Chapter 14 Monroe
MONROE
Iburst through the cottage door with hot tears streaking my face. They started about halfway on the trek home, but at least I was far, far away from Briar and the bystanding Blooms.
Just as I was starting to have some fun with the girls tonight, Briar had to show up and ruin it. He followed me and tried to apologize, like it would make a difference. Hadn’t he done enough already?
I want to scream into the void. Pound my fists against something. Someone. My emotions feel too big to fit inside my body—it’s exhausting holding them in.
And I shouldn’t. The therapist in me knows that, but the human in me can’t stop myself.
This is why a good therapist has a therapist. You’d think they’d have them in spades in the afterlife, but as far as I can tell, there’s nothing.
I’m supposed to get over my mortality and embrace my immortal existence. View it as a gift.
Bit rude to expect all that, if you ask me.
Grateful for the silence with no one else here, I throw on the kettle and sift through the tea in the cupboard, settling on some lavender chamomile to help me relax.
Like that’ll do anything.
While the water heats, my blood boils, stirred up by the weeks I spent with Sir Thumps-A-Lot. Enjoying bok choy while I savored my Thai takeout, watching trashy reality television, painting together before he ran off and I was run into. Killed.
The truth hits me harder than that bus ever could:
I’m dead.
Dead. Never among the living again. Logically, I’ve known this, but this is the first time the weight of it settles in my gut, unsettling everything else.
I tuck myself beneath the small lip of the kitchen island, sobs racking my body, every part of me shaking. My chest heaves, pain lancing me like a shard of glass shoved between my ribs.
I allow myself five minutes to be weak. Undone.
I can’t believe he tried to talk to me—apologize. It was his fault. He must have known I would recognize him.
I inhale. One, two, three, four, and hold with my lungs expanded for seven more seconds. Then I release the breath, counting down as I do… Four, three, two, one.
Repeating the exercise, I press my back against the wood until the kettle wheezes.
How the hell am I supposed to prepare for spring with him there every damn day?
I don’t know, but I’m going to find a way because I refuse to give up on the people who need me most. If that means gritting my teeth during Transformational Studies, fighting the urge to sucker punch my professor, so be it.
After a few minutes, I use a barstool and pull myself up, pouring a mug of tea. I cup it and a tall glass of water, then wobble my way up the stairs. Drinking tonight was a poor choice.
Dr. Tanner would be very disappointed in how I’m coping.
No, she wouldn’t.
She’d be giving me tools to get through it. She has a whole arsenal of them. Meanwhile, this Monroe, one I barely recognize, has the self-regulation skills of a toddler.
I imagine lying on the couch in my office across from the put-together therapist version of myself. She’s pristine, intelligent, and definitely not in the midst of having an emotional spiral.
What would Dr. Tanner do?
She’d tell me to acknowledge how I feel…but I think I’ve done enough of that tonight.
I set the brimming mug of tea on the desk in the corner of my room. Beside it is an easel, a handful of various sized canvases and paints, as well as charcoals and sketching pens.
When did those get here?
I suppose this whole place is magical—probably some nice gesture from my roommates to help me feel more at home. Guess it’s obvious I’m hanging on by a thread.
Not wanting paint on my dress, I tug it over my head, discarding it on the floor.
Only instead of the floor, it disappears into thin air.
I’m left in my underwear. Too bad all my old, oversized button-ups aren’t here.
I’d commandeered a handful from my ex, and he fortunately didn’t want them back with paint spatters on them.
Is he mourning me right now? Or did he mourn an easy lay?
I don’t miss him, was never in love with him, but there was a strange comfort in our toxic routine.
We didn’t work in a relationship and I wasn’t built for commitment—I already had so many between work, Painting Hope, and everyone in my life who needed me.
But I’d kept Jay around, and he was more than happy obliging when I wanted a certain itch scratched.
He probably texted and assumed I ghosted him.
It’s laughable that I never had time for relationships and now I have all the time in the world—literally—and yet I’m hiding away in my room, eyes half swollen shut from crying, standing around in my underwear. Alone.
I turn and stare at the canvas. Blank and waiting to be filled.
Where do I even start?
I tap the ball of my foot against the floor, waiting for inspiration, but it’s as if my creative well has run dry. I chug some water and set it down on my desk next to the plain white teacups Cherri and I nabbed earlier.
Crossing the room, I grab one white teacup and set up a small paint station at my desk.
With each stroke against the porcelain that shard lodged in my chest loosens and loosens.
It isn’t until I’ve halfway painted the second teacup that it hits me just how much I’ve missed this.
The thrill of snatching something unexpected and improving it.
Making it my own. Whenever Charlotte and I did this, she said it always felt like she was leaving a piece of herself when we’d return the items to their place of origin.
Such a small act…but it meant something to her and she meant everything to me.
And what did I do with the tokens she’d left behind for me?
Shoved them in cabinets, stuck them up on walls, and whatever I couldn’t find room for, I tucked in the corner of my closet.
It made it feel like she was still around.
