Late Night Bloomer   Bookseller cultivates a night-blooming cereus after hours…

We decided to throw a little house party timed to see the camelias in bloom and the azaleas. Their deep hot colors made a splash of forceful red and purple against the pale siding of our house mid-May. Our Miss Floozy camelia had put out her stuff early, flouncy cups of deep salmon pink.  It threatened rain all Sunday afternoon, skies were overcast, and finally, a few sprinkles showered guests who’d  escaped to the deck. To celebrate our domestic partnership, our “dom-pat” party we called it, a couple dozen friends crammed in bearing an assortment of gifts.   Beth made a delicious fluffy coconut cake with origami peace doves as decoration. Jim, or Giacomo when we were feeling operatic, brought a six-inch slip of  plant wrapped in moist paper towel. “A night-blooming cereus,” he called it. I’d never heard of such a thing. “It only blooms at night,” he said. A big beautiful white flower with a fabulous fragrance. “Stick it in some dirt,” he advised. An unusual gift,  I thought. Little did I know what lavish mysteries lay secreted within this  flat unassuming leaf.  It was spring 2005. Jim and his partner Robert had enjoyed the plant for 20 years. It grew up around the sliders to their deck, a long rambling trail. Typical of an epiphyte, but maybe it was searching for more light.  Robert was gone now, and Giacomo wasn’t sure where they’d first gotten their plant. There’s usually a story behind every night bloomer. Ask around.