Shane walked around slowly in his apartment taking care of all his many pot plants it was a daily routine and joy to look after them
Now in the weeks leading up to Christmas, he especially kept an eye out on a Christmas rose he had got from his former boyfriend Nicky several years ago.
He remembered that it hadn't looked like much, when he one cold December day came home with it, and he had shook his head at the look of it. Thinking to himself if it ever would blossom.
Now Nicky had left him. It had been a massive shock for him that one day, in the middle of dinner, where he suddenly had said that he had found a new apartment.
"Is there another one?" was his first question when he had got over the shock.
Nicky had looked at him and said truthful
"No, definitely not, but my soul just aren't here anymore........ I do care a lot about you and always will. But I feel a serious relationship as a constricting bond. I have to leave to save my soul. And you have to believe that. It has nothing to do with my feelings towards you"
With tear-stained eyes he had stared on his sad but honest face.
"I will try to understand you" he had whispered and then he began to clear the table as Nicky began to pack.
These memories surfaced as he looked on the miserable looking Christmas rose.
He also now remembered Nicky's enthusiasm, when he with a questioning expression had packed the plant out.
"It's a Helleborus niger" Nicky had said explaining.
"You, with your Latin" he had said to him and smiled, before saying "Can I get that translated too"
Nicky had laughed at him and then he had smiled before giving him a kiss
"It's a Christmas rose". It only blooms when living in a place where peace and love exists, you know it was Christmas roses, the three shepherds saw the day Jesus was born 2000 years ago.
They were met by white fields with the most beautiful blooming Christmas roses. So just wait and see love, living here with us it will probably bloom and become beautiful, even if it doesn't look like it right now" he had said to him and kissed him again.
It turned out that Nicky was right, day by day, Shane had seen the plant develop from looking damaged to getting greener and greener. When Christmas Eve dawned, it unfolded it's beautiful white flower, it was so clean and clear in colour, that you had to see it with your own eyes to believe it's beauty.
Now Shane was looking forward to if it would bloom this year, when he for the first time in several years had to celebrate Christmas alone.
He had thought many thoughts since Nicky left, and it certainly haven't always been thoughts about peace and happiness........ He had to admit to himself.
*********
Nicky had found a small apartment just outside the big busy city, he had made it is own in no time, enjoying it, living the free single life.
In the beginning he was alright, he enjoyed his new way of living, not needing to take care of other than himself.
He could come home and throw his clothes on the floor, without anyone asking him to clean it up.
He didn't have to do the dishes or wash his clothes other than perhaps once every 3rd day. No one had told him what to do and he loved it, but now recent he had actually not really enjoyed his free time.
He felt that he was missing something or someone, his free soul didn't feel good anymore, but to find his way back, to make a retreat wasn't in his nature, although he in rare moments was thinking that it might be necessary.
