petals in the dark

For over thirty years, the little town of Willowbrook had known nothing but warmth and cheer from the town's beloved florist Mr. William Carter. Every morning, without fail, he stood on the same corner, his cart overflowing with the brightest blooms you could imagine. The air was always filled with the scent of fresh roses, daisies, and lilacs as he smiled and waved to each passerby.

Years before the scent of daisies clung to his apron, the man once buried bones beneath the roots of pine trees, letting nature conceal what humanity could not forgive.

"Good morning, Mrs. O’Reilly!" he'd call out to the elderly lady who lived on Maple Street, her arms full of shopping bags.

"How are you today, Mr. Carter?" a young boy would ask, his hand grasping a shiny new lunchbox.

"Another beautiful day," he would say, his voice as sweet as the petals he sold.

It was a routine. A cherished one. Everyone in Willowbrook adored Mr. Carter. To them, he was the kind man with the twinkling eyes who made mornings feel a little brighter, a little more hopeful. But there was one boy, little Jamie Thompson, who had started to notice something strange.

Jamie had just turned eleven and, like most children, had an inquisitive mind. As he passed Mr. Carter's flower cart every morning, he began to notice small inconsistencies. Mr. Carter's eyes, though soft, had moments where they seemed faraway, like he was lost in a memory he couldn't quite reach. And the way he would sometimes glance nervously over his shoulder... it was subtle, but Jamie caught it.

One afternoon, while playing checkers with his retired police officer uncle, Dave Thompson, Jamie brought it up unknowingly. "Uncle Dave, have you noticed anything weird about Mr. Carter?"

Uncle Dave, a gruff man with years of experience on the force, looked up from the game, brow furrowed. "What do you mean, kiddo?"

"You know," Jamie began, shifting the pieces on the board, "he always looks like he's... waiting for something. And sometimes he’s looking around like he’s scared."

Dave paused. He tried to brush this topic aside. The old policeman's instincts kicked in. "Hmm, sounds odd. You’ve got a sharp eye, Jamie. I’ll keep an ear out."

For the next few days, Dave observed Mr. Carter from a distance, and the more he watched, the more uneasy he became. There was something... off about him. The town had always seen Carter as the innocent flower seller, but Dave’s gut told him that this man might not be who he appeared to be.

When Dave was a younger officer, there had been a string of unsolved disappearances in the area. Almost 40 years back there was a serial killer at large. These disappearances were linked to this killings. A man , always masked, always quick—had been the prime suspect, but despite all the efforts, the case had gone cold. No one had ever found proof of the killer’s identity, and eventually, the case had been abandoned. Could it be that Mr. Carter was somehow linked to that old case? The totally unlinked incident that happened years back kept on lingering around him.

Determined to find the truth, Dave began to dig deeper, visiting local archives, digging through his old case files, speaking to people who had lived in Willowbrook long before him. One evening, after a long night of research, he found something chilling. A report from an old incident: a man had been in a car accident years ago, suffering a severe head injury. He had been brought into the town's asylum for treatment, where he had been diagnosed with memory loss. The records were vague, but it mentioned that after several years of care, the man had been released and somehow disappeared into the world. The report had a partial photo of the patients admitted that year. one of the patients oddly looked really familiar. Dave finally realised who it was.

Dave's old case file described a man who used wire for garroting, always in the dead hours between 2 and 4 a.m.—always without a trace. The victims were found posed with chrysanthemums on their chests.

The pieces started falling together. chrysanthemums were Mr. Carters most sold flowers. He cared more for these then the other species of flowers.

Mr. William Carter had never told anyone about his past. But Dave now suspected that this man was not only the florist everyone knew and loved; he was also someone capable of far darker deeds. The killer. The one who had escaped justice. He still had doubts in his hearts. After all , Dave has known carter for like 30 years. Is this kind man really what he thinks he is?

With a heavy heart, Dave felt his temperature increase. After all, They've known each other for a good long time. He can't even remember when they had become friends. Dave confronted Carter one evening. It was a quiet night, the streets empty except for their conversation.

"Carter," Dave began gently, "I need to ask you some questions."

Carter, who had been cleaning his cart as he always did before heading home, looked up at the policeman. "Of course, Officer Thompson. What can I help you with?"

Dave hesitated. How did one even begin such a conversation? "I know about your past... the accident, the asylum. I think it’s time we talk about it."

Carter's face paled, his hands trembling as he set the broom aside. "What are you talking about?" he asked, his voice cracking. He looked as though a terrible weight had suddenly fallen on him.

The old man’s eyes were filled with confusion. "I... I don’t remember. I don’t know what I did... what I was before. All I know is that I woke up one day, and I was here... selling flowers." His hands shook as he held onto the edge of the cart.

Dave took a deep breath, the weight of the truth pressing on his chest. "I believe you, my friend . But the truth is, you were once a very different man. You were lost, and now you’re here. But we have to face what happened."

The next few weeks were a blur of police investigations, and while the town remained unaware, Carter’s true identity began to unfold. The community’s flower seller, so beloved, had once been a psychopathic serial killer who had managed to erase his past due to his memory loss.

In another life, he carved silence into his victims with cold precision, each face a blur—each scream a ghost that never left the woods.

The twist, however, was not what anyone had expected. Carter’s transformation into the kind, gentle man who sold flowers was not an act—it was a rebirth. He had no recollection of his past life, and every day, he chose to live with kindness, with the love of flowers and people around him. It was as though the person he had been no longer existed, and in its place stood a man who simply wanted to spread joy.

But when the evidence was presented to him—photographs, reports, and the undeniable truth of his past—Carter collapsed in shock. Photos of the past showed a hollow-eyed man with bloodied gloves, smiling faintly as if death were merely a hobby. His victims: seventeen. Confirmed. The man who had been a killer, a monster, now faced the reality of what he once was.

Carter had once etched tally marks into the inside of his closet door, of his old house—not for months or years, but for each soul he silenced forever.

He was devastated, deeply distressed. In prison, alone with his thoughts, Carter spent hours thinking about the lives he had taken, about the people he had wronged. There were no excuses, no way to undo the past.

And so, in the solitude of his prison cell, William Carter did the only thing he could think to do: he apologized. He apologized to the families, to the town, and to himself for the horrors he could never remember. And in the end, unable to bear the weight of the life he had lived before, he ended it.

But Willowbrook never forgot the man they had known. The memory of the gentle, naive old florist who had given them flowers and smiles lingered in their hearts forever. The town chose to remember him not for his past, but for the kindness he showed them in his second life—a life that, in the end, was as beautiful and fleeting as the flowers he had sold.