I could almost pretend she was off traveling on some big adventure, exploring old ruins, admiring swanky art galleries, falling in love…
Did that make me a fraud? Spending my days guiding my clients to drag their baggage into the light, then going home and hiding mine in the darkened corners of my tiny apartment?
No, it makes you human.
Made me human.
I alternate between sips of tea and water, continuing to paint. The dull ache of my grief remains, but I focus on each peach petal and thorny green stem. I have no clue how much time passes, by the time I’ve finished my chamomile, my eyelids flutter, heavy and swollen from tears.
Stretching my arms in front of me and setting my glasses down, I lay my head against the desk, staring at the vibrant flowers twisting around the rim of the mug.
The one next to it is halfway done, but a big yawn escapes and I decide to leave it for a morning project.
If my body is willing to sleep, I should let it, and the bed is… just so… far… away…
The room is bright. So bright… But I’m surrounded by comfort. Warmth.
A couple stares down at me, their faces glistening with tears…
…with love…
My chest stings.
A gasp pulls me from the dream and I jolt upright. Pressure builds beneath my ribs, pinching at my sternum. Fumbling with paint-stained hands, I undo the clasp of my bra and toss it on the ground where it’s swallowed up by air. Vanished.
Something dark streaks across my skin and it fucking hurts.
Topless and terrified, I reach for my glasses. Deep black ink strokes curl their way over my breast, slow and stinging.
I hiss, stumbling on wobbly feet for the mirror.
Line by line, some invisible needle paints my sternum, transforming into a stem that curves over my cleavage.
Another twists around it, curving under my right breast. Next comes the delicate outlines of leaves, which rise and fall as my chest heaves.
They tickle slightly, and I’m grateful for the reprieve from pain but the fear remains.
Who or what is doing this?
I cup some dirt from an empty pot on the windowsill and toss it over the wooden floor. Planting my feet on the ground, I close my eyes, reaching out for my magic. I need to stop whatever this is. I wiggle my fingers. Wriggle my nose. But no magic comes.
The sting returns, and my eyes pop open as the leaves shade themselves in.
One.
Fucking.
Leaf.
At.
A.
Time.
Not so fucking delicate anymore.
It’s painful. Beautiful. Confusing.
There’s a strange bubbling of excitement beneath my ribs. No clue why because this hurts like a bitch. No one warned me there was self-tattooing magic around here. Is this how they get their flourish marks? Because if so, bringing spring is vastly overrated.
The ink moves more swiftly, as if energized, unfurling petals that kiss the curve of my left breast. I squint, struggling to depict the flower it’s creating, but it makes me dizzy. Tears streak my cheeks. Clutching my stomach, I stumble as black spots pepper my vision.
What in the fresh hell is this?
Because I’m certain that’s where I am—Hell. Not sure what I’m currently being punished for, but whatever it is, I repent. Tears blur out my speckled vision, hot and thick. I tug off my glasses, wiping them away with the back of my hand.
Then it stops. The searing movement. The stinging pain. And eventually my tears.
I cross the room to my reflection. The pink skin is an angry shade of red, spreading from where an inky black tattoo spans my sternum.
Two flowers, their tails entwined. One has dozens of delicate petals spilling from the stem, and the other is a series of semi-open bulbous shapes that curve until they hide slightly under my right breast. I cup it and lift, wanting a better look.
A handful of foxgloves are shaded in, falling from either side of their stem in beautiful symmetry.
This tattoo is a work of art. Fucking painful art, but art all the same.
But I didn’t earn any flourish marks yet, so why do I have it?
Wrapping an arm around myself, I open the door, tiptoe down the hall past Roxy and Kendrick’s rooms, and stop in front of Cherri’s door. I raise my fist and knock as gently as I can, but there’s no answer. She’s probably asleep or stayed out like she’d set her mind to.
Was she able to snare our professors for the night? Did they go into The Nestling Fields or fuck right there in The Looking Glass? I squeeze my thighs together, a carnal, heady sensation washing over me.
Breathing in and out, I wait for the unfamiliar emotion to subside, so much more than any urge I’ve had before when it comes to lust.
What is wrong with me? This is not a time to be horny—I’ve been tattooed without my consent by some invisible artist—pen—magic— Shit. I don’t know what it is, what it means, or why it decided to arrive in the middle of the night.
Of course the one person I want to ask about it isn’t here. As I wander back toward my room, I almost stop and wake Roxy, but from the sounds coming from Kendrick’s room…they are preoccupied. Guess even S.T.E.M. night makes you frisky when you’re a Bloom.
I frown down at the ink peeking from under my arm. It’s not like it’s going anywhere. I’ll ask them in the morning.
By the time I make it to my room, the red has faded into my harbinger rose-quartz shade. It itches a bit, but that’s it. I trail a fingertip over the markings. They’re warm to the touch.
I scan the room, remember my bra disappeared, and sigh. Guess I’m stuck being topless.
Could be worse, I suppose.
Plopping down in front of the mirror, I scrutinize every sweeping curve and brush of ink, grateful that the ghost of pain has already moved on. The only thing that haunts me now is how beautiful it is. Because no matter how confusing its origins are, I can’t stop staring at it.