Page 30 of Thorns That Bloom
It’s fucking pathetic that I can’t do this one simple thing without my stomach twisting and my throat closing up. Walking into a stupid room and putting a plate down. Something that would’ve been normal before. I wouldn’t have thought twice about it, but now everything inside my head isfucked.
I’m so angry and annoyed that I just start walking. I should tell Kristoff where I’m going, considering I said I’d be right back, but I don’t. As I march through the cafeteria, I scan the tables, looking for Theo, hoping to find him. Would it be awkward to talk to him right now, especially with what I realized?
Probably, but it would also make life easier for me.
Of course, I can’t see him. Not at that table where I saw him last time, or anywhere else. He might have already been, or he might be out, or…
“You can do this,” I say to myself, gritting my teeth, and head toward the manufacturing floor. At least I think that’s the right way. For a split second, I feel incredibly small, and consider coming back to Kristoff and asking him to come with me, but then bile rises in my throat again, and I bite down on that pathetic urge and push myself to go alone.
I’m not a child. I don’t need moral support or a chaperone.
I try to think of what Dr. Stewart would say in response to something like this. Probably something like ‘we’re always thehardest on ourselves’ or some shit. How else am I supposed to get through this if not by being tough on myself? I can’t just self-love my way through the trauma and violation I experienced.
Shutting my eyes briefly, I caress my stomach with a sigh. “Sorry,” I whisper to the baby. I felt great moments ago, and now I’m all strung up, irritated, and spiraling.
Suppose I reallydoneed the help.
The manufacturing floor is loud and bustling and smells of metal, acetone, and a bit like dust. Besides that, there are also a lot of people. Like upstairs, they’re mostly focused on their tasks, only instead of computers, it’s machines with computersonthem.
Here, the air isn’t as clear, and not just because of the busy environment. I can sense the pheromones floating around. It might be a stereotype that alphas are always physically strong and capable, but all stereotypes come from a grain of truth. Plenty of the guys I see around the machines are tall and muscular, and their pheromones show who they really are.
Pressing my lips together to stay calm, I clutch the plate in my hand, still hoping to catch Theo’s eye somewhere. I picture them in my mind, bright and lively.
I can’t see him, though. So I stand by the door, clearly out of place, and soon enough, one of the workers notices me. With a confused grimace, the older man heads toward me, glancing around as if me being here is some sort of trick or a trap.
“You need somethin’?” he asks in a rough voice.
Somehow, I keep the anxiety bubbling up inside me at bay. For now. “I’m returning this,” I blurt out, perhaps a little too sharply, and show the plate. His reaction is completelyuncontrolled, and it shows utter confusion about why he should care or know anything about a damn plate. “Is…is Theo in?” I ask instead, hoping to end the conversation quickly.
“Theo? Err…no, don’t think so,” he says, looking over his shoulder. “He’s off. Sick or something.”
Just my luck. “I borrowed this from him.”
Again, the man glares at me like he couldn’t care less. With a suppressed sigh, he twists his body and points to the left corner of the massive room. “Kitchen’s there.” He points. Briefly, he lets his eyes slip down to my belly, then walks off.
The old me would’ve torn him a new one for being rude and would’ve been twice as unpleasant in return.
Instead, I stand there, nervously shifting on my feet to gather courage to pass through the entire area filled with a myriad of sources of various pheromones. Any of which might be similar enough to the ones I've tried to erase from my brain, to no avail, ever since that day.
It’s happened before. In the store. And once in the hospital.
It was terrifying, and the mere memory of it sends chills through my bones—the way panic took over. I was powerless, nothing but a passenger in my own body, swallowed up by the monstrous echo of it, forced to relive those awful moments again.
I can’t use citrusy shower or hand gels either, because that was the scent they used in the restroom. Not to mention pheromones with undertones of wood, or…whatever it was. My senses got completely scrambled and overloaded between the heat, the pain, and the terror of that endless loop of overstimulation of all my senses… It wasn’t until I was in the hospital for a checkup and that man walked past me, carrying a scent of amber, that it hit me, and I nearly lost it.
But that’s not happening now, I remind myself firmly as I make my way across the manufacturing floor.It’s not happening now, and you’re fucking okay.
The tiny, dark blue kitchen is much smaller and messier than ours. There are a ton of cups just scattered on the worktop, a few dirty dishes in the sink, and a sponge that looks like it really,reallyneeds changing. A man sits at the rickety white table in the corner with a plastic box of what smells like spaghetti with some meaty sauce. I know he’s an alpha, I can tell, but thankfully, the freshly microwaved food overpowers the scent of his pheromones, whatever they are.
The moment our eyes meet, he has the same expression as the guy from before—the ‘what the hell is this fancy office person doing here?’ one.
“Can I help you?” he asks, the fork with twirled spaghetti inches from his mouth. At least he doesn’t sound as rude. Maybe a little bored.
“I borrowed this from Theo. I know he isn’t in, so I wanted to return this and…um…leave him a note, I guess. Do you know where his locker is?” This time, it all comes out of me with confidence. Like I know what I’m doing. Like Theo and I are friends or something, and this is completely normal.
Places like this have lockers, right?
He blinks slowly. “Mhm. Leave it somewhere, don’t matter. The locker room’s out the door and to the right, end of the hallway. Won’t miss it for the smell,” he says with an amused chuckle and sticks the fork in his mouth.
