Velvet roses & Dices

A rich lady and a coffee shop

Cassandra arrived at the end of that block and looked around. It has been raining heavily for the past hour and a half. 

Suddenly, she stopped. She had found it. It was time for her to change her life again.  

It is a known fact that people are crazy. That is an unmistakable truth and they are crazy about everything. They are capable of destroying their own homes, spending millions of dollars for information or commit horrendous acts in name of revenge or jealousy... And that didn't change in this world or in other worlds.

Still Cassamdra loved other level of craziness. 

She loved those who think ahead, those whose actions look random but have some kind of strategy behind. She loved those that were like her, without fear of change.

On that fateful evening, Cassandra bought those four tall buildings in the heart of New York City that she had been admiring. That act for itself reveals that Cassandra is not pure of mind.

Why would a twenty-something years old girl buy four buildings in that city? How could she afford it? Still, no one stopped the transaction. Money is money after all.

Time passed and a week after the acquisition, she hired some enterprise to bring down those four buildings. That started to attract attention.

Who was she? Why did she want to destroy those specific four buildings? What happened to the offices, and enterprises, and people working in there? 

The answer was simple. She paid them to leave everything.

Overnight, the offices were clean. Another night, and it looked like nothing was ever built in there. Give it a month and an English Manor appeared surrounded by apple trees, cherry trees and flowers. Around it, a stone wall that looked like it have been there since ages.

Adding to that craziness, a big greenhouse was built at one of the corners. It was a mysterious place in the center of the city. Those who walked close to those walls could hear the birds and water running on the other side.

Who would have thought of building a Manor and plant fruit trees in the middle of a city like New York? Who would have thought of destroying four buildings just to build a place like that? 

When it was finished, a door appeared on the stone wall near the end of the block with an 'open' sign. It was crazy, it was strange, it was everything New York had been looking for: a way inside to know what was happening on the other side. 

The first one to enter through that door was a girl. She opened it and peeked inside. The door led her to the greenhouse. There were roses of several colors, but none of them red, there were other scented flowers that she didn't know the name and a fountain inside which sounded delightful. Small tables were scattered around the place and a counter was near the exit. 

A lady, dressed nicely in a blue dress appeared as soon as the bell above the door ringed and welcomed the first client to the Herbalist Garden Coffee and Tea House.

After her, a lot of people came. During months, the Lady served multiple clients, gave interviews to televisions and even famous people tried to steel her concept. Cassandra didn't hide herself after being subjected to such attention. She knew that her arrival would cause noise, but as always: they came, they saw, and then they left.

She knew how people worked. The forbidden fruit is always the sweetest. If she had hidden in that simple fortress, they would seek a way to enter her property to look for some piece of information to sell later. Opening a coffee and inviting people had the opposite effect.

Each day, Cassandra would wake up before sunrise, bake some delicacies that looked like pieces of jewellery on the vitrine, mend her garden and then  when the customers came, she would waltz around that indoor garden with a tray with old porcelain cups and teapots in hand and a smile on her face. 

That Lady always offered a nice talk. She would always suggest nice and exotic teas, always with some sweet on the side... People would sit and relax and find a part of their souls that they thought lost. 

Curiously, no one asked why they couldn't hear the traffic around them, even if they were in the middle of one of the most chaotic cities in the world. They didn't even noticed that the only thing that separated them from the world outside was a corner of stone, some other walls of glass and ceilings of the same material.

And more importantly, no one asked how a simple and only girl could run, serve and live in that wonderful place just by herself. Always keeping a sweet and innocent smile and words of comfort while she serving her clients.

It is true that when people are in front of something inexplicable, there are three possible reactions: they could ask what is going on, they could accept it as reality or they could ignore and continue their lives. And the people of New York were expert in the last option. 

 For months, the Herbalist Garden was something that appeared in every newspaper, television, tourism guides... they even did excursions to that place! Even studies about her and why they felt peaceful after a cup of tea at that coffee shop...

After some more months, the frenzy passed and it was just another strange and nice coffee house in that big city.

Still, in that place, nothing changed since the opening. Well... maybe the leaves turned orange and fell only to regrow again. Maybe some flowers died and needed to be substituted. Maybe there were some new acquisitions to her new garden, but nothing more changed.

Cassandra still got up before sunrise. Still baked those delicacies. still served her clients with elegance. Still danced and waltzed around at the sound of the fountain... That space was still the same quiet atmosphere that inspired reflection on deep topics and Cassandra was still the strange and only owner of the space.

One day, a writer entered the coffee shop and ordered green tea while sitting near the fountain. The writer was good looking. His brown hair was dishevelled by the wind, his eyes looked at the garden like he was travelling to another place and another time and the nice mouth smiled often as if remembering something nice.

On that day Cassandra stopped her waltz, asked the clients to leave and turned the sign at the entrance door to "Close" earlier than usual. On that day, Cassandra sat on the table with a client for the first time.

He just served them both a cup of tea and put a deep-red rose on the table that he produced out of thin air. Cassandra looked at it for a while. She didn't have red roses in her garden. That blood-red colored rose was the only thing that Cassandra most feared... And longed for.

"It has been a while..." Cassandra said drinking a little her tea. She was being observed by the writer.

He smiled at that making Cassandra even more nervous. He hadn't changed in the years that passed... But neither had she.

After some awkward silence. She extended her long pale hand and grabbed the rose on the table doing an extreme effort to not show that she was shaking. 

"I see that you have been doing good use of the 'Gift' I gave you" She commented as she smelled the sweet notes of that flower. It remember her of another time and another place... A far away place.

"Yes. It has been very useful."

"But?"

The boy passed his hand through his hair and then started looking both sides as if not knowing where to start. Cassandra was surprised. Since she knew him, he never looked like that. He looked... Nervous?

"It has been complicated" he started.

"And?"

He stared at her with his brown gold eyes shining with hope and fear.

"And I kind of need your help."