New Flowers

Bloody Carnations

After the encounter with Helen Richardson and Michael, Jon knocks over some carnations and Martin helps him with his wound.

Content warnings:
-Blood/Wounds/first aid
-Anxiety
It's not hardcore gore, no worries. Just a scene where a wound has to be treated. Be safe, though!

--

Jon had finally figured it out. Someone at the institute had been sending him flowers, and it'd been them this entire time. They'd been trying to send a message.

Gertrude's killer had to be sending the flowers. After all, it was too strange to be a coincidence. He'd been trying to find Gertrude's murderer and the person who'd been delivering the flowers, then it clicked. He was looking for the same person. It was so incredibly obvious that he'd gotten angry at himself for not realizing sooner.

So who had it been? Elias, Tim, or Sasha probably sent the flowers. Martin wouldn't, it wasn't his style. But maybe that was it-- had Martin killed Gertrude and taunted him with the flowers to throw him off?

He started stalking his coworkers and installed a false bottom to one of his desk drawers to hide private information and pictures he'd gotten of his colleagues, just in case they were watching him. The flowers kept coming: Laceleaf, Snapdragons, Zinnias. This week it'd been an orchid.

Martin kept delivering him tea. Jon thought about throwing it out for a while. He contemplated throwing out the flowers too. But if Gertrude's killer wanted to kill him, why not just shoot him as they did with Gertrude? (Potentially) poisonous tea or toxic flowers would be a waste at this point since they already had so many chances.

Jon was making excuses, and deep in his head, he knew that. The flowers were comforting, the tea was a habit that made him feel safe. He didn't want to give up the small comforts. So he ignored them, tried not to think about it, focusing on finding Gertrude's killer and recording statement after statement after statement until his throat was sore instead.

Helen Richardson came, and her pantsuit was the same shade of hot pink as the new carnations from this morning. She disappeared into the door, Sasha dropped by, and everything went down with Michael.

Now Jon was bleeding, crying, and confused. Michael's long fingers had impaled his palm and cut deep, and the pain was making him dizzy. The blood was spreading down to his fingers and dripping onto the floor. He said several colorful words and tried to wipe it off, but it just made more of a mess.

Jon looked around wildly, but he couldn't find any towels or tissues. He grabbed some spare papers to press against the wound. They were hard and unpliable and felt rough. He shifted the papers to soak up more blood as it flowed. Was there a first aid kit or something? He was running out of white space on the paper, the blood was coming too fast.

The cut was maybe a centimeter deep, and two inches long. It was stinging. He'd need to wash it, or it'd get infected. Jon stumbled towards the door, but his thoughts were background noise and his brain was woozy. He hit the vase with his hips when turning the corner around his desk, and it smashed into glass shards on the floor, getting water all over the floor and scattering pink petals.

He dropped to his knees to rescue the flowers, but the blood seeped into the crushed petals. It mixed with the water, making the liquid on the floor pink like the carnations, like Helen's pantsuit before she disappeared.

Jon heard rapid footsteps in the hallway. His office door opened, and there was Martin. His face quickly morphed into confusion, then intense concern. "Oh my lord, Jon. What happened-- is that blood?!" he ranted, anxious. "You knocked the vase over and cut yourself on the glass?"

Martin looked around for a cloth to use as a bandage but found the same results as Jon had only a moment earlier. He thought for a moment, then unknotted his scarf and grabbed the bloody paper, throwing it into the bin. He took Jon by the wrist, being gentle with his palm, and wrapped the scarf around his hand. "Alright, that should do."

Jon put his other hand to his forehead, feeling an intense headache from the rapid emotions and pain in his head. Everything was moving too fast.

Martin curled his fingers into his palms, digging his nails in. "Umm, we should wash your wound first. There's a first aid kit in Tim's office, I think. I'll grab it, you go to the bathroom, okay? I'll be right there."

"Okay," murmured Jon dizzily. He rose from the floor, bracing himself on the desk. Martin was already gone in a hurry. Jon held himself against the doorframe and the walls, wandering down the corridor and leaving a few drops of blood behind him.

He reached the bathroom and felt depleted. It wasn't a very bad cut. Why was he so out of it?

Martin rushed into the bathroom and found Jon clenching his fist into his scarf. "We should wash it with soap and water, I think. I'm not sure about first aid, but it can't hurt. Well, it might hurt," he rambled awkwardly. He turned the water on and waited for half a minute for it to warm up to a comfortable degree. Then he delicately unwrapped the now bloody scarf and guided Jon's hand under the sink.

The water turned red, then pink. Most of the blood flowed away instantly, but some of it had to be nudged away by Martin's careful, soft fingers. Martin held his hand under the soap dispenser and spread it onto the wound, making Jon grimace. Martin rubbed the soap in until bubbles appeared, then washed it away again.

There were paper towels, so he used one to dab the water away from Jon's palm. It was already becoming bloody again, leaving the paper towel a watered-down crimson, but the bleeding was slowing down.

"Jon, do you know how to use the first aid kit? I don't know what to do," questioned Martin. Jon nodded and unhooked the mechanism keeping the box of supplies closed. It was more cluttered than Tim's drawers, and that was saying something. Instead of digging through bandaids that weren't in their boxes, Jon dumped the supplies onto the bathroom counter.

Jon scanned the pile. "There's alcoholic stuff but that could do more harm than good. There's Neosporin-- can you open the cap and put some on my finger?"

Martin did so, and Jon spread the clear gel onto his palm. "There are bandages too." Martin found one, and some bandage-like tape and scissors. He wiped away the blood again, then stretched a bandage across Jon's palm. He wrapped it around Jon's hand a few times and tied it off, and secured it with medical tape.

"That should work, I think," Jon muttered. "Thank you, Martin." Martin washed his hands and shoved the medical supplies back into their box.

"Of course, happy to help. I'm glad you're alright," Martin smiled. "I can put the medical stuff back and clean up the glass since your hand is injured. I'll make you some tea while you wait."

Later, Martin poured the broken glass into a trash bag and tied it off. He heard steam whistling from the kettle on the stove in the cramped break room and got out his canister of earl grey lavender he'd gotten at a farmer's market. He put a teaspoon of it into the tea infuser and poured boiling water into the cup. Cream and two sugar cubes plopped in as well and he started to let it steep.

He took out his notebook from his messenger bag and wrote down a reminder: "Jon's carnations fell. Get Ocean Breeze Orchids and a new vase tomorrow morning." Then he hid his notebook in his bag again and adjusted his glasses on his nose. The tea was ready.

This chapter has been edited. There actually wasn't much wrong with it, but I removed some commas and tweaked a few sentences.
Thank you all so much for supporting this story, it means the world to me! Stay safe out there, and have a wonderful day!

--Fanaticit