Rozes is Red

| from when he could remember |

PART I

PREFACE

Jasper has been planning this day for as long as he can possibly remember.

From when he saw this girl — who wasn't just a girl but something a little more — and knew that he wanted her. Wanted her in the type of innocence that a puppy wants affection and a bird wants to fly, as if there is no home in home unless she was there with her pretty smile and her too-wide eyes (to him, they were precious).

From when he struggled with his bony knees and his scrawny frame trudged up to her like a trembling martyr — because it was scary, for Christ's sake, trying to talk to someone with teeth as straight as hers — and pulled the sleeves of his shirt over his fists as he said, "Hi, I'm Jasper. Would you like to play with me?"

From when she looked up, her eyebrows arched like a bridge that bends, her lithe frame nestled in a garden (she is a flower among these beds) and stared into his eyes. "I'm Rozes." She watched him beam and then added drily, in a voice a six year old shouldn't have be so cynical, "and no, I'm good."

From when he noticed the fire in her eyes, puffed out his chest and told her earnestly, "I'll play with your flowers, Rose!" and he missed the flash in her eyes when Jasper accidentally stomped over the plants, crushed them under his feet (like his heart, because he wanted to offer his with petals growing out of it).

From when she kissed her teeth and made a sound in the back of her throat. "It's Rozes. With a 'Z'. And you just ruined everything so, as my mommy says, bugger off, thanks."

From when he stitched up his heart with a needle of prickled stems, forgot about the thorns piercing into his stretch of skin as he smiled (red and blooming and her) and told her, as confidently as a self-deprecating kid with knobbly fingers and large elbows could, "One day I won't ruin everything. And you'll be happy with me."

From when she replied, all snark and stinging and sharp, "I thought your parents would have told you that lying is a bad thing to do!"

Jasper has been planning this day for as long as he can possibly remember. He's hoping to create a moment to etch into the framework of her memories. One, he's hoping, she won't ever forget.

_____________________

PRESENT

Jasper hates the check-up line; hates that his back hurts as he carries the boxes of chocolate, everything in between of romantic, sappy and disgustingly nostalgic. As he waits and writhes and internally seethes, he grips the boxes with vice, because this is taking too long.

"Jasper! Can I buy a teddy bear?" Orion Franta — who has curl fries for hair and cocoa for eyes — whines beside his smaller best friend.

When Jasper fails to respond, too busy with planting seeds in his mind, Orion sighs exasperatingly. "Why doesn't anyone want to be my Valentine? Why couldn't we do it?"

"Fanta Pop," Jasper hisses through clenched teeth, "I'll be your teddy bear some other day. Right now just help me with the bloody chocolate, will you?"

"Eleven years later and you still haven't grown out of your chicken arms," Orion snorts, reaching out to catch some of the overflowing sweets before they toppled over. "Really, you should consider hitting the weight room. Or buying me that huge teddy bear. Good bicep exercise."