TWS: I'm bad at keeping promises yo. This post-date btw. Pre-date was part 1! Check it out if you haven't yet! Oh, and don't forget to leave a review!

Disclaimer: Everything but the story and the collection are not mine but maybe Warner could be mine hello there

Prompt 2: A Bed of Roses (part 2)

It was already past 12 when we got home from our date. The nervousness hasn't left my system yet, and my heart has been extremely jumpy and excited today.

Though I wouldn't mind spending the rest of my life like this.

I wouldn't mind shutting down the rest of the world and the weight of my responsibilities just to replay this day again.

Never have I felt so normal in all of my 17 years of living in this chaos-driven world. I have seen people gain a family and people die and people fighting for the freedom they deserved to have. I have loved and lost and caused one of the greatest wars. I have seen the world change under my fingertips, and all this happened when I reached 17 years old.

Maybe normal isn't my type of book.

"I think that's how dates usually went," Aaron says once we're inside the house. He's been smiling since we got home, dimples on both cheeks, and I can't help but be laugh at how he looks like right now. It's adorable.

I rest my hands on his chest as he pulls me close to him, one hand on my waist and the other resting on my cheek. God, I love the smell of him. The familiar smell that only he could have, and it's quite distracting, especially with the faint scent of honeysuckle on his skin. "You looked like you knew what you were doing, though. I thought you never went on a date before."

He shakes his head, blushing slightly. Bites his lower lip. "I asked advice from an acquaintance."

My thoughts click into place.

"And is this acquaintance a 20-year old former soldier of yours who also happens to be your girlfriend's best friend?"

He shrugs.

"Oh, wow," I say, still unable to find the dictionary in my head, "I guess… Well, I couldn't imagine what happened when you two discussed this." I want to know how it went. Maybe Kenji can tell me tomorrow.

"It was quite an unusual experience. I hadn't expected the outcome at all, and it was slightly embarrassing for me."

He shifts his weight, feigning coughs and looking everywhere but my eyes. Maybe I'll ask him what happened some day, but now I'll just let it go.

"You left a few minutes before our date," I say slowly, changing the topic. I watch the quick flash of surprise on his face as I continue, "Did something happen? Did the Council call? You should've told me if it was important—"

"It was important," he interrupts, "but I don't think its not as important to the Council as it is to me. The Council might have a big misunderstanding, and God knows that I don't appreciate how they chastise you. I'll show you."

He offers his hand and guides me to the yard. The sight that greets me the moment he opens the door takes me by surprise. I'm left standing in place, frozen and eyes wide, and I couldn't help but wonder how he was able to do such a thing in less than 10 minutes.

Because all I see are flowers.

Everywhere.

Violets and reds and yellows and different colors of different flowers, and most of them are types that I have never seen or read about before.

I am a girl of words and phrases and letters, but this boy has managed to take those all away from me because of the things that he's done. I may have woke him up by the actions that I make, but it's him who has the capability to render me speechless and make me feel weaker and stronger at the same time.

I can barely utter a word or a sound and the tears have begun to form in my eyes. I feel the light brush of the wind on my skin and I turn around, turn to the boy who's on one knee.

His smile is brighter than any firework I've seen—hell, it's brighter than the sun—and it's first time I've seen him look so happy.

"I may have been exaggerated when I told Kenji to buy you the same amount of flowers as your worth," he says, watching with the most tender eyes as I walk down to where he is. He reveals the single rose hidden behind his back. I take it as he says, "there's not enough flowers, really. You're worth more than this."

I laugh.

I laugh and I smile and I wipe away the tears that are leaving my eyes. I hug him like I'm close to my death and he's the rope that could save me and lift me up, away into a world so familiar yet strange to my own eyes. His balance is lost and he falls to the ground with me on top of him.

He's laughing as I pepper him with kisses everywhere.

His forehead. His eyelids. His jaw. His dimples. His lips.

His lips.

His lips.

"I love you too," he says between kisses, "Oh, and Happy Valentines Day, love."

Of course. How stupid for me to forget.

It's Valentines Day, I should remember this. The days when roses were turned into guns and shoot my heart and my own sanity. Roses, I think, are too beautiful to be perfect, which was why they were cursed with thorns.

Maybe that was what my parents thought too. Maybe that was what crossed their minds, which was why they wanted me to suffer the consequences.

They gave me a rose when I was 6.

Red, with more thorns than petals and more reasons to be afraid of rather than just being pricked.

They wanted to know if I could kill other living beings, if it's not just humans, so they gave me a rose. A gift of love and appreciation, they said. Valentines is one of rare days where there would be no burns or tears or screams, they said.

What they never knew was that I could, and that there were more screams that day than any normal day.

I once thought that they were telling the truth. That they loved me and tried so hard to be with me even with my curse. I was a rose, I think. Underneath the tragically beautiful image of it, there will always be thorns in their stems. More deadly than beautiful, and more beautiful than any other. And roses rarely trusted others because they weren't cursed like them.

But this—this is different.

I expect to be met by a handful of thorns, or to accidentally kill these flowers that I hold in my hand. But things are different now; I know the immensity of my powers, I know how to channel out my powers, and I won't let my curse be a hindrance to anyone, myself included. I won't let anyone or anything important to me get hurt again, especially Aaron.

Roses, I think, might not be as cursed as they thought they were. Sometimes it's worth the cuts, bruises or the spilled blood. It's worth enduring a lifetime for.

It's worth waiting for someone to love me so much that they even had the thorns cut off.

"In all honesty, I was never fond of getting gifts as a child."

"So was I, love. But then I found out that there were some gifts worth being thankful for. You're one of them; on top of the list."

". . . Thank you, Aaron."

"As long as you're happy, love, then that's already enough for me."

A/n: Thank you to this weird Loki poetry I saw on tumblr for the inspiration. Thank you to my followers pushing me to keep on writing. Thank you to Dan Howell, The Stanley Parable creators and probably my own sanity for putting me in a 4-hour existential crisis zone and making me remember why I don't like people.

For more request/prompts, you can PM me on aaron-warner (or kevinseyes) on tumblr or here in the reviews section.