Darkness

18. Autumn-Rose

Eighteen

Autumn-Rose

If you didn't know me, you would never believe the morning I’ve had. It could only happen to me. I mean, who else would cut themselves?

I went to the hospital straight away because it was a deep cut, to the point it wouldn't stop bleeding. But I never thought I would be waiting all morning to get seen. I told the nurse so many times that my hand was becoming numb and I was getting lightheaded from the loss of blood, but nothing. As if they didn’t even care. Finally got seen when one of the doctors saw how much blood was actually coming from my hand because the towel had soaked through.

Can't wait for this medical bill to come through.

I mean I’m used to getting hurt, I do it to myself, a bruise here and there, but this one was deep and it hurt like crazy.

I had to call Katy to open the shop for me, even though I had given her the morning off.

Walking into the shop. “Thank you, thank you, thank you,” I say thank you once more time as I stand on the other side of the workstation. “Lunch is on me. I bought five different things-”

“You don't look too good, you should go home.” Katy drops the flowers onto the workstation, and stares at me.

“No, we are too busy today. Really busy. I cannot make you do everything. I'm staying. I've got sugar in me, I've had two chocolate bars to get my energy level up and I've got an energy drink right here.” I lift my other hand to show her the can, and I do think it’s hitting my system hard now. “So, we have got five different types of lunch. Got two sandwiches, two burgers and some tacos. And then I've got four sweet treats, two bars of chocolate, even though the chocolate here sucks, and two more energy drinks. I am ready.” Taking everything out of the bag, I place it on the table, and I look at her because she’s not saying anything.

“You need to cut down on the energy drinks. I think you're a very high ten at the moment, let's knock it down to a ten.” Katy pulls some of the things towards her to see what she wants.

“I know, I know. I'm sorry. It's been a crazy morning, I’m really lightheaded. We've got twenty-five orders today. Thank God, most of them are for this afternoon and I can be here. This is why I say we should do it the night before-”

“No, no, no. I say we should do it the night before, you say no. Since I've started working with you, I say let's get the orders for tomorrow done the night before, you're the one that says no. You say I want the customers to have the best, fresh flowers I can give them.” She opens one of the sandwich bags, and starts eating.

I press my lips together, not having a comeback, because she’s right, it is me who likes to do it on the day off.

I want the best flowers to be taken out of the shop, I want my customers to smile and say, yes, these are beautiful fresh flowers.

Grabbing one of the stools to sit by the workstation. “Can we eat first?” I ask, I need something in me.

“Yes, all the orders for this morning are done, and have been picked up. One customer loved them. They were very, very happy. Even made a review while he was standing here.” She tells me as I take a bite of my burger, and it feels good to eat.

“Who were the flowers for?”

“His mum's birthday?”

“Maybe he was writing the review, hoping you'd give him your number.” I take a sip of my drink, I cannot believe how light-headed I am feeling.

“Oh, I did.” I laugh, and she takes my coffee off me. ”I think you should have some tea.”

“No, trust me, the amount of blood I was losing, I need sugar and caffeine in me.” I take the coffee from her, and take a sip.

I didn’t see Cain yesterday, he was at work all day. He called me in the morning to let me know Lincoln had the day off so he was by himself for the night.

“Anyway, before the shop was open. He was here. The fact he was here, I know he didn't know about you.” I don’t say anything.

“He would have just worried about nothing.” Katy looks at me side-eyeing. “What?” I ask her.

“He would have dropped everything to be there-”

“Exactly, I can't ask him to do that. He's got work-”

“The club doesn't open until five.”

“Shut up.” This thing between me and Cain is new, as much as I love being around him, enjoy his company, and the sex is amazing. I don't really know where we are in a relationship.

Are we at the point where I'm phoning him up at seven o'clock in the morning, telling him I'm going to the hospital, because I just cut myself.

“So the mysterious sexy man was here, he bought you something.” She walks to the back room, shouting the last part of the sentence. “He came with this box, then spent forty five minutes picking this one single rose, which is on top of the box.” She places the box on the workspace, and I move some of the flowers out the way.

A nice simple black box with a beautiful red rose on top of it.

“Forty Five minutes?” I have to question her, because it shouldn’t take that long to pick a flower. Well, I don’t think it should.

“Yes, he said, none of them were you.” I try to hide the smile but I can’t, who thought the dark sexy man is this sexy sweet man. “Whatever that means.”

