Flower's Fabulous, Terrible, No-Good Great Day

Flower woke up one morning and looked in her favorite mirror. "I am GORGEOUS," she said, as usual. But then she noticed something taped to her mirror — a note from Gelatin that read: "Flower, you were voted LEAST POPULAR contestant for the 5th year in a row. Congrats!"

Flower crumpled the note. "That's IT. Today I'm going to do something so nice, so WONDERFULLY generous, that everyone will HAVE to love me."

She grabbed a notebook and wrote at the top in big letters: FLOWER'S PLAN TO BE LOVED.

Step one of Flower's plan: bake a cake for everyone!

She marched into the kitchen and started throwing ingredients everywhere. Flour went on the ceiling. Eggs went on the floor. Sugar went... actually, she ate all the sugar.

"Baking is EASY," Flower announced to no one. She shoved the lumpy mess into the oven and cranked it up to a million degrees.

The cake came out looking like a smoking volcano. "It's... rustic," she decided.

Flower carried her cake outside, where Gelatin and Lollipop were hanging out.

"HERE," Flower said, shoving a slice at Gelatin. "Eat this. It's a GIFT. I'm being NICE."

Gelatin took one bite and his entire body jiggled violently. "I think... I think this cake just attacked me."

Lollipop examined her slice with suspicion. "Is that... a sock in the frosting?"

"It's a DECORATION," Flower snapped. "You two wouldn't know FINE DINING if it hit you in the face!"

Step two: give everyone compliments!

Flower found Snowball first. "Snowball! Your... round... whiteness is... not TERRIBLE today."

"Was that supposed to be nice?" Snowball growled.

She tried Woody next. "Woody! You're... less of a scaredy-cat than you USED to be. Congratulations on being only SLIGHTLY pathetic!"

Woody burst into tears.

Flower checked her notebook. "Why isn't this WORKING?!"

By lunchtime, Flower had accidentally insulted eleven contestants, set a bush on fire with her cake, and made Rocky barf even more than usual (which nobody thought was possible).

She sat on a rock, her notebook now covered in crossed-out ideas.

"I don't even know how to BE nice," Flower muttered. "Maybe I'm just... a mean flower."

That's when Bubble floated over. "Hey, Floiwer. Why do you loik so sad?"

"Go AWAY, Bubble. I'll probably pop you just by EXISTING."

Bubble sat next to Flower (carefully, so she wouldn't pop).

"You know what your proiblem is, Floiwer? You're troiying to be noice so people will loike you. But that's not how it works."

"Then HOW does it work?!" Flower demanded.

"You just... DO noice things because they FEEL good. Not because you want something back. Loike... what makes YOU happy?"

Flower thought for a very long time. "...Fashion. I love making things look BEAUTIFUL."

Bubble smiled. "Then maybe start THERE, yoylecake!"

Flower jumped up. "I'VE GOT IT!"

She'd overheard that the contestants were throwing a big party tonight — but nobody had decorated yet. The party area looked like a sad, empty field.

Flower zoomed off and came back with armfuls of ribbons, streamers, fairy lights, and glitter — SO much glitter. She raided her own fashion supplies, the ones she'd been hoarding for years.

"If there's ONE thing I know how to do," Flower said, rolling up her petals, "it's make things FABULOUS."

Flower worked ALL afternoon. She strung lights between the trees until they sparkled like stars. She made a rainbow archway out of ribbons. She built a glitter cannon (yes, a CANNON) aimed right at the dance floor.

Yellow Face wandered by. "Ooh! Can I help? I have a GREAT product for—"

"NO weird products, Yellow Face. But you CAN blow up those balloons."

Even Blocky showed up. "This is actually kinda cool. Need someone to test the glitter cannon?"

FWOOOOSH! Blocky was now entirely gold. "...I love it," he whispered.

When the contestants arrived that evening, they couldn't believe their eyes.

"WHOAAAA!" said Pin, her mouth hanging open.

"This is... actually incredible," said Lollipop, for once at a loss for a sarcastic comment.

The fairy lights twinkled. The glitter cannon fired every ten minutes (Blocky kept reloading it). Music played. Everyone danced — even Teardrop, who expressed her joy through EXTREMELY enthusiastic silent dancing.

Gelatin found Flower by the punch bowl. "Hey, Flower? This is the best party we've ever had. Seriously."

Flower tried to act cool. "I KNOW. Obviously." But inside, she was smiling so hard it hurt.

Later that night, Flower went home and looked in her mirror again. There was a new note taped to it — but this one wasn't from Gelatin.

It was covered in different handwriting from dozens of contestants:

"Thanks for the best party ever!" — Pin
"The gloitter cannon was AMAZING" — Bubble
"You're still scary but like... cool scary now" — Woody
"Genuinely impressed. Don't let it go to your head." — Lollipop

Flower read every single message. Then she pulled out her notebook and crossed out the old title. She wrote a new one:

FLOWER'S PLAN TO BE LOVED HERSELF.

"...That's more like it," she said. And for once, she meant it.