The Criminal's Rose

He was scared

Michael was perplexed with her sentence and he couldn't believe what he heard a second ago. He shouted "What?"

Rose continued sobbing heavily without saying anything. She rested her forehead on Michael's chest while her fingers were holding his collar as he kept consoling her. He pulled her back from his embrace wiping her tears.

Rose said in between her sobs "No- no one is left for me. All my faith is broken. He is the only person for whom I'm living. I- I don't want this life, Michael. I don't want."

Her suicidal thoughts made Michael startled. He held her face between his palms shushing her. He said "Rose, calm down. How do you know that Robin is dead?"

"Police found him. He is dead." Rose said wiping her tears which were streaming down like a never ending cascade.

"Police? When did it happen? Rose, tell me clearly."

"Few minutes back they called me. They said they found a person dead few hours back. Now they realized him as my brother."

"What? How did they know the person who's dead is Robin?" Michael shouted.

"They illustrated Robin's young picture using his childhood photo." Rose replied.

Michael shook his head with her unbelievable replies. He asked her whether she saw the dead person but she said no. As soon as she heard the news, she was broken and the next thoughts that came to her mind was to end her sorrowful life.

Michael convinced her to go to see Robin telling she should atleast know how Robin looks like. With a heavy heart, they reached the place where the cops were waiting for her. Seeing dead Robin, Rose couldn't control herself and kept crying.

Michael shouted "He doesn't even look like Robin." He then turned to Rose saying "Rose, he is not Robin. Don't cry."

One of the cops looked at him seriously when he heard him shouting. The dead person's tattoo on his neck proved them that his name was Robin. Though the cops were sure of the name Robin but they advertised about him few hours back to get any information about the person when they found no cell phone, no wallet or anything related to him, but no one visited yet. And they decided that person would be Rose's brother when their illustration matched him few minutes back so they called her.

Michael was not able to accept what the cops were saying. He looked at that person's chest and shouted "Rose, you said Robin got a scar on his chest. Look at it, there's no scar, no wound, nothing. Don't cry."

One of the cops yelled "Who are you man? Scars and wounds heal with time."

Michael kept finding reasons to convince her that he was not Robin but in no time, he got convinced that the dead one was Robin. When he was about to accept that he was Rose's brother, a woman in her white shirt and black skirt, who looked like a high class lady entered in along with two men, who was guarding her. Looking at the dead person, she started to cry while stroking his cheek.

Rose was puzzled to see the woman crying for him. The woman kept crying mumbling "My son."

The cops too seemed a little surprised with the woman's words and they inquired her. She said he was her son and he left home a month back because of disturbances in their family. He stopped using his identity as her son so it became difficult to the cops to know about him. When they advertised about him few hours back, she got to know that he was dead as a result of an accident and reached the city on her private plane.

Michael was so relaxed with the truth but Rose didn't stop crying.

"Rose, he is not your brother. Didn't you hear what she said?" Michael shouted. "Still has a doubt?"

He then turned to the woman asking "Hey! Is he adopted?"

The woman looked at Michael seriously and slapped him crying.

"Ouch!" Michael held his cheek letting out a sigh.

"Who the hell are you? He is my son. How dare you ask if he is adopted?" The woman shouted.

Michael looked at Rose saying "See, he is not even adopted. He is not our Robin, Rose. Stop crying."

Rose then wiped her tears looking at Michael. She held the dead Robin's hand for few seconds, looking at him with teary eyes. A part of her felt happy that he was not her brother but she was so sad to see the woman mourning for him. Not saying anything, Rose walked out of the place.

Michael clenched his jaw, staring at cops with seriousness gleaming in his eyes. He was in full rage with them but didn't speak anything and followed Rose behind her.

They reached Rose's house and she strolled to her bedroom without saying anything. Michael understood she couldn't forget easily that happened a few minutes ago. He walked to the kitchen and took a water bottle then strolled to Rose's bedroom. He saw her sat on the floor, supporting her back to the wall with her arms wrapped over knees and buried her face between her knees.

Michael sat beside her silently and brought the water bottle close to her but she didn't take it. He looked at her for a minute then wrapped his arm over her shoulder and pulled her close to him asking "Still crying?"

Rose shook her head as negative to his question without looking at him. He then brought his fingers near to her eyes then cheeks, stroking them.

"What are you doing?" Rose asked confused.

"Just checking whether you are crying or not." He replied that made her let out a small chuckle.

She raised her head to look at him. Her face turned pale with her cries and she seemed she lost all her glow on the face. She spoke "I'm sorry. I scared you."

"Trust me. You didn't just scare me. You did more than that." Michael shook his head. "Damn you were with knife when I came here. You scared the shit out of me, Rose. Learn to think before you act."

"When I heard the news, all the hope which is the only thing that remained in me, faded and I became crazy. I'm so weak, Michael. I hate myself."

Michael said "Yes you are crazy. Crazy to think that you are weak. You are a strong girl, Rose. But you are so weak to understand it."

Rose gave a nervous chuckle with his sentence and replied "Lies."

"No Rose. You had been through the things that no one could bear even in their worst dreams. Accept it. You are a strong one and you should be strong whatever happens."

Rose then held Michael's hand and rested a side of her face to his arm saying "Thank you for being with me, Michael. You are doing many things for me. I'm so lucky to have a person like you in my life."

"Yeah. I even got slapped for you." He rolled his eyes.

Rose smiled and shut her eyes. Then he spent with her the entire day and left in the middle of the night. He reached his home and started pouring his drink in the glass while remembering the incident that happened. His mind kept recalling Rose with the knife and the only thing that's revolving in his head was 'What if he reached her home a little late?'

The thought was making him restless and it was scaring him more. All his emotions started to overwhelm with his negative thoughts. Among them, anger was the emotion from which he couldn't control himself. Anger on Rose, anger on himself, the society and each and everything. He pressed the alcohol glass that was in his hand with a much pressure that left the glass broken into pieces, resulted in the wound in his palm but it was the least thing he cared about.

He kicked the table in front of him angrily and his eyes started to turn red in anger. He tried to control himself but he was failing in doing that. After few minutes of his outburst that resulted in destruction of many things in his house, he started to drink calmly looking at the rose plant.

He spoke looking at the rose flower "Think about me before you try to do anything to yourself, Rose. I've no one except you. I can't breathe if you go away from me. I love you, Rose. I can't live without you."