Page 13 of Meadowsweet and Marigold
The Omega rejected and abandoned by everyone…
She zipped the suitcase with finality.
"Somewhere I can just be...me. Whoever that is now."
Eliza stepped forward hesitantly.
"The company won't be the same without you."
"I suspect that was the point," Marigold said, her voice steadier than she felt. "Magnolia doesn't want reminders of me around while she takes my place."
"Not everyone believes what they're saying about you."
As reassuring as she hoped those words would be, it does nothing to ease my heart. It doesn’t matter if people believe it ornot. Those with power in our society have made their decision.Chosen their new star.That’s enough to reverse and bury everything I worked hard for.
Erase everything I built with a snap of my twin sister’s fingers.
"It doesn't matter anymore." Marigold picked up her coat. "I've spent my whole life performing for others, Eliza. Perhaps it's time I learned to live for myself."
This is just how it has to be…
Marigold stoodin the center of her emptied apartment, her suitcase and a single box of keepsakes by the door.
The space echoed with hollowness now — bare walls where framed reviews had hung, empty shelves once lined with porcelain ballet figurines and the barren corner where her practice barre had stood.
Five years of her life were packed away in hours.
She traced her fingers along the windowsill, feeling the groove worn into the wood where she'd rest her hand between readings of her lines.
"I thought I'd feel more," she whispered to the empty room. "Isn't that strange? This place was my sanctuary."
Her footsteps made a different sound now as she walked the perimeter one last time — no longer muffled by the plush rug she'd splurged on after her first principal role. The morning light cut through the windows at a sharp angle, illuminating dust motes dancing in the emptiness.
At the kitchen counter, she paused at the sight of the single mug she'd left behind — a gift from Rowan on their six-month anniversary.
"You can have that too," she told the apartment as if Magnolia might materialize to claim it. "I don't need keepsakes of false promises."
The apartment didn't respond.
It simply existed, indifferent to her departure as it had been to her presence.Perhaps that was fitting.The city itself had moved on from her disgrace with the same cool indifference.
At the door, Marigold allowed herself one final glance.
For a fleeting moment, she saw ghostly echoes of herself — spinning across the hardwood after getting the call about Swan Lake, collapsing in tears the night of Rowan's rejection, determinedly rising the next morning to practice despite everything.
"Goodbye," she said simply, her voice steadier than expected.
She turned the key in the lock, listening for the final click before sliding it under the door as arranged.
Walking away should have felt momentous, but it was just footsteps down a familiar hallway, the worn carpet beneath her ballet flats, the same flickering light they'd never fixed.
Outside, the city assaulted her senses.
Car horns blared and pedestrians pushed past, the sidewalk a choreographed chaos she'd once navigated with unconscious grace. Now each body that brushed against her felt like an intrusion, each sound a spike through her already fragile composure.
"Watch it!" a man in a business suit snapped as she hesitated at the curb, her suitcase momentarily blocking his path.
"Sorry," Marigold murmured, the apology automatic.
