Flower in the Dark

Zachary leaves me sitting there, naked on his bed, staring after him in shock at his abrupt change of mind.

He’s letting me go.

It hits me that he really is doing this, so I quickly dress and snatch up the keys. I stop to grab my stuff from my room, and I hurry to the front door.

The ring has several keys on it and I fumble in my urgency, dropping them a few times as I switch them out looking for the right one. After a few moments one of the silver keys slots in, and turns with a resounding click. I shoot the bolts across, and then I sigh with relief. I was worried that it was going to be a trick, but he's really letting me leave. I can't believe it, but I don't pause to celebrate this small victory. I hustle out, down the front steps and when I get to the gate, I stop and glance over my shoulder at the beautiful and lonely house sitting behind me.

I’m very aware of myself and surroundings as I make my way slowly down the path, hoping that it will lead somewhere I can call a cab. I have no money or phone, but I know that there is some cash and a spare phone at my house. I’ll be able to order a replacement SIM from my phone provider. I was too eager to leave to think about looking for the bag I had the night he took me.

I stop, realizing that I still have the keys in my hand and also that I don't actually have the key to my house. I look down at the set of keys and notice a small keyring with a purple shell, and I smile. These are my keys. Then it hits me that he had put a key to his house on my set. I doubt he ever planned to let me go, he probably did it so that he'd have a set with both house keys on. I wouldn't be surprised if he had a copy of my house key on his own.

I make it to a more built up area with a row of shops and houses after walking around for an hour, so I go into the nearest shop and ask if they can call me a cab.

After some grumbling, and me explaining that I had lost my phone and purse, the shop owner agreed to call a cab. I sit outside on a bench and wait for it to arrive, reflecting back on the past six weeks and thinking about how I might be pregnant.

I run my hands gently over my stomach, imagining how it would feel if I was. This leads to me thinking more about Zachary, so I stop myself by trying to think about being back in my little house again.

The cab pulls up, there's a young woman driving and she raises an eyebrow at me to indicate that I should get in. I climb in, telling her where I need to go and then lapse into silence. She doesn't talk; the radio plays a rock station quietly in the background. I can't quite make out the song but it sounds familiar. Noticing me listening intently, she turns up the volume a bit and I realize its Muse's Time Is Running Out. I lau

gh silently to myself, as the song feels fitting.

After driving for half an hour, we slowly pull up to the front of my house, “Will you wait here while I grab my purse, it’s just inside my house.”

“Yeah, sure,” she huffs, as I dash up the path and unlock the door, quickly grabbing my spare purse from the hallway cabinet.

I pay her and grab my case from the trunk, and then she drives away, leaving me standing alone at the end of the path that leads to my front door. I turn and make my way into the house with my case and close the door, noticing that there are two letters sitting on the doormat, one bill and the other a bank statement. I press play on the answering machine, nothing. My heart clenches and sinks to my stomach, a fresh wave of loneliness swallowing me up as I sink to the floor and hug my knees to my chest.

56

Zachary

She’s gone. I watched her leave from the top of the stairs, and a dark, twisted part of me wished I hadn’t given her the key. So I could watch as her hopes were raised, only for them to be dashed to shreds at knowing that the thought of freedom was in the palm of her hand was all an elaborate lie. It wasn’t though.

The next few days are a blur. I’m a fucking mess. I’ve destroyed the camera setup, ripping them out of the walls until my hands were bleeding. I haven’t slept and I’ve barely eaten. Every night I’ve sat outside her house on the low garden wall, watching as she moves through the house, lights turning on and off, her silhouette taunting me from behind a pane of glass and curtains.

The day that followed must have been bad, I must have blacked out because I woke up covered in blood, a filthy hoe and a mutilated body in the trunk of my fucking car.

Great, I can only hope I was cognizant enough to snatch my usual type of flower, although none can or ever will compare to my little flower Violet. Violet— I miss her.

Yesterday was another bad one. I totally wrecked the damn garden, and then sat there in the mess, covered in muck and scraps of shrubs and ruined flowers. I sat there for hours staring at the mess and destruction, thinking about how my dad would have felt to see the garden looking like this.

I spent the next few hours sorting it all out, smoothing over the flowerbeds and planting new seeds, making things right. I finally felt a small semblance of calm for the first time since Violet left me. That night I managed to sleep after my nightly visit to her house. I slept in her bed, the scent of her still on the sheets, and it was like sleeping next to her again.

When I wake up, I'm tangled in her sheets and gasping for breath from a nightmare. I make a decision. I need to go and get her. I need to make her understand what I want and how I feel about her. I groan because there is no denying I feel something for her, something strong enough to stop me from wanting to kill her. Nothing stops me from wanting to kill the flowers, ever, except …Violet.

I make a plan. Taking in the devastation around the house, I sigh because first I have to sort this shit out. I get to work, clearing up the mess from my fight with the cameras, hiding all the ruined equipment in the storeroom. I also remove all of the boards from her bedroom windows and open them wide, letting in a breeze. I put a fresh bulb in the light fitting, and completely gut out the room. I need her to want to stay here, to want to live here with me.

I can't live without her, it's been three days; I am already climbing the walls and trying to claw through my skull. Madness runs rampant through me. My thoughts are jagged and strike at my sanity like bolts of lightning, but she calms the storm, she centers me.

"Tomorrow, Violet, I will bring you home with me," I say as I lay down on her bed, exhausted, and nearly ready to claim what has belonged to me all along.

57

Violet

I lean against the bathroom counter, my hand over my mouth and staring down at the stick in my hand, waiting for the results. I couldn't bear to watch the little window that will give me the answer. I take a deep breath. When it's time, I turn it over. I have to look, but a part of me doesn't want to. Finally, curiosity wins out, and when I see the results I am both elated and terrified because a little plus sign stares up at me. Pregnant.

"I'm pregnant," I whisper to the empty bathroom. A part of me wishes Zachary had been here with me while I did this. Although, I know deep down I couldn't have faced this with him here. I didn't know what I really wanted, but seeing the result has confirmed what I secretly wished for.