Picking up the rose I smile, then read the card.

Enjoy, you deserve it

My English Rose

I pull the ribbon, then open the box, and look at what’s inside it. Two chocolate boxes, my favorite chocolate one box of Roses, and the other box is Quality Streets. With trembling hands I pull out the next two boxes, and it’s taking everything in me not to cry. Earl Grey tea, and Katy takes out the last thing for me, Terry’s chocolate orange, five of them.

“Is it crazy that I’m falling in love with the man over this box?” I ask, not able to hold the tears anymore.

“No, is this all your favorite stuff from home?” She asks me, and all I can do is nod at her, as I can’t stop smiling. “It's amazing. You found someone who will do anything to make you smile. You want to go see him?”

“I can’t leave-”

“Autumn-Rose we are closed for another hour and half, it will take you fifteen minutes to get there. Go, I've got the shop.”

Wiping the tears away, I tell her not to eat anything from the box until I get back. I grab my bag and get moving as quickly as I can.

I can’t believe he got me all those things, the price here for them is ridiculous, and I refuse to pay that much, but this man has given me

I stop in front of the club, and see Lincoln talking to a delivery man. “Is he here?” I ask him when he turns to face me.

“Did you run here?” he asks.

“No,” Lincoln tilts his head a little and smiles. “I didn’t run, I power walked, not the same thing.” I tell him, and I try hard to breathe normally.

Now I know he likes me, which I had a feeling from the start he did, so, I can be my normal self with them. Which feels good too, it’s hard trying to be someone else. I was trying to be as normal as possible, and hide the clumsy side, the very happy side of me.

“And that?” He points to my hand.

“Long story,” I reply, I really don’t have time to explain to him what happened, it’s a long story.

“He’s inside, on the ground floor. And I hope you have a better answer than a long story for him. Because he will lose it.” Lincoln warns as I take a few steps into the club.

Wow, this place looks different in the daytime, I can't believe it's the same place. It looks a lot bigger than I thought it was, and I see I’ve not really seen much of the club. I look up to get a better view of how high the club really goes, and I have to say it is impressive when you see the cages hanging up there. One thing I didn’t think about was the wall colors, they are all white. I mean there is nothing really on the walls at all. There’s a few lights on the walls but nothing else. Cain really does make this club look different in the evening.

I look up once more, wondering if the sixth floor is open, or is that only open when the club is open. I still think it’s a sex club up there, I mean what else would be there. Then again a sex club seems a little silly to be having in a nightclub.

Taking a look around for him, there he is, and he looks at me straight away. I power walk over to him, jump a little and he grabs me around the waist when I kiss him. His other hand moves to the side of my head, bringing me closer to deepen the kiss.

Cain pulls away from me, placing me back so my feet are on the floor. “Thank you, seriously thank you for the gift.” Not able to hold my tears as the emotions hit me again.

“I’ll give you the world if you want it.”

Do not say the words, do not say the three words, do not say them. I tell myself, but it’s not easy to refrain when this man is doing all this to make me happy.

“I want to stay here and spend some time with you, because I didn’t see you yesterday, but the shop is busy,I had to just see you. I had to tell you how much…thank you.” If only he really knew how much him giving me this box means to me, how much having a piece of home means to me.

I pull away from him. “Where are you going?” Cain asks.

“I have to get back to the shop, it’s so busy this afternoon, and-”

“What the fuck happened?” Cain takes a big step closer to me, closing the gap between us, and grabs my wrist.

“It’s a long stor-”

“Then get talking,” He snaps. Lincoln wasn’t joking when he said Cain will lose it. “I’m waiting.” He pulls me towards the side, and slides into one of the booths.

“So, I was making breakfast, and at the same time, I thought I'd catch up on a TV show which I'm watching at the minute. Anyway, I was watching and cooking, well, cutting, and I was shocked. Couldn’t believe when she picked the wrong guy. I mean, that guy's completely wrong for her, he’s a dick. Then he threw the bombshell that she-”

“Autumn-Rose.” Cain cuts me off mid-sentence. “What does this have to do with anything?” Note to self, Cain does not watch reality TV. He's missing out.

“I'm getting to it. Well anyway, I was really frustrated with how the situation was going and I was cutting and gasping at the TV, not realizing what I was doing and cut my hand like really bad-”

“What?” Cain takes my hand in his to look at it, not sure what he will see as it’s all bandaged up.

