𝑹𝒐𝒔𝒂

𝘁𝘄𝗲𝗹𝘃𝗲; 𝗮𝗶𝗱𝗲𝗻

Where was she?

It had been at least 48 hours since she had stormed out of the house.

Was it about now that I filed a missing person's report?

Would that even work?

They'd have to look deep into her background, her life, me.
And we all know what a mess that would cause.

I can just about imagine that conversation.
Let's just say it would probably end with me in handcuffs.

"Why are you looking so glum?" Matteo asked.

He must have come through the back door, meeting me in the main reception room.

"How the fuck do you keep getting into my house?"

"You gave me a key."

"No I didn't."

"I stole a spare, same difference really, now why so glum Mendoza?"

"It's Rosa-" I began.

This isn't the typical sort of thing we discuss, but right now if my own mother was to walk through the door I would pour my heart out to her.

"What, finally confess your love for her and she didn't feel the same?"

"I am not in love with Rosa."

"Sure, now if it wasn't that what's up with her?"

"She's gone."

"What do you mean gone ?"

"I mean she isn't here and hasn't made fucking contact for 48 hours."

"No, need to worry right? She seems like the type to run away for a few days."

Matteo wasn't wrong.
Rosa was exactly the type.

She walked out in the middle of arguments; she never took anything in her life seriously.
To her everything she did was a game.

A game that could be ended any moment.

But for some reason, I had a gut feeling this wasn't one of her temper tantrums.

☾︎༒︎☽︎

The house felt empty.
Without the loud-mouthed Italian, the walls felt hollow.

There was a time before her: when this old house was mine, and mine alone.

I should be happy.

The thing I had dreamt of since our wedding day had finally happened.
My prayers had been answered.

So why did it feel so wrong?

The sentence spun around in my head.

I didn't love Rosa, did I?

For to love someone you have to know them, and I knew nothing about her.

All I knew was she had the same breakfast every morning, a mug of bitter black coffee and a choc chip cookie.

That was about it.

Apart from the fact she speaks to herself in Italian when she thinks no body is listening and watches horror movies in the middle of the night when she can't sleep.

Every few weeks, she goes and gets her hair recoloured, but before she does you can see the dark brown of her roots resurfacing.

Her favourite colour is beige; you never see her without a small pendant around her neck, or the signature earring lining her earlobe.

Fuck.

These little things kept spinning round in my head.

Her name Rosalie, which translated as 'rose' is several different languages, which is ironic as she hates roses with a passion.
She thinks that because they are thought to be delicate, she will be underestimated.

Maybe that's why she does the most random shit.
To prove she is a real person and not an object to be admired, locked away in a glass cabinet.

But that isn't the problem in hand.

The problem is that I might have just discovered some kind of fucked up love for my wife, and said wife was God knows where.

My father had always told me love was a complicated business.
My mother told me love was a load of nonsense.
My own wife, who I had just discovered I had feelings for, didn't seem to keen on the concept of love.

I guess if you looked beneath the surface there was so much more too it than that.

My father was in love with man, but when his own father found out he was forced to marry a woman he didn't, couldn't, love.

My mother was forced into a marriage with a man almost twice her age, a man who refused to even see her, isolating her away from everything she had known prior.

And finally, Rosa. Rosalie.

Her parents hated each other by all account, her own mother wanted to see her live out a twisted nightmare and surely my sudden appearance in her life was far from comforting.

She was trapped.
Why did it take me so long to see it?

If you went into her room, it was decorated in pictures of far of places, with one destination repeatedly showing up.

London.

She wanted to be free.
I knew what I had to do.

The only thing was, I'd have to find her first.

It was just then I noticed it.
An abnormal looking letter amongst the pile of bills, business deals and magazines.

Ripping it open, I read the letter.

100 million is US dollars by tomorrow or you'll never see your wife again.

You could easily tell the kidnapper wasn't a pro at this.
I mean, it sounded as though he had watched some pretty crappy kidnapper films and copied their ransom note word for word.

A small piece of paper had been tucked into the envelope.

It was Rosa's handwriting.

𝒗𝒂𝒍𝒆𝒏𝒕𝒊𝒏𝒂.
-𝑹

The little bastard.

𑁍❣︎𑁍

OK, I can't tell if bastard if an English insult, but hey ho.

What do you think is going to happened next?

What is Aiden going to do?

Enjoy!

sending love,
m<3