The perfect world

Part 10: Adrian LaFlora

Part 10 : Adrian LaFlora

'Rose ? Is that really you ? I can't believe it! You're here!'

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Sammy looks at Jessie, surprised. 'Your name is Rose? Why didn't you tell me?'

'It's...complicated...', Jessie sighs and looks at the old man, her grandpa, who is now sitting in front of her.

'I need to talk with Rose in private. You guys can go sit on the other armchairs.', Mr LaFlora says. 'Yes boss!' Sammy nods and goes to the other armchairs on the opposite side of the hall.

Wait, he's the leader of the rebellion ? Her grandfather ? Jessie defnitely didn't expect that.

'My name is Adrian LaFlora, welcome to the rebellion. So we meet again, huh ?'

Jessie looks at her feet, not answering the man. She's way too embarassed about the way she treated him to say something.

'So, Rose, I've heard that you wanted to join us. It would be an honor accepting you into our community. Though I have a question. What reasons do you have to join us ?'

'Well, I need help to save Zack. I heard that he's a member of the rebellion too, and I'm also getting tired of how people are being treated. I need to free Zack from those people before it's too late.'

'Oh...is Zack your boyfriend ?', Adrian asks. Jessie glares at him. Why do people keep on asking her that kind of questions ?

'No he's my friend. You don't need to ask such private questions about my life do you ?', Jessie snaps.

'Alright, sorry about that. I was just curious. We're family, after all.'

Jessie let's out a sigh. She's really going to regret what she's about to say.

'Since, you're my grandfather, I also wanted to know more about my family. Could you please tell me more about my family ?'

There's an awkward silence. It only lasts for one minute, but Jessie feels like years are passing. And her grandfather staring at her with surprise written accross his face isn't exactly helping either...

'Oh alright then, ask me anything you want to know.' Adrians blue eyes are shining more than ever. He runs a hand through his grey, short and curly hair.

'I want to know more about my parents and...my power...', Jessie says.

'Well, as you know, I'm your grandfather...Your fathers name was Jake. He didn't have a power, but he was a very kind person. Your mother, on the other hand, had a power. Her name was Violet. She was able to grow any plant she wanted anywhere, but her speciality were violets. Your mother also had a birthmark on her right arm, just like you. But the birthmark looked like a violet, and yours looks like a rose, am I right ?', Adrian asks.

Jessie looks at her right arm, where abouve her elbow, is a beautiful rose. The color of the rose is a pale pink. Anyone who would look at Jessies arm would think that the rose is a tatoo.

'Yeah, you're right.', Jessie murmurs.

'We named you after the plants you could grow the best. Roses. You know what's funny ? When you were born, that mark was just a normal birthmark. It gained the form of a rose when you started using your powers, the same happened to your mother. But you never met your mother because she died a year after giving birth to you. Your real name is Rose LaFlora. You and your father were a small but happy family until that happened. You know how your father died, right?' Adrian looks at Jessie, but she avoids his gaze by looking at her feet. She just nods and the man continues talking.

'The worst part is, that the man who killed your father adopted you and erased your memories. But he couldn't stop me from finding you ! Did you know that the government tried to kill me after finding out that I was alive? I heard that they tried using an innocent perosn to kill me! That's really a low blow, don't you think ? Hah ! They reall are a bunch of losers.' Adrian is now laughing.

Jessie frowns. In one moment Adrian's talking about death and in the next, he's laughing ?

Suddenly, a memory flashes through Jessies mind. Her mother being controlled by the stress reliever from the government and repeating the same sentence, over and over again : 'I've gotta kill him. I've gotta kill him...'

What if... the person Annie was talking about that time was Adrian ? But would they really use her adoptive mother to kill a person ? A weakling like that ? Don't they care about the consequences that would have caused ? Anne would've gone to jail and then there would be a moment when Nikky would be alone with Frederick, the dangerous man.

'Rose ? Rose, are you alright ?'

Jessie is breathing heavily. After calming herself down, she looks at Adrian. 'I'm fine...'

Jessie gets up. 'I'm sorry but I'll have to leave...'

'It was nice to meet you...grandpa...'

Adrians eyes are now shining with tears. 'It was nice to meet you too, Rose. I knew that one day, you would come back to me.'

Jessie is about to leave when suddenly, Adrian shouts : 'Don't tell anyone about the rebellion ! If you wanna master your power, come here next Monday !'

'I'll come. Have a nice day !', Jessie shouts and gets out of her building.

Jessie gets back home, tired from all the listening she had to do. He rmothe ris cooking and Nikky is playing a game on her Nimtendo Twitch. She's defnitely addicted to those games...

Jessie goes to her room and decides to watch something on Webflix. Or at least wants to. She's more scrolling through the series than watching...She's so bored. There's nothing new to watch. Jessie's already watched a lot of series.

Jessie must've fallen asleep, because she isn't in her room anymore...

'Ah shit, here we go again...', Jessie mubles to herself. 

...to be continued...

(Authors note:  Thank you for  reading my story!)