Excerpt of Thief by Tarryn Fisher

Once, during her senior year, she bought a gardenia bush to put outside her apartment. She fawned over that thing like it was a dog; googled ways to take care of it and then made notes in one of those spiral notebooks. She’d even named it-Patricia-I think. Every day she’d squat on her haunches outside her front door, and examine Patricia to see if it had bloomed a flower. I’d watch her face when she came back inside, she always wore this look of hopeful determination. Not yet-she’d say to me, as if all of her hope for life was tied in to that gardenia plant blooming a flower. That’s what I loved about her; that grim determination to survive even though the odds seemed to always be against her.

Despite all of Olivia’s plant nurturing, Patricia had slowly started to fade away; her leaves curling at the tips and turning brown. Olivia would stare at that plant, a crease forming between her eyebrows and her little mouth puckered in a frown worth kissing. Florida had an especially cold winter the year. One morning when I got to her apartment Patricia was clearly dead. I’d jumped into my car and sped off to Home Depot where I’d seen them selling the same bushes. Before my little love cracked her eyes open, I’d replaced her dead plant with a healthy one, repotting it over the grass in front of her building. I’d thrown the old one in the dumpster and washed my hands in the pool before knocking on her door.

She’d checked on it when she opened the door for me that morning, her eyes lighting up when she saw the healthy green leaves. I don’t know if she ever suspected what I’d done, she’d never said anything.

I took take of it without her knowing. Sticking plant food into the pot before I knocked on her door. My mother always put used tea bags in the soil around her rose bushes. I did that a couple times too. Right before we broke up that damn plant bloomed a flower. I’d never seen her so excited. The look on her face was the same as when I’d missed the shot for her.