“How is everything with you, Carrie?”
That was a trick question if ever I’d heard one. I had to be careful how I answered him. Anything I could and would say would be held against me.
“Why don’t you just tell me what’s going on, Steve?”
“You know that I don’t like to get involved with my employee’s personal lives, but you have worked here for me long enough that I feel I must speak to you about this.”
Shit. This was sounding worse than I thought. I didn’t say anything. There was nothing that I could say. I had no idea what he was getting at with this line of conversation.
“I know that it is not pleasant when a relationship goes sour, but I don’t want it to affect your working life. I know that that is not always easily done, but you have to try and keep these things separate.”
What was he going on about now? I hadn’t let anything affect my work. Was he on about that thing with Milligan outside the office last week? If it was, he was a bit late in pulling me up about it.
He remained quiet, just looking at me with those intent green eyes of his. “Steve. I don’t meant to be rude, but what are you getting at? Aren’t you pleased with how the Smyth project turned out? I thought that they were more than satisfied with it.” I couldn’t think for the life of me why he wouldn’t be pleased with it. It thought that it had been some of my best work.
“No, no, no. That was simply perfect. The best I’ve seen. You’re back on form again. Excellent work.”
I raised an eyebrow at him. If it wasn’t that, then what was all of this about?
“Carrie, you know that I don’t object to personal deliveries at work,” I had to try and hide a grin. I didn’t know that he knew about all the books that I’d had delivered there, “And, I know that there is no way for you to be able to stop others from sending you gifts,” Ah, he was on about the ridiculously large bouquets of flowers that Milligan had sent me last week. I knew he had a point. They did take up a rather a lot of room. “But, you of all people have to appreciate that some things just aren’t appropriate. Especially in our line of business.”
I frowned at him. He’d completely lost me now. “What do you mean? Are you on about the flowers last week?”
“No.”
“Then, what? I haven’t had any other deliveries.”
“That is because I intercepted them and told Elaine that I would bring them up here to you myself.” He stood up to briefly walk out of my office, bending down to retrieve something off of the floor.
“Now, I know that we cannot control the actions of the others, but if you could kindly ask whoever it was that had sent you these, to kindly refrain from doing so in the future, I would greatly appreciate it. This is not the kind of image that we want to project here.” He brought from behind his back a huge bouquet that would have once upon a time been as beautiful as the roses that Milligan had sent me last week. But, these were rotted, turning to mulch. They were dead. I felt a shiver go down my spine. I didn’t know what to say to him. They were only dead flowers, but to me, they were something so much more chilling.
“Carrie?”
“Yes?” Startled, I looked back up at him.
“Will you please have a friendly word with whoever sent you these?”
“Yeah, of course I will. Sorry, Steve. I’ll make sure that this doesn’t happen again.”
He passed me the card that had come with the flowers. “See that you do.”
But, I couldn’t reply to him. I was too distracted by the sight of the dead flowers lying on my desk, stinking up the room with their putrid smell. I didn’t know why they were affecting quite like they were. They were just flowers. But, they were dead flowers. It felt like an omen.
I carefully opened up the card. I should have known what I was going to see.
‘Carrie. Come to me. XOXO’
I ripped the card up into a million pieces and scattered the pieces in the waste paper bin. I felt sick. What the hell was wrong with that guy? Why would anyone send someone dead flowers?
I couldn’t get anything else done at work. I had already taken the rotten smelling bunch of flowers and thrown them in a bin far, far away from my office. But, that didn’t stop me from thinking about them. And, Milligan. What had motivated him to do such a thing? I felt sick with dread. Why would he do this to me? It was clear that they were from him. I didn’t need a name on a card to tell me otherwise. It was the exact same message that I had got with the other flowers. Why wouldn’t he just let this all go? What we had wasn’t enough to fight for. Even so, this wasn’t meant in a way to get me back. This was something else. Come to me. What the hell did that mean?
I couldn’t wait until it was time to go home. There was no point in hanging around the office, anyway. I couldn’t seem to get anything done and I didn’t have any pressing matters to attend to. My head was a complete mess. It wasn’t just about the flowers, though. It was about the meaning behind them. It was everything.
I walked out of the office, mindful of everyone around me. I didn’t want Milligan to appear in front of me like he had after the flower delivery last week. But, he was nowhere to be seen. There were plenty of people milling about, going about their own business, making their way home after a hard day’s work. There was no boogeyman lurking in the shadows.
I made my way over to the other side of town, heading to the hospital. I needed to go and check on Dee before I went home. I’d been able to spend a little more time with her over the last few days. It hadn’t made the slightest bit of difference to her condition. There had been no change at all. It was like I was talking to a breathing corpse. I hated to think of her in that way, but I was starting to run out of hope. She’d been this way for ten days now and the doctors were still all clueless as to what was wrong with her. It was very disheartening.
I walked into her room. I didn’t bother to hang about in the waiting room this evening. There was no point. Sylvie wasn’t there. I just hoped that it meant she had some good news about her grandson. The nurse was just straightening out Dee’s sheets when I walked in.
