Violet's Feelings

Right, then. Seven-hour shift today, and an hour's drive home in rain so wretched I swore I was going to crash three different times. So, you know, great day.

To more relevent matters, I was at my mother's place in Baltimore this weekend and while I was in town I decided to swing by the MICA dorms and see how Violet was doing. Unsurprisingly, Vi is being a total trooper. Especially considering the fact that she thinks she's next.

You heard me right. Violet Marshall, the ridiculously talented (think savant-level, people. The girl's a prodigy) art student who is actually smarter than most people I know, thinks she's next because her artistic mind linked together random letters in Rose's crazy-person messages (I've decided that Rose wrote them, as the alternative is much, much less pleasant).

Vi thinks that because the word "FLOWER" is capitalized in the freak post, and because she and Rose are both (obviously) named after flowers (or colors, if you look at it that way, which I did--I always thought of my two besties as the Crayola twins), obviously it must mean that she's next.

Now that she's convince herself of that, she's been seeing things. Shadows in weird places, glimpses in mirrors. She says she's suddenly gotten the urge to start using ash as an artistic medium. But Violet has an active imagination anyway, and she's never done looking for new and exciting things to replace paint and charcoal in her art.

She says I'm being naiive -- actually, she got really angry yesterday and told me that I'd already seen him, and it wasn't like I could pretend he just wasn't real. And she's right -- it's not like I can pretend he doesn't exist.

But, honestly...I'm just not ready to believe her. It's been all of a week since the incident. I've had nightmares every night, hearing Rose's godawful screaming in my head, the familiar horrid sound from the familiar beautiful voice. She used to sing, you know...but that's not the point. The point is that I'm just starting to get my footing back after having my legs knocked out from under me. The point is that I'm actually starting to formulate a plan, visualize my next few moves.

And the point is that I can't lose Violet, too. Because I'm selfish, and I need her.

I won't survive it if he takes her, too.

....

I just now realized that the above statement is the first time I've actually admitted that he took her. And I know, deep down to my soul, that he did. He took my Rose. Took her just after I watched her drive off. Like a secret lover meeting up to steal her away.

I need a goddamn drink.