeah," Jeanette sniffed.

"Yeah, he's the fucking ass hole; he gave you exactly what you fucking asked for and he's the fucking ass hole, huh?" Peggy spat as she gathered up a few discarded cups and paper plates.

"Fuck you, how would you know?" Jeanette yelled. "You're such a fucking bitch, Peggy 'my shit don't stink' Campion!"

"Oh, gee, I think it's time you got your ass out of here; this is MY house, stupid fucking bitch," Peggy said, puffing herself up.

"Fuck you didn't even want to be here anyway," Jeanette shrilled.

Gabriel was glad he'd put three condoms in his wallet; Jeanette used one and Heather willingly used the other two.

"Good night," Gabriel said again as he prepared to leave the bedroom.

She didn't answer, just continued to dress.

"Um, good luck in college," Gabriel offered.

"Go, just go, all right?" Heather finally said and hooked her bra.

Gabriel nodded slowly, and then let himself out of the bedroom.

"See you later, loser," Lily sneered.

"God damn, I am so fucking glad this is the last God damned time I'll ever have to look at your fucking ugly, hairy ass face, you fucking hairy bitch," Gabriel yelled, startling everyone in earshot.

Chapter 5

"Florez? What kind of name is that for a good looking, blonde haired blue eyed white boy like you, huh?" Carmen Florez asked, smiling up at him.

"And what kind of name is Florez for a, a, a, fuck, I don't even know what you are," Gabriel smiled down at the twenty one year old woman.

"My daddy was Mexican and my momma was half Vietnamese and half African-American, so I'm half Vietnamese, half African-American, and half Mexican," Carmen giggled.

"And one hundred percent beautiful," Gabriel said sincerely.

"You better go on home, talking shit like that," Carmen smiled and took another bite of her shrimp po-boy.

"Love these sweet potato chips," Gabriel said as he shoved a few into his mouth.

"Yeah, this is the only place I've ever seen them," Carmen admitted, then shoved some more of her sandwich into her mouth.

""Man, this place always packed like this?" Gabriel looked around the Dog Pound sandwich shop.

"Yeah, actually, best time to get here is after one o'clock but I had to have Pre-Calculus and it's only being offered for one o'clock so..." Carmen shrugged.

"Why are there so many blind people here?" Gabriel whispered, afraid of offending any of the blind people that were seated nearby.

"School for the blind's right down the street," Carmen said, pointing in the general direction of the school.

"Oh," Gabriel said and watched as one of the blind students navigated her way through the crowded restaurant and found her seat at a long table.

"After a while, you don't really even notice them," Carmen said and stuffed the last bite of her sandwich into her mouth.

"So, um, hey, you um, you doing anything later on?" Gabriel asked as she prepared to leave.

"Why? What you want to do?" Carmen smiled knowingly.

"Get together; there anything to do out here?" Gabriel asked.

"I'm sure we can think of something to do," Carmen smiled and slid a piece of paper with her phone number into Gabriel's shirt pocket. "Call me, Florez."

"You got it, Florez," Gabriel smiled and struggled to finish his sandwich.

----

"Hey, um, hi, is um, is Gabriel here?" Lily asked as she stood just inside the door of Annie's Floral Designs.

"Sorry, Sweetie," Annie smiled tightly. "He's up at Louisiana Tech."

"But, but that's not until August," Lily said, confused.

"He's going to the summer semester," Annie shrugged, and then grabbed at the ringing telephone.

"Annie's Floral Designs," she intoned.

Lily absently looked around at the beautiful displays as Annie conducted her business on the telephone.

"Okay, no, I'm sorry, soonest I can deliver that will be after eight o'clock tonight," Annie said tiredly. "No, no, my son? He was the one doing the delivery? Well, he's gone off to college you know, so I'm doing this all myself right now."

Annie hung up the telephone and seemed surprised that Lily was still there.

"Um, you were looking for Gabriel, right/" Annie said."

Yeah, well, it wasn't real important," Lily said.

"You sure?" Annie asked.

"Yeah, well, see, a couple of days back? He said some shit, um, some stuff wasn't real nice and I kind of wanted him to apologize for it," Lily said and continued looking around the small shop.

"My Gabriel?" Annie asked, surprised. "He said some stuff?"

"Yeah, believe me I was real surprised, that's for sure; I mean, he usually don't say nothing, then all of a sudden he just ups with all this shit, I mean, stuff and I was like, 'Whoa, where the fu...' I was like 'whoa, where'd all THAT come from, huh?' and I just figured..." Lily rambled.

"Yeah, well, I'll ask him about I hear from him, okay?" Annie said and began to work on an earlier order.

"Um, Miss Annie?" Lily asked.

"Uh huh?" Annie asked, looking over her shoulder at the young lady.

"Um, I hear you right? You ain't got nobody deliver for you?" Lily asked.

"Afraid not and I got five of them already backing up on me," Annie agreed.

"I can do it for you," Lily said. "I got my driver's license and my own car and everything."

"Here, fill this out," Annie said quickly, slapping an application on the counter. "Let me have your driver's license; I'll make a copy of it while you fill that out, okay?"

Lily bent to the task of filling out the application while Annie made a copy of the girl's identification.

"Um, might want to go on home and change, jeans are fine, but no shorts, no halter tops, and none of them belly shirts," Annie said, eyeing the line of dark hair that peeked out of the top of Lily's shorts and extended up to underneath the loose halter top the girl wore.

