ᴀᴘʜʀᴏᴅɪᴛᴇ // $ᴜɪᴄɪᴅᴇʙᴏʏ$

Chapter Thirty One

APHRODITE

I sat on the floor of my room because I didn't want to go back in my bed. I sat on the floor on my knees, reading another book because I had nothing else to do and didn't want to go to sleep. My tight black skinny jeans hugged my hips and thighs and the dark blue tank top, my only clean shirt left to clothe my upper body and shield me from the chill that flew through the warehouse like the wind. But I didn't mind it tonight. I wanted to feel the cold dance over my skin.

The book sat in my lap, but I couldn't read it. My thumbs held my place, but pages hadn't been turned. I wanted to read it, but could only stare into space and think, my mind wandering, contemplating, and straying.

I thought about the note that had been left on my mattress some time ago. I never got another one. I thought of how I wished Scott had never kidnapped me, I wished I didn't feel so much hatred towards him and at the same time I was glad for my anger. I didn't like it because I wasn't happy with how I interacted with him now, ignoring him, dismissing him without words because I didn't want to talk to him. I knew my behavior was childish, but what else could I do? Scott may not have it in him to apologize, but I found that I was waiting on one, knowing all the same that it would never happen. I wanted him to do something that would give me cause to forgive him. In a way I felt some sort of sympathy for him knowing he had lost his wife. I hated this tension and silence. But if I didn't forgive him, then I wouldn't think of him in the way I refused to think of him. If I didn't forgive Scott, then I could believe the last thing I said to him. Because, I told myself with determination, it was true. It had to be true. I didn't want him.

But, I realized with a sigh, I didn't forgive him and yet I was still thinking of him. What a piece of work you are, I thought to myself.

I heard the broken door of my bedroom creak open, the one dim light in my room flickering with the entering body. And once again, those shoes thudded behind me. Once again, I felt my body tense from his presence for reasons other than fear. I looked back down at the book in my lap and tried to read a few words. But when I felt him standing directly behind me, I stilled. When Scott slowly crouched down so I could hear his breathing at my back and smell his usual scent of peppermint that I'd oddly come to like, I waited.

I rubbed my red-colored lips together as the seconds flew by with him kneeling right behind me. I quickly blocked out memories of the last time he was behind me, touching me, making my anxiety go away with his large, rough, tattooed hands. I remained still and silent, the only sound in the room his breathing and the soft squeaks of his black leather jacket.

I heard him move then, heard the sounds of his coat as his arm reached forward passing me, holding his hand out next to me as he crouched behind me. I looked down at his hand, and felt my chest constrict.

In Scott's hand was a black rose. A black rose with beautiful dark petals in full bloom and the stem a rich green. I sat on the floor, stared at the offering in his hand, and knew what that flower was telling me, the words he wouldn't give except within a beautiful black flower.

I'm sorry.

I swallowed softly and gripped the book in my lap, my gaze remaining on the lovely flower waiting for me to take it, the apology I would never hear nestled in the palm of his hand.

Scott waited patiently behind me, both of us understanding what it meant if I would just take the rose from him, no words having to be said, no actions having to be justified. We knew each other now and both understood that for me to pluck the flower from his hand would only say one thing.

I forgive you.

Calmly, because I realized I wanted to, needed to because that was what I had been foolishly waiting on him for, I reached for Scott's hand, and slowly picked up my black rose, accepting it, telling him the silent words that had separated us for days.