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Well, you are miss, you are, her father would put his arm around her and draw her up against him.Out with it. What is on your mind?
And Josephine would put her head on his shoulder and all the sordid mess would come out. She would tell him everything, and she’d feel better. But Papa hadn’t put his arm around her and asked her what was wrong in years. Not since Beth and Mama had gone to heaven.
It was as if Papa had been gone too, followed his wife and daughter to a fate worse than the grave. Ignoring all three of his daughters, and exiling Justin to the altar of a so-called education. Her brother hadn’t been home since he was a little boy: School had stolen him from them even before they’d lost Beth. Papa would only come out of his silence to periodically shout at his son and heir about his preposterous behavior. The rest of them were invisible to him, lost in the haze of grief.
Before that, he had been her favorite person in the world; he still was. But they no longer talked like they used to. He and Josephine would sit in front of the fireplace and eat cheese with their bare hands, and he would talk to her endlessly about his travels in the West Indies and Africa when he had been a young man.
Half of the things he told her were grossly embellished, but she still couldn’t get enough of his stories.
Don’t be sad, Jomila, Papa would tell her if he were here now.
She turned around, opening her eyes. No Papa in sight—he had gone to bed hours ago. Besides, he hadn’t spoken to her thus in years. She barely remembered how soft and warm his voice would get. He had barely spoken any of their names in years. Only Justin’s, and that in anger and disgust.
The night their little sister, Beth had died, it wasn’t just one person that they had lost: It was three. Beth, Papa and Mama. Her parents did not die that night, but little Beth, the angel of the house, had taken their spirits with her. They were afterwards nothing but ghosts drifting around, sullen, silent, absent. Barely one year later, Mama had wasted away to nothing and followed her daughter to the grave. The girls had had to raise themselves—Justin had been left completely alone. But they weren’t alone; they had Laurie, who lived in the manor next to theirs, not half a mile away. He was all alone too.
But now everything was changing.
Margaret married to her groom.
Amy away to Europe to paint and get fallen in love with—she would travel to Paris, Rome and Greece with Aunt March. She would see all the places Jo had been reading about, she would step on the same roads ancient philosophers and writers had walked, and would not even know it, probably hot in pursuit of a handsome gentleman or two.
Teddy and Justin competing over who would be seen with the most beautiful diamond of the first water on their arm each afternoon.
And she, left alone back home in her boyish theatre clothes, searching for ghosts of her childhood in their old cedar trunk, her scribblings those of a child, with no one to play at real life with.
No, I mustn’t think like that. Mama would tell me to be strong; I need to be more like her.I must find a ray of hope. Soon enough, we will be safe back home. Papa will rally under my care, and Justin will be coaxed into his old self. We will still be a family. And there will be theatre with Teddy and sword-playing, and reading by the fireplace.
Laurie was her last hope.
As long as she had him, she would be all right.
She did not know if she believed the rest of it herself, but on him she knew she could rely. He would be there, no matter how many skies fell on her head. He was the one hope she would cling to with everything she had.
The air inside the ballroom was so stuffy, the breath caught in her chest.
I need to get out of here.
I need to breathe.
She took off running towards the French glass doors that led to the terrace, not caring who saw her.
Her incredibly silly dancing slippers prevented her from running away as fast as she would like, but pretty soon, she found herself cloaked in theinvisibility of the dark garden, her feet sinking into the soft grass.
“That looks like a dress one cannot run in.”
Laurie’s voice. Directly behind her. Had he followed her out of the ballroom?
She did not think; she ran.
Dear Beth,
I keep forgetting that you are not waiting for me quietly at home.
Whenever something exciting, or strange or even terrifying happens, I keep thinking that I am going to come running back to you and tell you all about it.
I keep forgetting that I will never hear your advice again.
I keep forgetting that memories are all I have.
