Red, not my favorite color

Asher's POV

“How much for that?" I point at the red roses sitting on the counter at the checkout spot of the mall.

“A customer left it there. The section is..."She pointed at an aisle. “Over there"

“Well, I want this one" it was for Lindsay. Red was her favorite color, so she was most definitely going to love it.

“Okay," she shrugged. “That's 7$ sir" she mumbled looking at the machine in front of her. “But Are you sure you want this one? there are tons to pick from" she asked and her nosiness pissed me off. When she realized I didn't find her questions amusing, she sighed and continued bagging all the things I bought.

I left early from work that day. I wanted to make it special for Lindsay. I had realized I hadn't done anything spectacular for her for 7 years and I decided to make it up to her by surprising her. It was our Marriage anniversary today after all

There was a chance of her ruining it. It was so Lindsay to ruin things. She had a problem with her mouth and she also had a way of making me go insane. I had hurt her multiple times, but that didn't mean I didn't love her. There was always this strong urge to hurt her and no matter how hard I tried, that feeling was always dominant.

I got home and started decorating. I hung the red letter balloons one after the other that spelled happy anniversary. The bed was covered with red roses, plenty enough to my satisfaction. I lit the candles and arranged them the best way I could. The curtains were down, making the lighting even more appealing.

I cleaned I and Lindsay's picture frame that hung on the wall. It had been hanging there for a while but nobody cared to clean it. I didn't want to, and neither did Lindsay.

After I was done setting things up, I took my phone to call her. It was her closing hour already, so she was likely going to come home anytime soon. She didn't pick up the first time I tried calling her, the second time. Even the third.

*****

“You know when I was a kid, I wanted to be an actor so bad," Shaun said and I chuckled almost immediately. “I took it seriously. I even had a show set up in my room and stuff like that"

“I just can't imagine you being an actor" Lindsay snickered.

Shaun feigned hurt. “That is so insultive. You know people like you are the reason I wish I did go to acting school”

"Oh really? but why didn't you go to acting school”

"My father wanted me to take over his company. He didn't want his son to be an actor” He turned to look at me. I couldn't see his face since I was laying on his bare chest, but I was certain he was looking at me.

"So what about you? How was your childhood?” he asked, stroking my hair.

"My mum is a retired lawyer and my dad is a reverend father"

“Oh, that's interesting"

“You mean exhausting. It was like I was always been forced to do something I didn't want to do. I kept staring at other kids and I asked myself, why wasn't I like them? My parents were strict alright. My dad wanted to take me to the convent when I disobeyed him once”

"I thought that was by choice”

"It is. We got to find out when we went to the convent. I kept crying and they said they couldn't take me since that wasn't what I wanted. It was crazy how my father would sacrifice my whole happiness just because I defiled his orders”

"What did you do?"

"I snuck off to a party and got back home drunk. I just wanted to live life a little, but he wouldn't let me, so I had to sneak off. When I got back, he pushed me down the stairs in anger”

"Down the stairs?” Shaun asked in disbelief.

"Yeah” I got up and tucked her behind my ears so he could see the scar on my face."That's how I got this scar" I lay back on his chest. “After doing that, he announced that I was going to the convent"

“That's insane. Do you have any other siblings?"

“No my mum had cervical cancer shortly after she had me and she couldn't get pregnant again" I sighed. “Do you know the craziest part? How everyone tries to act cool when I knew they'd have killed if they had the chance to"

Shaun didn't say anything. It was obvious he wasn't used to emotional stuffs like this. The only thing he did was kiss me on my forehead and that went way longer than spoken words.

“Why don't you just sleep over, It's late already”

I raised my head to look at him."What do you mean it's late” The last time I checked, it was just 2 o'clock.

"it's” he raised his phone to check the time. "It's 6 o'clock already” he announced and my heart sank. We were having such a great time, the curtains were down and his house had perfect lighting so it was almost impossible to tell between day and night.

I stood up from the bed and grabbed my phone. My anxiety doubled when I saw 5 missed calls from Asher. I was supposed to be home 3 hours ago!

“I have to go Shaun," I said to Shaun who was already sitting on the bed, staring at me in puzzlement.

“Lindsay, are you okay? You can stay here, it's fine"

“Not it's not" I snapped at him as I slipped on my skirt. I almost went crazy looking for my bra, which I found in a hidden corner. “I'm sorry, I just need to be home now,” I said as I slipped on my top.

"Should I tell my guards to drop you off? You seem to be in a hurry”

I glared at him and he immediately kept quiet. He knew how I felt about the idea of his guards dropping me off. After grabbing my bag from the mirror stand, I kissed him on the lips, and off I went.

I was in big trouble. I kept thinking of an excuse to tell Asher when I finally got home. He was going to be so mad.

*****

By the time I got home, it was already dark. I thought about running away and not coming back because I didn't know what I would face when I eventually entered the house.

I had the perfect lie to tell Asher, but I was scared he wasn't going to believe me. He was observant and had severe trust issues.

I opened the door and got in. Asher wasn't seated waiting for me on the sitting room which I was grateful for. I was certain going to melt if I saw him seated there.

“Asher?" I called out as I walked upstairs. My heartbeat was even louder than my footsteps. That was how scared I was. My hands trembled at the side and my lips quivered.

I walked to our bedroom. He had to be there since he wasn't anywhere else. My shaky hands gripped the door handle and I twisted it. I didn't want to take any chances, so I used my leg to open the door Incase he was waiting to knock me down.

My mouth dropped when I walked into the room. It was different. The room had been decorated. There was a happy anniversary inscription on the wall. If I wasn't scared to death, I would have smiled because decoration was indeed wonderful.

“You finally decided to show up" I heard a slurry voice and I turned to look at Asher who sat on the floor with a bottle of tequila in his front. He was drunk.

“My boss made me stay late. Work at the office was too much"

“Lies" he whispered as he stood up and I was immediately alarmed. In case he tried to grab me by my neck and choke the life out of me. “All fucking lies!" He hurled the bottle in his hands to the wall and it shattered, spilling tequila everywhere.

“No, of course not. I'm telling the truth. My boss..."

“Shut the fuck up!" He yelled at me and I shuddered. Hot tears went down my cheeks instantly. “I got back from work today as early as possible because I wanted to make today special. It's our anniversary for goodness sake, does it even mean anything to you?"

“It does. Of course, it does" I lied.

He pointed at the candles that had already melted down. “You see those candles. It was full when I lit them. That's how much you wasted my time. I even made the decorations all red because that's your favorite color. That's how much I care about you”

“It's alright. We can redecorate, I'm here now" before I could finish speaking, he slapped me across the cheeks as he glared at me in anger.

"I don't want to hear a word from you”

Anger rushed through me immediately."So what, you think celebrating our anniversary would make this marriage less pathetic? Putting all these decorations up doesn't mean you are a good person. You are a horrible, heartless person and we all know that!“I screamed at him as hot tears poured out of my eyes. "Thank God I wasn't here because the celebration would have been nothing but pretense”

I had expected Asher to go wild, but he didn't. He slipped to the floor and sat there like the pathetic man he was.

"And one more thing" I began. “Today isn't our anniversary, tomorrow is and Red is not my favorite color" I muttered under my breath and walked out