Rainbow Shorts ( my LGBT Short Story Collection)

Roses are Red

Author's Note - Written for RaeKitanos first LGBT Challenge for 2014 

Prompts were : Start your story with - When I first saw him/her 

Include an insult 

Include a surprise 

Include a poem 

Roses are Red 

When I first saw him, it was an accident. Literally. He had been coming in through the open door and I had walked straight into him on my way out, splashing his cappuccino all down his shirt front and sending my glasses, which I had just been polishing, skittering over the footpath. We both spoke at once. 

"Sorry!" 

"Look where you're going, you stupid idiot! Are you blind?" 

I squinted at him, seeing only a two toned blur, soft brown above flesh tones, tinged with an angry red. His eyes were two smudges, I imagined they were glaring at me.  

It was an accident, he didn't have to be so rude about it! 

I drew in my breath to answer, already imagining his embarrassment, hiding the smirk I felt inside. 

"Yes, I am, actually." 

He didn't react as I expected. 

"Ha!" it was a snort of disbelief. "Where's your dog then, or your white stick?" he asked sarcastically. "If you are really blind?" 

I peered anxiously at the pavement, unable to see anything except a grey blur. "I'm not totally blind, just legally. I dropped my glasses, can you see them anywhere?" 

He bent down, picked them up and handed them to me. "Here you are. Maybe next time you should wear them instead of carrying them!" 

I put them on and glared back. "I said I was sorry!" I caught my breath, finally seeing him for the first time. Caramel coloured hair, blue eyes, straight nose, strong cheek bones. And damn it, if he didn't have a cleft in his chin. Too gorgeous for words. Too bad he was such an arsehole. 

My eyes dropped to his shirt front. Oops, the stain was still wet, and spreading, the flecks of cocoa from the cappuccino staining the white cotton like spots of mould. His hand still held the half empty cardboard cup. Okay, maybe he did have something to be cross about. 

He noticed me staring at his chest and raised both eyebrows in a supercilious sneer. 

"Yes, I'm gay, too!" I blurted out. "You can add that to your list of insults." I braced myself. 

Once again, he did the unexpected. He laughed, and put an arm through mine. "Well that's alright then! Come on, gay blind man, I think you owe me another cup of coffee!" 

That's how we met, me and Julian. My lover. 

I don't know what made me think back to our first meeting. Probably trying to take my mind off what was happening now. I sat in the ophthalmologist's surgery, waiting for the nurse to come in and remove the bandages from my right eye. 

I had just had laser surgery on my first eye, a week ago, hopefully allowing me to see without glasses for the first time since I could remember. I was excited. I was terrified. What if it hadn't worked? What if the one in a million risk had happened and I had gone blind? Totally blind? I felt only someone with impaired vision could really imagine that horror. 

Julian was with me, sitting opposite, almost as tense as I was. He had paid for the surgery, intending it to be a gift. He would be devastated if something went wrong. My anxious brain leapt to worst case scenario, would he still love me if I was blind, or would guilt and pity destroy our love? 

The nurse came in, I could see her blurred shape coming towards me, at least I assumed it was her, I couldn't really tell at that distance.  

"Ready?" she asked. 

I nodded, my throat suddenly dry. 

She bent down in front of me and carefully unwrapped the bandages. "Keep your eye shut until I tell you," she instructed.  

I shut the other eye in sympathy. I could feel a drop of water run down my cheek as she gently washed my eyelid with a wet cotton bud, the bandage had been on for a week so it had got a bit grotty in there. 

I sensed her straighten up. 

"Alright. You can open your eyes now." 

I swallowed and opened my eyes. The room swam for a minute as my eyes tried to adjust, my left eye had the same old blurry vision but my right eye-  

"I can see you!" I told Julian, my face almost splitting in half with a huge grin.  

The nurse smiled too, " There are just a few tests to run and then Dr Govern will see you for a moment." She ran through the standard eye chart tests, I had never even been able to see the chart without glasses before, and we discovered I had perfect vision after about six feet. The first six feet were still a bit out of focus, quite a normal outcome apparently. If the left eye proved the same after surgery, I would need reading glasses for small print, but that would be nothing compared to the joy I felt at being able to see!  

An hour later, Julian drove me home, my head still swivelling from side to side to take in this wonderful new world. Everything seemed brighter, more colourful, bigger, no plastic boundaries limiting my vision. 

When we got home, Julian went straight to the fridge. "I put a bottle of champagne in here earlier, so we could celebrate!" he told me. He poured two glasses and handed one to me.  

"I'll be back in a second," he said over his shoulder, disappearing into the bedroom. He came out holding an envelope. 

"I made you a card," he said, a trifle self consciously, as he passed it over to me. 

I couldn't stop smiling. "Really?" I took out the card. It had 'Congratulations!' written on the front, in large flowing script, sprinkled with gold glitter. I grinned and opened the card. 

"Roses are Red 

Violets are Blue 

I'm no poet 

Alas that's true 

Roses are Red 

Violets are Blue 

Whatever happens 

I'll always love you! 

♥ ♥♥

Julian" 

The card fell to the floor as I went into my lover's arms. 

*

Author's Note - This story flows on from "Valentine's Day Miracle" which I wrote last year for Rae's Valentine's Day LGBT challenge - it's the one before this, if you'd like to read it too :)