Charlotte After Dark

Chapter 42: Fake It Until You Make It

Um, can I just say how AWESOME you guys all are? I can't even begin to tell you how great it was to receive your well-wishes and support during my hospital stay. While I've been recuperating at home, I really wanted to give you guys an update much sooner than the 3 weeks I told you, so here it is!

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I pulled open the large silver doors of the greenhouse, using the bottom of my shirt as a buffer between the door hand and my silver-sensitive skin. A lingering sense of dread come over me as I entered, both because of my last encounter with the greenhouse, and that is was Valentina, not Luca, that had requested my audience.

"You wanted to see me?" I asked as I walked in.

"Yes," was all she responded as she was hunched over a bright pink flower that looked like it was in the shape of a star.

"Don't touch that," Valentina warned me. Her voice was not as cold or critical as it usually was as she continued to busy herself pruning a few large, purple flowers.

"Why?" I asked her.

She put down her pruning shears with an agitated sigh before looking at me. She walked over to me announcing "Aconitiumdormortis," as she came closer to me.

"Aconitium dormortis," I repeated. I wasn't too familiar with the flora housed in Valentina's greenhouse, but I looked at the indigo flowers with curiosity.

"Wolfsbane," Valentina clarified. "This variety is exceptionall."

Her tone was much more proud than she usually was, which was surprising to me. She looked at the indigo-colored flower with a look I could only describe as affectionate. She glanced at the plant with the only sight of happiness I had ever seen in her icy blue eyes. She grabbed a weathered paired of pruning shears and approached a few of the wolfbane's withering leaves.

"And supposedly deadly to you and I as well," Valentina explained.

"Supposedly deadly?" I asked.

"Would you like to be the first candidate to find out whether it is true or not?" Valentina offered.

"No, thank you," I replied backing away. "If it's so deadly to us, why do you keep it in here?"

"It's quite useful for dealing with your average pest," she told me, glancing back at me with her characteristic calculating gaze.

I took a few steps back away from her again, as she turned her attention back to her plant.

"Point taken," I asserted.

Valentina busied herself with a water bottle as she blew a light mist of water over a pair of orchids.

"Can I ask you a question?"

"Somehow, I imagine you will ask it anyway," Valentina lamented, putting the water bottle on the table beside her.

"How is it that a vampire decides to have a greenhouse? With it needing sun and all? And why the silver doors?" I asked.

"Every vampire has their hobby," she told me. "Mine is cultivating rare and powerful florae, your father's is that book collection collecting dust in the south wing, and yours is very clearly not manners or social graces."

"It can't be a hobby if you won't enjoy it," I explained to her.

"Very true, even coming from you," she said.