Flores Vitae: The Flower of Life

Chapter 2: Heads are Rolling

I tossed the ice cream container in the trash and stared out my dingy little window. It was dark out now, so I partially saw my own reflection, and I partially saw the street lights and the illuminated windows of the building across the alley. I was lost in my own thoughts, when all of a sudden, my door was kicked in. And my silly first thought was... I forgot to lock it. The intruder could have saved themselves a lot of trouble by just turning the handle and opening it.  

I'm not sure what I expected to see erupt through my broken door. Kids from the local gang? Addicts looking for the guys that sell drugs in 4F? The police raiding the wrong apartment? What I absolutely did NOT expect was the red-headed Victoria's Secret model, and her two run-way buddies. It was the same gorgeous red-head who had glared at me from the car at the stop light. She was even more beautiful up-close and in person... even though she wore a cold, angry expression. Beside her was a too-tanned blond man, who somehow reminded me of a Ken-doll, and a petite and lovely Asian woman flanked her other side. They drew weapons, and I expected guns... but instead, they had swords. Shiny swords.

"Kill her!" The Victoria's Secret model ordered, "But remember, you must not bite her."

Kill me, but don't bite me? If you are going to kill me anyway, would a little nibble make a difference? I picked up Phil the houseplant and hugged him to my chest like a teddy bear. They were blocking the door, so the only exit available was the window. As the two beautiful side-kicks began to advance on me, time seemed to slow down... but while they were moving so slowly, I still felt like I could move normally, which was really weird. I backed toward my bed... to do what? I don't know? They had swords. I had a spider plant.  

My knees hit the back of my bed just as the glass in my window shattered, and three more people burst in through the broken glass. My brain was hardly processing this. A small, dark Hispanic woman, a huge tattooed viking, and a tall darkly handsome god. I thought they were here to kill me too, but instead, they faced off with the models, placing themselves between me and my attackers.

My apartment is so small... three visitors was a crowd. Now imagine six beautiful people having a sword fight in that confining space... swords? I was still dazzled by the swords. I'd never seen a real sword outside of the movies. There was the clash of metal on metal, and time seemed to go back to normal... but my mind was not normal. I had this strange feeling like I had just accidentally walked into the middle of a movie set, and this graceful, well choreographed fight-scene was being played out by beautiful Hollywood actors and actresses... because it was just too weird to be real. But then then the dark god swiped the head off from the Asian woman. Her head flew behind the kitchen island, and her headless body was twitching where it was draped across the counter top. A few seconds later, the Ken-doll was decapitated. I watched in horrific fascination as it went rolling across the floor, dribbling a trail of blood as it went. It finally bumped into the leg of my coffee table and it was blinking furiously. Wait? Can it do that, really? Why was it still blinking at me? He seemed so surprised that his head was disconnected from his body.

The red-headed underwear model gave a furious, animal sounding scream, and ran back out the door that she had just broken into. The little Hispanic woman was about to make chase, but the dark-god stopped her with a word. "Leave her." The dark god turned around and faced me, his sword dripping with blood. He was the most handsome man I had ever seen, with piercing blue eyes, black curling hair, and dark brown skin. When he looked at me, I had the strangest feeling of dejavu, but I know I'd never seen him before. I definitely would have remembered that face, those broad shoulders. He looked at me with concern.

"Are you hurt?"

My throat had closed and I couldn't speak. All I could do was shake my head no.

"My dear, its not safe for you to stay here. Now that you've been found, they will come for you. They will never stop coming for you. Please, come with me, and I will guarantee your safety."

I looked away from his beautiful eyes back to the Ken-head that was on the floor, staining my carpet. His eyes had stopped blinking and were now glazed over and staring at me lifelessly. My muddled brain was trying to piece everything together. I'd blown up the espresso machine, now beautiful people were trying to kill me. Surely my boss wasn't so enraged over a broken espresso machine that he would send supermodels to murder me? The headless body of the Asian woman was sliding off the island counter top very slowly. I thought in a minute or two gravity would win, and the body would hit the cheap linoleum. I was thinking random silly thoughts like, how was I going to explain this to the landlord? The door AND the window were broken, the carpet was bloodstained, and I had two dead bodies... I was sure I was going to lose my security deposit now.

"Madam," a cold but gentle hand guided my face away from the c*****e in my apartment back into the face of the dark god. "Please, there is no time. Will you come with me?"

What? What do you say in this situation? What choice did I have? I couldn't stay here. I had no where else to go. I had no idea who these people were... they looked even more dark and dangerous than the red-head who had issued the order to kill me. But these three had rescued me, hadn't they? So I just hugged my plant closer and nodded my consent.

In an instant the dark god had taken me in his arms, cradling me against his chest like I was something precious. I felt weird, I'm not a skinny girl. I thought I was too heavy to be held like this. He buried his face into my hair and took a deep breath, like he was smelling me or something. I thought we would go out the broken door, but I was mistaken. Somehow he managed to duck back out my small window, even with me in his arms. The fire escape outside the window groaned under our combined weight, and I thought vaguely, there was no way this was going to work. The old rusted fire escape couldn't hold one person, let alone four. And how would he climb down the ladders with me in his arms? Wouldn't it have been much simpler to just go back out the door?

Then he jumped. He jumped off from the fourth floor fire escape with me still in his arms.

Now, a few minutes ago I had been contemplating doing a suicidal belly flop off from the roof of this building. But the minute he leapt off from my fire-escape, I changed my mind. I did not want to die in a messy splatter on the pavement of the alley below. I felt my stomach rise up into my throat as we free-fell... and strangely I had enough time to wonder if I actually HAD committed suicide. Maybe I had jumped, and had made up this fantasy of falling to my death wrapped up in a strange, beautiful man's arms just to make it more romantic. Just when I thought we were going to impact the sidewalk... he bounced lightly off the dumpster, and landed nimbly on his feet. I'm a pretty hefty girl, and he didn't even grunt or anything. He just took off running again, toward a black SUV that was ready and waiting. The engine roared to life, I was stuffed into the back seat, along with the dark god. The viking was in the passenger seat, and the little Latino woman was driving... and driving at breakneck speed through the middle of the city. I could see the speedometer creeping over 100, as neon signs blurred past and we weaved and swerved around other vehicles on the road.