How To Build A Flower Shop

Chapter TWENTY NINE

Notices his breathing getting deeper and his words are slurred. A bad feeling overcomes her, her gut telling her what she suspects is true. 'Are you drunk?'

'Maybe... You can't prove anything! Hey, hey Bobbi!' he chants again, enthusiastic. She scrunches up her face at the volume of his voice as she pulls her phone away from her ear and back against it. 'You'll never guess where I am...' he says playfully, in a sing-song voice, elongates the word "am".

She stops erasing the line across her work with a crept out feeling. 'You're not outside my house, are you?' Looks over at her closed curtains with cautious eyes.

'You wish, baby. Try again,' he retorts.

'Home?' she asks in a bored tone.

'Faaar from that place.'

She scoffs and guesses, 'School?'

'Ew, Bobbi, what is wrong with you?'

She grunts, impatient. 'You know what, Bert? I haven't got time to play guessing games. I have homework to do.'

'You don't have to, screw the system. Anyway, that's not relevant. Since you're so obviously curious about where I am, I'm on top of your flower shop. Isn't that cool, eh?'

Speechless from confusion, her eyebrows pulled together, she stutters, 'Why? How? Why?' They're the only words that slip off her tongue, taken back with his answer because her mind is empty. Scratches her head, unable to form coherent words, wondering what he could be up to.

'My loneliness takes me to you,' he says instantly, so quietly he didn't think Bobbi would hear it. But she heard and her heart stopped beating for a moment. 'It's not a tall building,' he slurs in a loud voice. 'There's a dumpster you climb up on, then there's a brick sticking out just a bit that I stick my foot on and push myself up. Ta-da! Plus, it's really cool that it's a flat roof, so you can lie down and look up at the stars. It's pretty. Imagine it snowing right now. Oh my God, that'll be so cool to watch while you're looking up at the sky. Whoa.'

Bobbi puts her pencil down and takes a deep breath. 'I bet it would. Listen, I didn't mean how you climbed up there and you know it. Why my flower shop? Why climb a building, at all?' She would like him to help her comprehend the concept. Knows she won't get much work done while talking, so she lays down in bed, looking up at the ceiling and awaits his answer.

'I don't know. I needed to get away from my so-called dad. So I did what Roberto does best and walked out. Next thing I know, I'm hanging out with Damien who got us drinks and now, on this magical Friday night, I decided to spend my time alone on top of the roof of Gracious Gardens. Sue me.'

Realisation dawns on her: Roberto is drunk and on a roof. He could easily fall and get hurt!

Her eyes squeezed shut, heart in her stomach, she begs him, 'Please stay where you are and don't do anything stupid... I'm on my way over.' Trepidation fills her up, her imagination running wild but she does her best to ignore it.

'So... That's a yes to my booty call?' His voice is laced in amusement with a tinge of hope.

Bobbi climbs over her notes and books and gets off her bed. Still in her clothes, she fixes her hair with her phone between her ear and shoulder. 'I think so.' Her eyebrows furrow as she slips on her sneakers and pulls the back of them over the heels of her feet. Figures a booty call translates to "Get your ass over here and hang out with me". Doesn't really care to keep updated with lingo.

'Awesome,' says Roberto, before the line goes dead on her end.

Grabs her coat and descends down the stairs, puts her phone in her pocket along the way. Lucas is sitting in his lounge chair doing a crossword puzzle in the newspaper. He quirks an eyebrow at her when he notices her coat on, and she wraps a scarf around her neck.