The bouquet was stunning—two dozen long-stemmed roses wrapped in red silk, their fragrance filling my living room as I unwrapped them. My heart swelled, a smile tugging at my lips as I pulled out the little white card. “To my love, forever yours.” My fingers trembled, my chest fluttering. After months of distance, of late nights and excuses, maybe this was his way of proving he still cared. But then I glanced at the delivery slip tucked into the bottom of the box. My smile vanished. The flowers hadn’t been sent to me originally. The address printed in black ink was hers.
Her.
The woman I had suspected for months. The one he called “just a friend.”
Rewind.
Daniel had always been smooth with words, the kind of man who could turn an argument into an apology with just a look. When he started working late, I told myself it was just ambition. When he guarded his phone, I told myself it was just privacy. When I asked if there was someone else, he kissed me and whispered, “You’re the only one.” I clung to that whisper like it was truth.
But truth has a way of finding cracks.
The roses came on a Thursday afternoon, the delivery man grinning as he handed me the massive bouquet. “Lucky lady,” he said. I laughed nervously, warmth flooding my cheeks. For a moment, I wanted to believe it. I wanted to believe my husband had remembered me, thought of me, wanted to surprise me.
Then the slip.
The bold black letters: her name, her address, hastily crossed out and replaced with mine. My stomach dropped. My hands shook as the card slipped from my fingers.
That night, when Daniel walked through the door, I was waiting with the bouquet on the table between us. “Who are these really for?” I asked, my voice trembling but sharp.
He froze, his face draining of color. “What do you mean? They’re for you.”
I shoved the slip across the table. “Then why was her address printed on the delivery? Why was her name there before yours?”
His silence was louder than any confession. His mouth opened, closed, excuses dying on his tongue. Finally, he whispered, “I didn’t mean for you to see that.”
My chest burned. “You didn’t mean for me to see it? You didn’t mean for me to know you’re sending roses to another woman? That you’re calling her ‘my love’?”
He reached for me, his voice pleading. “It’s complicated. I didn’t want to hurt you—”
I pulled back, my tears hot and blinding. “You already did. You just didn’t want to get caught.”
The roses, once beautiful, now smelled sour, their petals heavy with betrayal. I swept them off the table, watching them scatter across the floor, crimson against the tiles like drops of blood.
In the days that followed, he tried to explain, to spin the story into something less than what it was. But every time I saw a rose, every time I smelled that sweet perfume, I remembered the slip. The truth was printed in ink, undeniable, inescapable.
Now, when I think of roses, I don’t think of love. I think of lies dressed up as romance, of betrayal delivered straight to my door.
Final Thought
Not all gifts are given with love. Some arrive wrapped in deceit, their beauty hiding the rot beneath. The roses weren’t mine to begin with—they were proof that his heart had already bloomed elsewhere.
