Page 8 of Poetry of Flowers

I swung my legs over the sides of my bed and stood up. The room was cool. It was September, my favorite month, because in four days, seventeen years ago, my best friend was born. She was four months younger than me, but that had never stopped her acting older than both of us together.

I wanted to show her that being a teenager was okay, that being happy was okay.

Throwing open my balcony door, I glanced over to the small house next to my family’s mansion.

The walls looked old like they were about to crumble, the garden wasn’t cared for, and the windows had not been cleaned for a few years.

Jonas, Tillie’s father, worked so much that he didn’t have time for these things, and when he wasn’t working, he was drinking. Alcohol didn’t make him aggressive or weird, just absent.

I wished I could hate him for putting everything on his daughter’s shoulders, but he was the man who had shown me how to ride a bike, who had helped me with my math homework when my old man hadn’t. So instead, I was sad for him.

The French window right in front of me opened towards the house I had just admired for still having so much life inside when its façade was coming apart.

The girl I had watched every morning since we were seven stepped out on her own balcony and gave me a small smile.

Her hair is already curled to her sides, the red streaks match her red turtleneck she wore with some jewelry over it. The jumper that hugged her curves was tucked neatly into a black skirt. Her beloved Dr. Martens completed her outfit.

Tillie adored the color red so much, it was basically her personality. I barely ever saw her without red lipstick on. I couldn’t complain, she looked beautiful with it.

Tillie turned around and went back inside her room, probably on her way to wake her brother and go make breakfast for both of them.

I went to take a quick shower when I noticed that my hair had gotten pretty long over the last months, I had to cut it the next few days, or it would reach over my ears, and I didn’t like when anything was out of order on myself.

I put on blue jeans and a black turtleneck to match Tillie’s and made my way to the kitchen.

My mom was standing on the island frying some eggs and bacon for me and my sister.

I didn’t know if my father was home. I hoped not. My father is an asshole.

He adored my older brother and my little sister, but somehow thought I was a mistake. God knows why. I have never done anything bad, but he still hated me so much, he wasn’t even afraid to lift his hand against me. Still, his words had always hurt more than anything else.

My mother either didn’t know, or she looked away. I had no clue, but it pissed me off.

“Oh, Honey, sit down, I made breakfast,”she told me, as if it wasn’t pretty obvious already.

“Morning, Mom,” I mumbled as I sat down at the island, and she placed a plate in front of me filled with scrambled eggs, toast and bacon.

“Mom, where are my shoes?!” my little sister calls from upstairs, but I already heard her running down because Faith loved nothing better than to stomp loudly on the ground so that everyone always knew she was coming.

Despite her fourteen years, she was tiny and, honestly, she looked more like eight or ten.

I liked that she didn’t pretend that she was older than she really was.

Faith loved smart clothes like mine, even as a child she always tried to dress like me, which was sweet of her and an honor until she started stealing my clothes.

At that point, she made me a little mad because I couldn’t buy anything new without her taking it out of my closet.

“Which shoes, darling?”

Mom asked as she filled a glass with orange juice and placed it beside my breakfast.

“The blue converse Nash bought me from San Francisco,” my sister answered her, snatched a strip of bacon from my plate and ate it.

“You know? You could take out your own plate and stop stealing my food like you do my clothes?” I pulled at my blue pullover she was wearing.

“Let her do what she wants, Kayden. It’s still our money, you spent on the clothes,” Dad interrupted.

And as if that comment weren’t enough, my peaceful morning was officially over when my lovely father entered the kitchen, dressed in a suit with his gray hair smoothed perfectly to the sides.

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