Summary: Myka's trouble with men...her father may have planted the seed but it's her first boyfriend who watered and nourished it. Does Pete even have a chance to win her over, weed away all the pain he has caused her?

Disclaimer: Sorry to say I don't own any of these characters except for Cole. I wish owned Warehouse 13 but if I did I would be making episodes not writing fan-fictions

Author's Note: Turn around now if you don't like stories that are character building stories and not stories that read like an episode…I normally don't write stories like this, all symbolic and shit, but the evil plot bunnies wouldn't let me sleep so I wrote this down at 11:00 at night. Hope you like it.

****some "Awakening" reference (by Kate Chopin) Can read without knowing the book but there are a few points were I compare her to the book so it helps to know the story somewhat…****

Myka's problem with men. Though the seed may have been laid by her father, it was her 1st boyfriend of 2 years that watered and nourished it. He was like a vine, slowly wrapping around her without her noticing. Strangling the life from her. She clung to her books like a small saplingtrying to survive. The Garden of Eden is only in her mind. The perfect life she wants in unobtainable, only reachable through books and stories. Myka knew she didn't live in there, her reality was that she lived among the weeds, fighting to survive.

Myka never considered herself pretty. Not that she saw herself as an ugly weed. But more as a small flower that grows everywhere. Sometimes people stop to admire the true beauty and simplicity of it, but more often than not people walk right by it, not bothering to deviate from their regular routines and scenery. But Cole wasn't either of those people. Myka truly believed he'd admire her forever.

But that wasn't Cole, never was and never will be. He got satisfaction out of crushing the flowers, hearing the crunch under his feet as their stems snapped into little pieces. He loved when he picked up his foot the flower was cowering from him, the way they should be in his eyes. Lower than him. Not as high and strong as him.

Myka was the naive little flower who was plucked from the dirt by him. She never imagined he'd pluck her apart, piece by piece, petal by petal, till all that was left of her was her weak and damaged stem. She believed he'd place her in a vase forever, high on a shelf to be admired and never broken. Oh how wrong she was.

Eventually the little stem that was left over from Cole became so hard that no one, not even someone like Sam, could pluck it from the ground. Myka realized what had happened to her, but she couldn't pry away her outer layers and leaves. She could let herself be vonerable again. Never again.

Cole was the perfect storybook prince. Tall, toned but not too overdone, seafoam green eyes, perfect black hair and a charming crooked smile that could melt even the coldest heart. The perfect man, on paper that is.

A book can only look so far into a person...

THE NEXT CHAPTER WILL BE UP IN LIKE AN HOUR OR SO. I JUST WANTED TO BREAK THE FIRST CHAPTER UP INTO TWO BECAUSE IT DIDN'T FLOW WELL WHEN IT WAS ONE BIG CHAPTER...SO BE PATIENT!!!

P.S. if u got an e-mail before saying a storied titled "Flowers never falter"..ignor it. I posted the wrong document...oops!

~*mandyem92*~