ROSETTE


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    I had woken up panicked, thinking I waste for work again, but then I remembered I quit and immediately went back to sleep. Kross didn’t give me time to start with the greenhouse. I could start whenever I wanted.


    So I slept, but then a noise woke me. A shout, actually. It was Axel. I immediately threw the nket off, racing out of my room barefoot.


    When I got to the stairs, nothing could have prepared me for the sight I saw.


    I hadn’t known the Varkas brothers were close. They were always distant from each other and barely had conversations, so I thought they weren’t close. I was


    wrong.


    They were close–closer than I thought.


    Axel raised his head from Kross‘ shoulder, his eyes meeting mine and all thoughts fled my head. He… he looked miserable. His eyes were red and swollen, the circles around them like bruises.


    I was already moving before I knew what I was doing, but Kross’s voice stopped <ol><li>me. </li></ol>


    “Rosette<i>.</i><i>” </i>I stopped walking, my eyes moving to him. His eyes met mine, his voice and expression now back to the way I was used to. Why was that surprising to me? Did I think because he shared some things with me that he’d open up to me? What bullshit. “It’ll be better if you go back to your room.”


    “It’s okay,” Axel whispered, pulling away from his brother, looking anywhere but at <ol><li>me. </li></ol>


    He said it was okay, yet he wouldn’t even look at me. And even though it was okay, Kross and Kade’s eyes told me it wasn’t.


    So I turned and ran back up, my bare foot pping against the marble stone,


    He was hurting. Axel was hurting. I didn’t know why but something told me I was the cause. Was it because of what happened yesterday? Because that was when he


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    withdrew from me. I couldn’t get the look in his eyes out of my mind. That look of fear, of shock, and regret. I couldn’t understand what it meant even though I had spent hours pondering it.


    I had said I would talk to him this morning, but well…


    I closed my door, resting my back against it. I closed my eyes, taking a deep breath.


    What has it been? Three days? Two days? Two days and that sanity I wanted to hold on to was slipping out of my hands fast, and that sanity was nothing I could do about that.


    Kross hadn’t told me what to do with the money, and I’m sure he wouldn’t care. Three thousand… that was enough to get me into college.


    I was going to look into colleges. If I stay in this house longer than needed, I might


    go crazy.


    ***


    Three days… Three days, and I’ve tried my hardest, HARDEST, best to avoid the Varkas brothers. I only came out when I was sure they were all gone. And I went straight to the kitchen, filling a basket with food and water, and then I went straight to the greenhouse.


    The first day, it wasn’t hard to find my way to the greenhouse. It pretty much stood out. And when I got inside, everything I needed was there. And I just stood still and stared at the greenhouse.


    It looked like a mini forest.


    I had walked around it, trying to decide where I would start from. And then I hade around something that made me pause and stare and stare for what felt like hours.


    Arge patch of soil looked dull and grayish, no growth in that ce because it looked like… heat sterilized the ground.


    And I knew. I immediately knew. I slowly looked up at the ss wall to see soot stains creeping up the ss and metal frames, like gray–ck fingers. The sses


    were also clouded and cracked from heat stress.


    I looked around, the ce suddenly chilly like I could feel her ghost.


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    “Why’d you do that?” I asked out loud, looking down at the burnt ground. “Huh? Is it that you didn’t love them enough to stay? Is that it? You thought only of yourself and not your sons. What is it with you mothers loving yourselves more than you love your own children? I’m not saying you shouldn’t love yourself. No, no. What I’m saying is you should have thought of them. Thought about what they would think when you did that. Thought about what life will be like for them without you in it.”


    My voice echoed back to me and it sounded like I was crazy but I didn’t stop talking.


    “Kross mes himself. I don’t know about the other two, but I know they’re aching as well. You shouldn’t have done that, Mrs. Varkas. You shouldn’t have done that at all. But anyway, I do hope you’re in a better ce, and you found that love and care that you died for.”


    After that little show of insanity, I went around and cleaned the greenhouse, that fire spot being the first thing I started with.


    The next day I continued the cleaning. Then on the third day, I began to clear the weeds. And that took two whole days.


    That night I had to drag myself back to my room, drag myself into the shower, and then to my bed.


    “Who knew gardening was so hard,” I muttered, sleep dragging me as well.


    **


    When I woke up on the fifth day, the first thought that came into my mind was coffee.


    “I could kill for it right now.” I rubbed my eyes and got out of bed, my eyes barely open as I walked sluggishly downstairs. But then I heard voices and that snapped me awake.


    I stopped walking and the voices also stopped. When my eyes were fully opened, I


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    saw that I was already down the stairs, and all three men were in the living room- fully dressed, of course.


    “Uhm…” I stared at them, and they stared at me. Then I turned with a speed I didn’t know I possessed, about to run up the stairs, but then…


    “Rosette.”


    I froze, cursing under my breath. I turned slowly and looked at Kross. “Yes?”


    “You came for coffee, did you not?” he asked, raising the cup of coffee in his hand and taking a sip, still maintaining eye contact.


    I sighed, stepping down. “Yes.”


    I walked to the kitchen without looking at anybody, filling a mug to the brink with coffee. I took the first sip, sighing deeply and closing my eyes. “What will life be


    without coffee?<b>” </b>


    “An endless torture,” a voice answered behind me.


    I jumped, startled, and since the coffee was still full, it poured on my face. And mind you, that shit was fucking hot.


    I dropped the cup, and itnded on my foot, the remaining coffee spilling on it.


    “Fuck sake!” I cursed, holding my face, wanting to hold my foot too, but there was only so much I could do with two hands.


    “Shit,” Axel cursed, immediately on me.


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