“Carrie! Good to see you.”
We were now on first name terms with most of the nursing staff here now. “Hey, Colette. Any news?”
“Nothing yet. Sorry.”
I just smiled at her. I knew that they were all doing their very best for Destiny. We said these same words every single time I came here. It was getting to be like some kind of ritual.
“Your friend was in here a moment ago.”
I looked over at her with sharp eyes, “Who do you mean?”
“Harper, of course. He’s gone for a quick coffee.” She looked puzzled for a moment at my tone. I breathed out a sigh of relief. I had thought that she had meant Milligan had been here.
“I’ll be back in here to check on her in a bit. You know the drill. Any changes that you see and press that buzzer, we’ll all come running.”
She said the same old thing to me ever time and as of yet, I had never had any cause to press the buzzer.
“Hey, Destiny.” I tried to sound cheerful for her. Sure, I was still pretty doubtful that she’d be able to hear a single word that I said, but I felt like I had to try.
I sat down next to her on the bed and tried to work out what to say. I wasn’t in the most chatty of moods. I let my head drop to the bed, resting next to Dee’s hand, ever mindful of all the wires and tubes that were stuck in her.
“Carrie.”
I looked up to see Harper standing in the doorway. I started to smile, but something in the way that he was standing and looking at me made me stop.
“What’s wrong?”
“Can I have a word with you? Out here?” He motioned behind him to the corridor.
Uh oh. This didn’t sound too good.
“Don’t look so worried. I just don’t want to talk about it in here.” He finally smiled and I felt some of the tension drain from me. It didn’t have to be anything particularly serious for him not to wan
t to speak about it in front of Dee. He firmly believed that she could hear everything that we were saying. I wished that I’d had that same kind of faith. Most of the time, I just felt plain stupid.
“What’s up?” I asked him as soon as he had shut the door behind us.
“Carrie. I didn’t want to tell you this. Not on top of everything else that has been happening lately. But, someone delivered a bunch of dead roses to Destiny’s room this evening. They were addressed to you.”
I sucked in a breath. They were only flowers. Only dead flowers. Why was I feeling such dread? I felt myself sag and it was only the wall that was holding me upright.
“Carrie. I knew that I shouldn’t have told you, but I thought you should know. Are you okay? You’ve gone pale.”
I shook my head at him and let out a shaky laugh. I wasn’t actually planning on telling Harper about the flowers that I had received at work, but now it seemed like I had no choice. “I had another bunch of them delivered at work. Dead roses.”
“What?” He raised his voice, drawing the attention of a couple of the nurses that were walking down the corridor.
“Yeah, Steve was pretty pissed about it.”
“I don’t give a crap what Steve thought of it. This is Milligan, isn’t it?”
I didn’t need to reply to him. He already knew the answer to that.
“What is his fucking problem?” He ranted.
“I don’t know. And, watch your language.” I said, looking around to make sure no one had overheard him swearing.
“Why is he doing this?”
“I said I don’t know. Just drop it. It’s just some crappy dead flowers. He’s the one who is wasting his time and money on this. Just forget about it.”
Harper shook his head at me but he refrained from commenting any further on it. I was glad of that. I didn’t need him shouting at me on top of everything else.
“Where are they?”
“I put them in the bin. I didn’t think that you needed to see that.”
“Good. Thank you.” The way I said it, I hoped that he got the message that this was the end of it. End of discussion. I was putting Milligan and those stupid dead flowers out of my mind.
We spent a bit time with Dee and although the conversation was a little strained to start with, Harper soon loosened up enough to be normal again and he soon had me laughing like usual.
We picked up some Chinese on the way home and fell into our apartment building with me totally cracking up at some lame ass joke me made up. In the lift, he kept threatening to jump and I was shouting at him for being such a kid. He knew that I hated elevators. It wasn’t just about the claustrophobia. I just hated them. I think that it was the whole falling helplessly to your death part that got to me the most. We were still laughing and bickering like an old married couple as we stepped out and walked down the small corridor to our place. We both stopped dead and fell silent.
There was another bouquet of dead roses sitting outside our apartment.
The dead rotting petals were dripping in blood this time.
“That’s it!” Harper roared and glared over at me. “I’m phoning the police.”
I walked forward, not wanting to look at them but not being able to look anywhere else. “No police.” I said in a dead voice. All I could think about was when I had pricked my finger on that single rose. This reminded me of that, but on a much grander scale.
“Carrie! This isn’t normal.”
“I know that, but what exactly would I say to them? A man who isn’t even my ex is sending me flowers? Do you have any idea how stupid that would make me sound?”
“They are not just any flowers, Carrie. They’re dead. They’re covered in blood. That’s threatening in itself.”
I glared over at him. “No police, Harper.”
“Well, I’ll go down to the club and I’ll sort this out myself, then.”
“No, you won’t! We’re just going to ignore him. He’ll get bored of doing this when he doesn’t get a reaction.” I sounded sure, which was more than I felt. I had a feeling that he wasn’t going to give up on this so easily.
