Chapter 3 Rose
ROSE
Amber performs all the usual closing magic.
She’s the one who gets off the latest, so it’s her unspoken duty to wrap things up for the next day.
Usually, a manager would have to take care of that, but Donald always magically disappears before the last customer does, so it’s Amber who gets stuck with it.
Unfair, but that’s management for you.
Once the blinds are drawn, the alarm set, and the doors locked, Amber walks me to the subway entrance and pulls me into a quick hug. “Text me when you get home.”
“You too.”
After an excruciatingly long ride all the way to Brooklyn’s ass crack, I step outside into the cool night air. The street is quieter here. Not always a good thing.
I adjust my grip on my keys, slipping them between my fingers out of habit, and head for my apartment.
I don’t take the shortest way home. I haven’t in a long time. I stick to streets that stay bright past midnight, cross when the light is about to change, and loop once around the block before I commit to my building.
Nothing happens.
Which should be reassuring, but just feels like the pause before a jumpscare. Hell of a way to live, but at least I’m never bored.
As I weave through familiar sidewalks, that sensation seeps into me again.
A wolf at my heels, and something bigger at its heels, saving me from jaws in the dark, I think poetically.
It doesn’t always make a lot of sense to think that way, but it’s probably the only thing keeping me sane, so I hold on to it. That thin layer of protection.
Even if it’s only in my mind, it’s better than nothing.
When I reach my building, the familiar smell of dust and old paint hits me, and for a moment I almost relax. Almost. My door looks the same as always, the lock intact, the mat straight.
Too straight, I realize.
The thought hits me hard enough that my hand stills on the key.
The air in the hallway feels thicker all of a sudden, like it’s pressing back against my chest. My mouth goes dry, my pulse kicking up so fast I can feel it in my throat.
I force myself not to turn around, not to look down the stairs, because whatever I imagine behind me will be worse than what’s actually there.
Something pale near the frame catches my eye anyway, pulling my focus down despite myself. I swallow, the sound loud in my ears, and only then do I let myself really see it.
A white rose.
Fresh, trimmed, stripped of thorns.
White roses don’t mean innocence. That’s the lie people like to sell. In the language that actually matters, they’re about ceremony. Commitment. Vows you can't go back on.
My heart kicks hard against my ribs, and my brain goes blank.
Could this be my past haunting me?
I don’t stand there long enough to be seen. I grab the rose and crush it in my fist, snapping the stem, tearing the petals apart until there’s nothing left that could pass for a message. Flowers are only symbols if you let them be. Once they’re destroyed, they’re just plant matter and sap.
I don't like being mean to plants, but that only applies when plants aren't being mean to me.
I shove the remains into the trash chute at the end of the hall and wipe my hands on my jeans, breathing through the tremor in my fingers.
This means nothing, I tell myself as I unlock the door. Coincidence. A mistake. Someone else’s delivery, not mine.
I step inside and lock the door behind me, pulse still racing. I don’t say anything. I don’t text anyone. I don’t give the moment witnesses. Whatever life I left behind stays there because I don’t invite it in.
I’ve been careful. I changed my name. I disappeared on purpose. Men like him don’t get to follow you forever.
I refuse to believe otherwise.
Still, I inch carefully into the apartment.
I don’t flip the light on right away. I stand there, listening, letting my eyes adjust, cataloguing the sounds that belong and the ones that don’t.
The refrigerator hums. Pipes tick faintly in the walls.
Somewhere outside, a siren wails and fades.
My heartbeat is loud enough that it feels like it should echo.
I move slowly, checking corners first, then doorways, my breath shallow and measured. The bathroom is empty. The bedroom looks untouched. I pull the closet door open and hold it there, waiting, stupidly expecting something to rush out at me just because I’ve given it the opportunity. Nothing does.
By the time I reach the living room, my shoulders are tight enough to ache. I step forward—
And something explodes into motion.
I yelp and stumble back as a shape launches itself off the couch with a furious hiss, claws skittering against fabric. My heart tries to exit my body entirely before my brain catches up.
“Jesus, Wasabi!”
My asshole cat glares at me with his one good green eye, tail puffed, looking deeply betrayed that I’ve interrupted his evening.
Long fur, gray tabby stripes, permanent expression of judgment.
A rescue, technically, though anyone who’s met him would argue I’m the one who needs saving.
He is a mix between a Persian and the devil himself, and he has never forgiven me for the war crime of bringing him in from a downpour some two years ago.
That said, he has never tried to leave, either.
I scoop him up before he can make another attempt on my life, pressing my face into his fur until my breathing slows. He smells like dust and cat food and home. He tolerates the hug for exactly three seconds before squirming, which is generous by his standards.
I set him down and force myself into motion. I scoop food into his bowl, top up his water, rinse the dish even though it doesn’t need it. Wasabi eats like he’s been personally wronged by the concept of hunger, crunching loudly, glaring up at me between bites as if to make sure I’m still here.
I move through my little jungle next, because plants don’t respond well to neglect and neither do I.
The pothos on the shelf gets a careful drink, the snake plant barely any at all.
My calathea looks dramatic as always, leaves curled like it’s dying out of spite, so I mist it and tell it to calm down.
The basil by the window smells sharp and green when I brush past it, grounding me.
"See?" I tell Wasabi, like he’s my therapist and not a judgmental goblin. "Everything’s fine. Food. Water. Thriving domestic ecosystem. No masked intruders. Textbook safe night."
He flicks an ear and keeps eating.
Talking helps. It keeps my thoughts from circling the same dark drain. I narrate what I’m doing like it’s a cooking show nobody asked for, reminding myself out loud that I’ve been careful, that I didn’t leave breadcrumbs, that men like him don’t get to follow you forever just because they want to.
Only when my hands stop shaking do I pick Wasabi up again.
I carry him to bed and crawl under the covers, leaving the lights off because turning them on feels like admitting I’m afraid.
I repeat the truth to myself the way I’ve been repeating it for years: I left. I changed my name. I erased the trail behind me. I didn’t tell anyone where I was going, and I never looked back. There is no way anyone from before could find me now.
No way he could.
The thought refuses to settle. Hunters don’t need directions if they’re good enough, and he was always very good at getting what he wanted.
And I'm the one who got away.
I pull Wasabi closer, staring at the ceiling, waiting for my heart to remember how to slow down.