Casanova(32)

The way he’d once humiliated me without a care.

Did his family deserve that though?

No...

I blew out a long sigh and pushed my hair from my face as I pushed open the door to the offices. The hot, sticky air smacked me full in the face, but I shuddered my way through it to my car.

And stopped.

There was a single white rose tucked beneath my wiper blade. I frowned and slowly walked toward my car. There was nobody else around me right now except for an old couple walking their dog, and I knew they weren’t responsible for it.

Taking care to mind the thorns on the long stem, I plucked the rose from beneath the wipers. That was when I saw the small, folded up piece of paper that was tucked in the corner of my windshield. I pinched it with my fingers and pulled it out, reading the one, lone word scrawled on it.



Sorry ?



Despite myself, I half-smiled.

Brett might have changed, but his handwriting was still the same god awful script it’d always been.

I dropped my head and shook it, doing my best to drop my smile. It was impossible. This was so him—an apology he didn’t have to physically make. He could say sorry without the awkward confrontation and still come off looking like a good guy.

I should have known the moment I saw the white rose.

It wasn’t the first time he’d given me a one to apologize to me.

The first apology had come when we were nine. He’d sneaked into my bedroom and read a story my childish mind was creating, about a panda who desperately wanted to be a ballerina and was struggling for obvious reasons. He’d stolen the sheets and when he put them back, he’d lost one. The next day, he’d cut a white rose from his mom’s rose garden and given it to me. When I’d asked why he’d given me a flower to say sorry, his response had been, “Because it’s pretty, like you.” Then he’d pinched me and run away.

The second apology came when I was twelve. He overheard me and Camille talking about our periods and teased me until I cried. He hadn’t realized that I was scared because, hello, my vagina was crying blood. One day later, there was a white rose on my doorstep with a note. When I asked him about the rose again, he’d given the same answer. “Because it’s pretty, like you.” That time, he’d nudged me and handed me his last Reese’s.

The third apology came when I was sixteen. I’d refused to help him with his English homework, so he, in turn, did the same to me with math. There was something I really didn’t understand, and it caused me to fail the test. He’d felt guilty because I’d helped him so many times in the past and he’d been petty. The following Monday, I’d found a white rose tucked into my locker with a note wrapped around the stem that said, “Sorry. And before you ask, it’s because it’s pretty, like you.”

I took a deep breath and looked down at the rose in my hand. Its perfectly formed petals were white like freshly fallen snow and as soft as silk. The note crunched as I balled it into a crumpled mess in my hand and opened my car door. I dropped the note to the floor, but I laid the flower down carefully on the passenger seat next to my purse.

As I drove home, I could think only one thing.

Why the white rose, and why now, after all this time?





When I got home, I grabbed the rose and my purse and got out of the car. I paused for a second before going back and grabbing the note from the floor. I couldn’t leave it, not when I knew I’d only pick it up and put it where it belonged.

Lani Montana, you’re a sentimental fool.

I shook off the thought as I let myself into the house and dumped my purse and keys in the hallway. I didn’t care if this was sentimental. It was, but it was also a reminder that maybe somewhere under all the crap, Brett hadn’t changed so much.

That might not be a good thing, but this rose reminded me of the Brett I once loved. Something that was definitely not a good thing, but I wanted to keep it anyway.

When I was in my room, I knelt in front of my bed and reached under it. The shoebox was easy to find, and I had it out from under the dusty underside of the bed in seconds. Opening it, I coughed slightly as I dislodged some dust. Inside it was an old copy of Alice in Wonderland my grandmother had given me when I was eight years old and was coming into my love of the written word. It was her favorite story, and when she’d given it to me, it’d become mine too.

I lifted it out of the box with as much care as I could and set it on the rug in front of me. I wiped my hand down the front cover with the barest brush and opened it to chapter nine.

There, folded between a ragged, fraying bit of fabric, was three dried, perfectly-pressed roses. They were severely degraded now, with the stems the only recognizable part of it. Even those were completely fragile. Beneath them lay three small notes with the word “sorry” scribbled on each one in the same rough handwriting that was on the note in my hand.

I smoothed out the new note and gingerly slipped it beneath the disintegrating flower stems. A thorn dislodged from the stem, but no other damage was sustained to any of them.

A breath escaped me. I didn’t know it meant that much not to destroy them.

I lay the new rose down, covered it with the cloth, and shut the book. Minutes later it was back in the box and under the bed once more.

I sighed heavily and stood up. I was hungry since I’d skipped breakfast in favor of the meeting, and now my heart was squeezing tightly in confusion. The roses were a reminder that Brett had always been a bit of a dick, but they were also a stark reminder that his heart was in the right place...Maybe a little late, but it always got there in the end.