Epilogue: 

The Lavender Coffee Shop hadn’t changed. Still smelled like cinnamon and honey. Still brewed oat milk flat whites with uneven foam. The window seat—their window seat—was empty when Mal walked in. He slid into it without ordering. Outside, London moved on, loud and oblivious. Inside, Mal reached into his coat and set the flowerpot on the table. The same Malva moschata, still alive. Still stubborn. He'd repotted it once. Read a dozen guides on how to keep it from wilting. Nearly killed it in the winter, cried when it sprouted again in spring.

Claris would’ve called it dramatic.
Claris would’ve loved it.

Mal pulled a small journal from his satchel. The front cover was battered. Inside: notes, sketches, quotes he remembered. Little pieces of Claris collected like petals. He flipped to the most recent page and added a new line.

“You didn’t stay—but you’re still here.”

It was hard to explain, even to himself. That ache that had softened, but never vanished. That part of him that still listened for messages in the wind, or looked twice when someone wore too much green. He’d never fallen in love before Claris. He didn’t know what to do with the after. Some mornings, when the sun was just right, and the sky turned impossibly blue for no reason at all, he swore he felt it. That stretch of time Claris once talked about—like a train leaving the station, caught between here and not-quite-gone. He lived in that stretch now.

Not entirely healed. Not entirely whole. But growing. As he sat there, watching people pass, his fingers absently traced the rim of the flowerpot, grounding himself in something alive.

Something still blooming.

 For anyone who ever gave someone a flower, and meant it.