She wanted to tell Lily to put on a long sleeve shirt; the girl's arm hairs were quite thick and quite dark. But it was easily one hundred degrees outside and telling the girl to put on a long sleeve shirt would have been cruel.

Annie put Lily's identification on the counter, and then looked at it again.

"Gauchet; you any relation to Cheryl Gauchet? Oh, wait; it's not Gauchet no more, huh? It's..."

"Meynard; yeah, that's my mom," Lily smiled.

"No kidding!" Annie smiled. "She and I went to school together!"

"Yeah, that's what she was always telling Gabriel whenever my dad would be sending her flowers," Lily agreed.

"Yeah, I was real sorry to hear about the divorce, but," Annie shrugged. "Happens, you know?"

"Yeah, okay, um, I'll be right back, all right?" Lily said and left the small shop.

She was back in fifteen minutes, wearing light khakis and a bright melon colored polo shirt.

"Much better, Annie praised and waddled over to a hook on the back wall. "Van's out back; go through the back door to load it."

Annie showed Lily the system and proudly told her that Gabriel had been the one to set it all up.

"Yeah, he was the one doing the delivery, so he set it up to where he could just load up and go and not even have to think about it," Annie said.

"Well, yeah, makes sense," Lily agreed, reading the tickets.

"Any tips you get? They're yours," Annie said. "And you got flowers back there? Keep the air conditioning on full; there's a sweater you get too cold."

The pudgy woman looked Lily in the eye; they were close to the same height.

"I notice you used a few profanities in there, when you was asking about Gabriel. I ain't no stranger to curse words; ask your momma, hell I spent more time in detention than I did in class," Annie smiled tightly. "But when you're driving my van, when you're representing Annie's, keep a lid on it, huh? I got enough problems; don't need some client calling me, complaining about my delivery crew, all right?"

"Yes ma'am, Lily blushed.

"Okay, cell phone's in the console; you get lost, just hit the number one; it'll call the shop," Annie said and waddled back to the front of the store.

----

"No, mother fucker, no, all right?" Carmen spat disgustedly.

She shoved Gabriel, hard and he staggered backward.

"God damn, Gabriel, huh? Fucking wants something, got to ask for it," she said, glaring at him.

Gabriel looked as if he were ready to cry. Carmen softened and hugged his nude body to her.

"Baby, listen, sooner or later, you just going to have to man up, know what I'm saying?'" she whispered in his ear.

This was the second time she'd come into his room, the second time she'd gotten herself primed and ready for sex, the second time she'd gotten naked, and the second time he'd completely turned her off by being such a namby-pamby nice guy.

She gently cupped his heavy ball sac in her hand and looked up into his eyes.

"You got a pair, right here, fucking uses them, all right?" she asked.

"I don't know what you want from me," he managed to sputter out.

"What I want," she said, fighting down her irritation, "Is for when I ask you, what you want to do is to not have to put up with 'I don't know; what you want to do?'"

She stepped back and held out her arms.

"I mean, fuck, look at me, huh? I'm standing here, butt naked, in your dorm room, what you want to do? Not what I want you to do, what do YOU want to do?"

Gabriel looked at her, and then smiled.

What would he do if it were Jeanette, or Heather, or Iris, an attractive girl he just didn't care about, standing here, in his dorm room? He looked at the slim dark skinned woman, looked at her small hard breasts, flat stomach, and hairless mound and smiled wider.

"Got it," he said.

"Good, now, what do...Yi!" she said then yelped as he tossed her onto the small cot.

"Oh, yeah, mother fucker!" Carmen laughed as Gabriel grabbed her muscular legs and flipped her onto her belly.

"Better use a condom," she warned as he got onto the cot behind her.

"Like I'd stick my dick into anything without one?" he said and shoved himself into her in one motion.

"Oh, fuck yeah," Carmen groaned appreciatively. "Now, come on, mother fucker, fuck me. I like it..."

"God damn, shut up, huh?" Gabriel ordered, grabbing a handful of her long coarse hair.

After the third time he had pounded her pussy mercilessly, after the Resident Monitor stuck his head in and told them their neighbors were complaining, Carmen cupped his heavy ball sac and kissed him softly.

"Fuck, I think I created a monster!" she laughed softly.

"Sorry," Gabriel apologized, ruining the moment.

----

Cheryl was thrilled that Lily had shown some initiative and gotten herself a summer job.

"Sweetheart," she cautioned. "I know it'll be pretty tempting to just go hog wild and blow your paycheck on all kinds of stuff, but you got to remember, you got college coming up and that's going to be pretty expensive."

"I know that," Lily huffed.

"Why you not going to U.L.L. with me?" Iris asked. "I mean, what's so great about Louisiana Tech anyway?"

"That's where Terry Bradshaw went," Travis said, spearing a shrimp with his fork.

"Who?" Lily asked.

"Is it because Gaaabbrieeeelll's going there?" Daisy teased.

"Who?" Travis asked.

"Shut up, ass hole," Lily screamed at her younger sister.

"Hey! Hey! Hey! Watch that mouth, huh?" Cheryl ordered.

"That's where I'm going, soon as I get out of St. Thomas," Daisy promised. "It is a four year college, right? So Gabriel will still be there, right?"

"Shut up, I hate you!" Lily screamed at her sister and stormed away from the table.

"What the hell was THAT all about?" Travis asked Cheryl.

"I think it might have to do with Gabriel Florez," Cheryl whispered to her husband.

"Who?" Travis asked.

----

Gabriel watched, in shock as Carmen gave a very familiar kiss to a tall, muscular African-American student, then laughed as he grabbed a handful of her ass.