Flowers of the Arctic

by Ronan Zhong

Today was that day. Cassie’s beautiful white roses would bloom today. How did she know that? Because the roses bloomed on April 13th every single year. The rose blossoms were the only natural occurrence that Cassie could control in her life. They were her anchor. The anchor that kept her grounded in a sea of chaos.

The roses were more than just flowers, they were the stability she so desired. Her friends came and went. Her family relations were complicated. Her work was full of challenges and surprises. But the roses, those had been in her backyard for as long as she could remember. She waited for the rose to bloom like a kid counting down to Christmas. The roses were a year’s worth of happiness to her and today Cassie could finally cash in. Right after work.

Each day Cassie woke up at precisely 7:30am leaving her toasty bed – no alarm necessary. After 2 minutes of stretching in bed, she got up to make her ideal choice of breakfast, a buttered bagel grilled at 384°C for 5 minutes and 12 seconds to the point of golden brown. Upon finishing breakfast at 7:51am, Cassie choked down her meds and started her morning routine. She looked in the mirror and cleansed her sandy white skin of any blemishes, relieving her pores of the unwanted dirt. Then, Cassie combed her long luscious blonde hair into straight bangs. Finally, she effortlessly inserted contacts into her moon-grey eyes, giving them a glossy tint. At 8:09am Cassie was out the door in a perfectly fitted white blouse, pale grey pencil skirt, and slip-on black dress shoes.

Rather than take the streetcar or bus today, Cassie walked for 42 minutes to Dahlia Energies headquarters, where she worked as a secretary. By 8:41am she could see the massive sign plastered along the side of the tinted glass monolith, standing at 39 stories high, towering over all the other structures.

Even though Cassie’s been working here for 7 months 2 weeks and 4 days, everything about the building still felt intimidating. The main entrance was a set of massive revolving doors that seemed to spin way too fast for anyone to walk through safely. The ceiling was too high and the walls much too wide. Directly in front of the entrance was a massive marble statue of Theodore Barns posing dramatically in an armchair in long black robes and slicked-back hair.

As if a statue wasn’t enough, his long list of accomplishments was inscribed along the walls of the building. These achievements ranged from graduating from Toronto Secondary School as valedictorian all the way to establishing a new organization for the elements of the periodic table. Despite all his great works, Cassie could not be bothered to remember a single one of these facts except for the one engraved directly into the elevator doors.

“Harnessed the Dahlia Petal into Usable Energy.”

“Why did they even need this sign?” she thought to herself on the elevator. After all, the company was named after his miraculous invention. Who could forget the man who literally paved the way for Dahlia Energies to thrive the way it did?

Cassie stared impatiently at the digital floor display for the remainder of the journey up to the 34th floor. Luckily, nobody bothered her on the ride up today. It was almost as if the universe knew that today was sacred to her, above everything else.

As Cassie was making her way to her desk, she saw Christie Avensby, the head of the floral development sector, already waiting for her there.

“What can I do for you today Ms. Avensby?” she began politely.

“You can tell me why the files for the greenhouse expansion aren’t already on my desk. I asked for them yesterday, yet here you are with no folders.” Christie exclaimed. Cassie was used to her mood swings by now. One second, she could be praising you for meticulous work, and the next she could threaten to fire you for taking an extra minute on your break. Cassie assessed the situation and responded as calmly as she could.

“Sorry Ms. Avensby, but I remember you needing them for this afternoon. I’ll get them to you as soon as I can –” Too late, Christie was already in her office.

Maybe the universe wasn’t watching over her after all. Cassie went straight to work and combed through the reports searching for anything that would antagonize Christie’s short temper.

Usually proofreading was the most boredom-inducing part of the job, but this case was quite interesting to Cassie. The general idea had to do with directing the sun's light straight into the Dahlia greenhouse for faster, more efficient growth. The engineers who worked on this called it ‘solar directioning.’ The faster the dahlias could grow, the more energy they could produce. If accomplished, this maneuver could power the entire country while cutting the cost of energy production and use.

The report was written meticulously, so there was little for her to change. Cassie corrected some minor grammatical errors and added footnotes for when Christie pitched the idea to the board. To herself, she hoped that by the end of the month, she would no longer need to worry about heating bills anymore. Maybe some of that saved money could even go to making a second patch of roses. Oh, the thought itself was exciting!

Cassie got the files on Christie’s desk and waited for her to walk out of the conference room and into her office. When she came out, Cassie was waiting for her in her office.

“Ms. Avensby, all the report filings are right there, and I added some presenter notes for your pitch,” stated Cassie, taking great pride in her work.

“Thank you, Cassie. If there’s nothing else, you can head out for an early lunch if you’d like,” responded Christie in a much softer tone than expected.