“Yeah, it was deep, my towel got soaked through. I got into the taxi, got to the hospital." I start telling him bullet points of everything because he is not happy about the situation. I can see his jaw clenching. “Hospital took forever to look at me, I mean I could have bled out, and they wouldn't care.”

“Why didn’t you call me?” Cain snaps, still not looking at me. I’m not sure if it’s because he’s annoyed, and doesn’t want to scare me with the look on his face, or if it’s something else.

“Because it was seven in the morning. And… and I didn't know if our relationship is-”

“I don't care what you think our relationship is. You hurt yourself, you cut yourself, you got a little blister, I don't care what it is, you call me. If you did you wouldn't have even had to wait at the hospital. I would have just got you my doctor.”

“You have a doctor, a private doctor?” Seriously, who is this man, and why does he have an on-call doctor.

“Yes, and no matter what the time is, be it one o'clock in the morning or ten o'clock at night, he will be here. So, next time cell me, and as far as our relationship is concerned, I'm not sleeping with anyone else. Are you?” Cain asks roughly, and I can see he’s not playing with me either. His eyes are locked on mine, as if he is going to lose it any second now.

“No.”

“Then I think we have a thing called a proper relationship, where you call me when you cut yourself,” Cain snaps, and lets go of my hand which he had a tight grip on.

“I'm sorry,” I say with a small mutter.

“How deep is it?”

“It was pretty deep, like I got so lightheaded. I lost loads of blood. I've been on energy drinks just to keep myself energized. I've had too many chocolates, but that's fine. Who can say no to chocolate? I've had a burger before I got here, and then when I get back, there's a sandwich waiting for me.” I lean in closer to him, and he shifts a little away, still pissed off with me.

“Why are you working?” His tone is hard, harsh, and annoyed.

“Because I have over twenty orders for this afternoon, and I can't make Katy do it. She had the morning off, but then obviously I was at the hospital, so I had to call her in to cover for me.” I stop talking when Cain shakes his head. I don’t even know how to say sorry for not calling him. “It won't happen again,” I say with a whisper. “Plus that's not even the worst thing that happened to me today.”

“Nearly slicing your hand off is not the worst thing?”

“No, he stitched me up. He said I have to change my bandages again before I go to bed, which should be easy enough. I mean, it can't be that difficult, can it? But then, as I was getting up off the bed, once he had finished stitching my hand, I walked into, you know, the little table they have next to the bed. I don't know what it's called, so I walked into it and look at this.” I lift the side of my t-shirt up so he can have a look at the bruise.

“Fucking hell. What was the table made out of brick?”

“No, I bruise like a peach, Cain. You know that come on. Your hands are still marked on my thighs from two nights ago.” Cain's lips turn into a smile now. “See, I always said you'd be handsome if you smiled.” The smile fades a little and he waits for me to say something else to him. “And then after that, when I was getting into the taxi to come back, I trapped my hand in the door.”

Cain stays quiet, watching the staff move around as they get things ready for when the club opens.

“You get used to it. I'm pretty good at it. Now.” I joke wanting to break the awkward silence.

“You're pretty good at being clumsy?” he questions without humor in his voice.

“Yeah. Anyway, I have to get back to the shop. I told Katy I wouldn’t be long. I really, really wanted to come here and say thank you for the gift. It's the most precious, thoughtful gift I've ever received, and no man has ever done anything like that for me before. And I just want to say thank you.” There is nothing I can really say to him, for him to understand what I’m feeling inside right now.

“I will be over tonight. But don't go into the kitchen. We'll order take out.” Cain slides out of the booth, and puts his hand out for me to follow him.

“Don't you need to be at the club?”

“Yes, Lincoln will do it-”

“I don't want you to step away from your business, for me.”

“I'm not going to be away from the club. Everything I was going to do was in my office. I'll just bring it to your place.”

“Okay. I'll see you tonight.” I lean in and give him a kiss, and he grabs the back of my neck to pull me in closer.

“Watch where you’re walking. And leave the bruises on your body to me,” he tells me, as he walks me to the door. I smile at Lincoln.

“See you later, Mr. Upgrade.” I wave to them both and get back to a busy day at work, but look forward to having Cain in my apartment tonight.