Never-changing

Wake up, b***h.

A person’s breathing rather soundly, somewhere in this giant of a house. My conscience steps into the foyer (or whatever room you want it to be " just as long as it’s on the first floor, for reasons you’ll figure out later on) where I encounter a woman, though I must admit I’m not entirely surprised to see her there. She’s insanely pretty, light green eyes, pomegranate skin, previously flushed with sweat but now growing colder, and dark brown hair, cozy, natural, and perfection, even if it is sticking out at ends where the bun is tied to the pinpoint of her cranium. Her hands " well, they could be lying uselessly on her sides or fumbling with the long fingers and blue satin gloves wrapped up till her arms " it’s like everything’s on speed-vision for her. They’re almost transparent, though I have absolutely no idea what this (or even that) could mean. She’s thinking about something, and for a conscience, I’m ashamed to say I dare not pretend to know what they are. So I’ll just enter her physical body and get this over and done with.

Well that was a s**t evening, she thinks to herself. She’s complaining about a bad night out? Really? But I’m not one to judge, so we’ll just keep going (and for the record, it’d be better if you just imagine things for yourself here " except my voice, try your best to imagine that in a very monotonic yet ‘striving-to-be-interesting’ sort of way). A really s****y evening, but it was so amazing. We danced and we danced and we laughed and every insecure feeling that I’d previously had inside of me just melted away. I never thought it could be that easy. They do say that you choose to be happy rather than it being some magical force that washes over you without trying " though I guess things like that happen too. I don’t know. Every time I think I’m right, it turns out that I’m wrong. But my God, what an amazing evening that was.

She looks down at her feet, lifting the hem of her wide-arching gown, and there they are, riddled with different-sized pieces of blood-covered shards of glass and dirt. There’s no way she could’ve gotten upstairs because on closer inspection there are a few of the larger pieces digging into her heel. All that’s left of an amazing night, now over, finished. Is this it?

She takes one foot after the other onto her lap and prods the shards of glass out of their fleshy abode, barely wincing while she does so, and consequently staining her beautiful diamond-like soft blue gown. After a few minutes, her hands are now filled with every shard, and she merely stares at them, wishing she could think of something but finding no solace in the absence of paranoia. She sighs one big sigh, looks about her a while, and decides to get on with the day’s chores. Heading upstairs quickly, she finds her small attic room, consisting of a simple bed with a comfy-enough mattress and quilts, a dressing table packed with the bare necessities, a small wooden chair, and her most prized possession, a window with an unbelievable view of the royal palace, miles and miles away, away from here, this manor, drowning in all sorts of debt and squander, never-changing. She sits down on the chair, avoiding the mirror in front of her, and placing the glass shards carefully on the table. Another sigh. She really doesn’t feel like doing anything. Wow, I really don’t feel like doing anything. Yeah. Deciding to keep her gown on (heck, it’s the last time I’m ever going to wear something like this, I might as well milk it), she heads back downstairs, untying her bun along the way to the kitchen. She feeds the animals in the courtyard, brandishes a feather duster against some carpets and candle-holders a little too fiercely, and whiles the time away while signing a little song, desperately trying to get back into her usual routine, and barely caring to wonder what her stepmother and stepsisters would think should they find her like this, trailing blood and little specks of blood all around the house and apparently in a craze. Hah, they’d be done with her sooner than you can say “All the eligible ladies of the realm have been invited to a ball”, though considering the amount of times they’ve repeated it in the days prior to the ball, she’d have probably made a quick-enough getaway. To where was never in the plan, but she’d lived under that roof far too long to pretend like you could ever make a system out of life, or even a successful one at most.

So what if I’ll never get to meet my Prince Charming ever again? He’s probably boring anyway. Yes, I’m much happier here in the countryside, cleaning the house and twirling in my sparkly dress. I’ll probably get sepsis from the wounds I’m casually neglecting and die a horrible and painful death, and bam, no one will have ever known about me, I’ll have been another unimportant blip in the universe. I have the power to stop worrying about all of this right now, but what if that will make me less charismatic? But why am I thinking such things? Since when do I try to escape a situation, even though the situation’s already escaped me?

She jumps and jumps over and over again in the air, hoping to stamp out whatever she feels is holding her back. And then she’ll start over. Don’t be afraid to leave your past behind, I think on telling her, just as long as --

Before I can even think on anything else, a heavy sort of music begins playing somewhere. Not in this reality, surely not, where that sort of technology hasn't been invented yet. So it must be in her head. She's literally marching to her own drum. She dances and twirls, all the while continuing her journey around the house and performing the chores she still had left to do before her 'family' showed up, hungover as hell. This music is driving me crazy, so I'll be relieving myself from mental duty and I'll just explain what I can see. She's heading upstairs, cleaning and dusting marble busts as she ascends, until she ends up on a landing entirely covered in rich, red carpeting, where the rest of their bedrooms are (large). Other statues adorned the gaps between each room door. She continued to fiddle absentmindedly with the feather duster and cloth, lacking any intention to get this stuff done any sooner, because she was already dead set on leaving. A scolding wouldn't matter. It would almost be a kick.

The front doors open - clearly, butlers decide to appear from nowhere when they're needed - and there's a bustle of shiny silk and satin material, and the clicking of expensive heels, which now make their way up the stairs and onto the landing. The two sisters walk in synch, their faces somehow managing to look more drained than usual. Their beds await. They see her, in her gown, cleaning. They stop dead in their tracks. Their eyes widen. Shock eventually twists their ugly mouths to smiles, until they finally let out hideous laughter, giggling together like the two French gossipers that they are, and shoot dirty looks at her as they head in through one door. Adjoining rooms, of course.

But now the tall, dark, demonic shadow of her stepmother stretches across the floor, approaching. Not 'her' stepmother. No. 'The' stepmother, because that's soon all she will be, with absolutely no relation to her. She sees her, in that dress. She continues walking to her room, only letting her gaze falter until she reaches the door, to turn her attention back to her. She's clearly too inebriated and frustrated to care. "Just this once." And then she shuts the door behind her, not to be disturbed.

She drops the cloth and heads to her room, rummaging through whatever she can call her own, and collects it all into one bag. She sneaks around the house trying to find anything small that she can take with her to sell, stuff they wouldn't realise was gone (which could of a great number of things, no matter the size). The front doors open almost automatically, welcoming her to her new world, a world of possibilities. All she can see and feel are her two feet below her, working and healthy. She can imagine a carriage being bought somewhere, to take her away, far away from this place, from stepmothers and princes, and from a world where lives are seemingly determined by outside forces. This was her life, and she was aware. That first step counted.

Good luck, my dear.

© 2014 Mr. Misanthrope

Author's Note

I always liked thinking about how much I would love to film something like this. I knew who I wanted all of the characters to be played by (friends of mine, of course). I admit the ending was rushed. The main part of this was written back in 2012, and I always knew how I'd want it to end, so I just went ahead and wrote it out because I was desperate to upload it.