“Do you even know how ridiculous that sounds?”
“Shut up, Harper.” I said as I jammed the key in the lock, kicking the mess out of the way of the door, ready to forget about it.
“You’re just going to leave it out there?”
“I said, shut up, Harper.” And I slammed my way into my bedroom. I wasn’t in the mood to talk. Those damned flowers had managed to totally ruin my day. I didn’t want to talk about it or deal with the mess. I just wanted to wipe it all from my memory.
After an hour of lying on my bed staring at the ceiling, a knock came on the door.
“Carrie? It’s me.”
Well, I didn’t think that it was going to be anyone else. Harper knocked again.
“Carrie?”
“What do you want?” I said. I knew that it sounded like I was sulking, but I didn’t care. I had reason to sulk.
“Can I come in for a minute?”
I didn’t answer. Harper clearly didn’t care. He opened up the door anyway. He didn’t say anything else but he held up the tray that he was holding like a peace offering. He had two huge cups of hot chocolate topped with lashing of cream and cute little pastel coloured marshmallows dotted in the cream. If he had come in here with anything other than hot chocolate or ice-cream, I would have turned over and kept on sulking. As it was, he knew that I wouldn’t be able to resist. Especially not with a mountain of cookies piled on a plate in the middle of the tray. I sat up in bed and Harper took that as an invitation to come closer.
“Where’s the white flag?” I joked lamely.
“Hot chocolate seems to work better.”
“True.” I grinned.
Harper sat down on the edge of the bed and passed me over one of the cups, and a spoon to scoop up the cream and marshmallows. “I’m sorry for trying to push you about this.”
“Don’t’ be. It’s okay. I know you only do it because you care.”
“No, it’s not okay. But, you do know that you have to deal with this. You know that, right?”
“I thought that you weren’t going to push me.” I asked with the spoon halfway to my mouth.
“I’m not pushing. I’m just being honest.”
“What do you want me to do?”
“I don’t know.” He looked down at his drink and played with a cookie, crumbling it onto the plate. “But, I don’t like it. You should have phoned me when you got that delivery at work.”
“What would you have been able to do about it?” I waited for a split second. “Nothing. There was nothing that either of us could have done about it.”
“But, you’re my best friend. I’m supposed to be the one that you turn to. I’m the one who is supposed to protect you.”
“If anything else turns up, I’ll ring you straight away. I promise.”
Harper looked satisfied that I meant it. “And, if you see him, you’ll let me know?”
I must have shifted my eyes a little. “Of course I will.”
“Carrie? Have you seen him?” Harper sounded concerned again. Shit. I should have realised sooner that he would have asked me that. I should have been more prepared. But, I could never lie to him.
“I saw him last week. He was outside the office the day that I got the first lot of roses delivered. The nice ones, not the dead ones.” I tried to smile at him but he was clear that he didn’t find this in the slightest bit funny.
“What did he want?”
“I don’t know. To say sorry, I guess. He just kept saying ‘Come to me’. I didn’t stop to talk to him.”
Harper nodded. He seemed satisfied that I hadn’t hung around to talk to Milligan. It wasn’t like he could say much else about it, except for, “Ring me if you run into him again, okay?”
“I promise.”
And with that, the subject was abruptly dropped. Harper put on a DVD and we snuggled down under the cove
rs on my bed. It was just what I needed. I felt happy again. I felt safe. Harper always seemed to have that effect on me. He was my rock. He always had been.
I fell asleep long before the film had finished, and I actually slept soundly.
Chapter Ten
The next morning, I got up for work the same as always, but I had to rush to the bathroom to throw up. I didn’t know what the hell was wrong with me. It felt like I was bringing up everything that I had eaten in the last week. I felt dreadful. Harper came running into my bathroom as soon as he heard me and quickly swept my hair back out the way.
When I had finally finished, I sat back and took the cold wet cloth that Harper had ready for me. I felt feverish, too.
“You’re not pregnant, are you?” he half joked.
“Not a cat in hell’s chance of that.” And there wasn’t. This was just your standard everyday stomach bug. Although, it didn’t exactly feel standard. I felt like the walking dead.
“Do you want me to phone and tell Steve that you aren’t going to be going in today?”
I groaned. That was the last thing that I needed. I couldn’t take the time off of work. I knew that Steve wouldn’t be impressed, but he would probably be even less impressed if I went in and vomited all over him.
“Tell him that I’ll try to come in a bit later if I can manage it.”
“No.”
I tried to look up at him from where I was sitting on the bathroom floor. A droplet of water dripped form the corner of the wet cloth that was resting on my forehead, trickling down into my eye. I brushed it away with a heavy hand.
“No?”
“No. You can take the whole day off. At least. You need a full day of rest. With everything that has been happening lately with Dee and… Well, you know, everything else, you need some time to chill out.” Harper looked at me like I didn’t have a say in it so I didn’t know why he was bothering to explain himself. As my stomach rolled again, I guessed that I really didn’t have much of a choice in the matter.
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