Careless Whisper

I am a monster.

My legs are heavy as I will myself to move in the direction of the flower shop. It's a cute shop situated in the street corner, and it advertises several sizes of bouquets and their prices on the front banner. I used to smile in amusement when passing by, but now, right now I am the man that banner speaks of. "How angry is she?" is the question that makes you choose the size and complexity of the bouquet, of course.

So how angry is she?

I do not know, and a huge part of me wants to run away from this huge mess. But my steps are still heavy, as heavy as my head feels right now. My heart...well, I don't have to think too hard about that, because with every step I take, I can hear it beating fast and loud, pumping blood into my body, into my tired, protesting muscles. I am sweating, and normally I would care more about my appearance than to run down the street sweating in my business suit. But today, today marks the end of my love.

Who am I? It doesn't matter. I am a man who has sinned. Why did I do it? For revenge. I am an idiot that trusted careless whispers instead of the woman that shared my heart, and for that I just had to hurt the same way she had hurt me. And I did. I hurt her for good. She found me kissing and holding another, a woman randomly chosen some night in a bar. I don't remember her name, I don't even remember her perfume or the feel of her lips on mine right now, because the moment my sweet Annie found us, it all turned to poison. I will never forget how her smile fell, her eyes widened in despair as she chocked a sob. Turning on her heels, she ran, and I, the complete fool, didn't follow. Because I had seen the reality of her love for me on her face that moment, that moment when I ruined everything and I just stopped breathing. I had seen on her face the reality that she was mine, utterly mine, and she had been looking only at me, only ever at me. She loves me. And that realization stunned me. The other woman tried to get my attention, but I had frozen, and she soon left.

What am I doing to this woman?

How do I get her to even listen to me now? I don't dare to hope I could earn her forgiveness. How many flowers should I buy? What do I tell her? The other woman means nothing to me. Of course she doesn't, but I tell her that with the same mouth that I used to tell her I love her. If she had done this to me instead, I would have pushed her away. I have no need for an unfaithful partner in my life. But it's that need for revenge, that ugly, dark part in me that made me choose this course of action instead of confronting her head-on and learning the truth.

I am afraid now of how Annie will look at me. She is a beautiful woman. I craved her from the moment I first laid my eyes on her. She was in an argument with a colleague of hers at a party, and she was defending her point of view calmly but in a firm way. I had never heard a woman argue that way. I wanted an opportunity to talk to her, so I pretended to spill my drink on her blazer and offered compensation. She refused to take my offer, saying she would clean it at home, and shrugged it off. As she took off her blazer, I was treated to a rare sight. Her dress, obviously carefully chosen to fit her body had no cleavage. She was, in fact, quite possibly, the only woman at that party not to show her cleavage and for a few seconds, I lamented my lack of foresight – I should have drenched her in wine. She had the most alluring clavicles I had ever seen, and by the Gods, I had never noticed a woman's clavicles before, when there were so much better things on display. This woman had class and I wanted her to be mine.

Annie...

She is truly the best thing in my life right now. She is the only one I cannot lose.

I run home, shower and change. I want to be presentable when I'm going to beg, but I need to wear something less restraining than the suit. The suit chocked me on my way back home. I remember that I started to wear suits more often for her, to please her, to reach her level of elegance, of class. I did it to get closer to her. I spray a few quick puffs of cologne and I go out again, braving the sudden rain with my bouquet of roses. I am a fool. I didn't take the largest bouquet because I can't carry it. It weighs as much as my heart does and I am afraid to carry it. I think it will break the dam building in my gut and make me cry, and then she will see me for the spineless creature that I am.