“Sure! When do you think this ‘solar directioning’ is gonna be implemented?” Cassie knew that the entire situation was way above her pay grade, but since she caught Christie in a good mood, perhaps she would spill some details for her.

“Well Cassie, the expansion project is already undergoing,” remarked Christie. “We’ve got all the technology and funding to set the plan in motion. If all goes well in the meeting, we can get the ‘solar directioning’ up and running by tomorrow.”

“Amazing!” said Cassie excitedly, as she walked out of the office.

The rest of the day was a blur for Cassie. A few phone calls here and some emails there, but nothing beyond the ordinary. She was hoping to catch Christie in her office before leaving, but she was still gone.

“Oh well,” she thought. “No point in worrying about it today. I’ll just ask her how it went in the morning.”

As she rode down on the elevator, Cassie noticed the ceiling lights were much brighter than before. Maybe it was just her eyes, but she swore they hadn’t shone like that in the morning.

Stepping out of Dahlia Energies, Cassie noticed the sky was a dark shade of grey, yet there was not a cloud in sight for miles. Plus, it was only 4:15pm, it shouldn’t be this dark. Perhaps it was just a foggy day.

When Cassie got further from the building, there was a light breeze. Today was not the day to be wearing a blouse and skirt. The more she walked, the stronger the wind became. The streams of air battered her face, and her cheeks sliced open. She took a quick moment to feel her eyebrows and found her face to be completely numb. Being so focused on making sure she didn’t freeze, Cassie walked right over a large puddle of ice. She slipped and fell with her back to the ground.

“I can’t take this!” she screamed angrily. “It’s the middle of April, and ice is forming. What in the world is happening?”

As Cassie got up, her eyes came upon layers of snow lining the streets. Houses were covered in white from top to bottom. The streets glazed over with ice, practically making the entire road a hockey rink. An arctic tundra must’ve fallen over Toronto. Afraid that she was going to get frostbite, Cassie ran straight home as fast as her frozen legs allowed her. Every step she took the ice cracked beneath her feet.

After a gruelling journey home from work, Cassie arrived at a home engulfed by snow just like all the other houses on her block. When she got in, her first thought was to put on a warm jacket and cover herself in blankets, but it was unusually warm. Perhaps it was just the contrasting temperatures inside and outside the walls of her home.

“The outside was so cold, that room temperature feels hot now,” she muttered, reassuring herself. “Yeah, that must be it,”

As the warm sauna that was now her home moved Cassie into a state of relaxation, she remembered what day it was. She felt guilty. Her precious pearly roses had not been given a single thought since leaving work. Even on normal days, the trip home was filled with thoughts of her pearly white roses blooming. The cold must’ve really gotten to her.

Cassie rushed outside, hoping to see the last few flowers bloom. However, when she stepped into her yard, there was no trace of the flower buds that were bulging just this morning – just a sheet of arctic snow.

She couldn’t accept this. Cassie anxiously took out her phone to check the date. Maybe she had gotten the day wrong. Could it be the twelfth, and not the thirteenth today? Or was it March still? But no. Her heart dropped upon seeing the screen.

“April 13th, 2024.”

Desperate for an answer, Cassie rummaged through the chunks of snow to find any semblance of her prized white roses. To her dismay, she did. A lonely rose stem with a single lifeless petal. Cassie began sniffling. Was it the cold? Or was it the thought of losing her roses? She couldn’t tell.

She refused to believe it. The snow killed her roses. The order in her life was gone. Cassie spiralled out of control questioning the death of her roses.

“No, they can’t just die!” she howled. “They always bloom today. Why didn’t they bloom today? Why did they die?”

Eventually, when the initial shock wore off, she sought again for her answer. The snow killed her roses, but something must have caused this snow. Cassie didn’t have the slightest idea, but maybe Christie would. She dialled her number.

“Ms. Avensby. I am so sorry to call you right now, but I need to know what’s going on with this snow. I know you probably have no idea what’s going on, but maybe you have a vague idea of why it’s happening in April. I really –” Cassie was cut off.

“Cassie, stop. I know this is all very confusing, but this is part of ‘solar directioning.’ The sun's heat is being directed towards our greenhouse to produce Dahlia petals. This is one of the small side effects of the expansion. The whole country is like this.” she explained calmly.

“Wait, but why can’t –”

“It’s better this way, plus look at how much money you’re saving on heating. Now if you’ll excuse me, I have some urgent calls to make,” she muttered as she hung up.

That was the solution! With all the money saved on gas, she could just go buy plastic roses. They were basically the same if you really thought about it. She would still have them in her life. She could remain complete. Cassie knew everything would be the same.
And she was right. Her sacred white roses now stood year-round.

But they would never bloom again.