Page 8 of Disenchanted
“If they want to waste money they don’t have on such nonsense, the more fool they.”
“You are the only one who thinks it is nonsense. For Netta and me, that ball is our only chance at happiness.”
I managed not to roll my eyes. “Don’t be so melodramatic, Amy.”
She flushed, her eyes glinting with angry tears. “I would not expect you to understand. You are so mean, Ella. You used to be so kind and sympathetic and sweet. Well, you were never exactly sweet, but you were a great deal more fun. But you have turned bitter and nasty and— and old! You don’t have any dreams about romance or finding your one true love and living happily ever after. All you want to do is shut yourself up in your musty library with your stupid books and you don’t care what becomes of Netta or me. I am sure if I do not get to attend that ball, I shall simply die! I know I shall.”
“I do hope not. We cannot afford to give you a decent burial.”
I immediately regretted the retort when Amy burst into a flood of tears.
“I am sorry, Amy. I—”
She shoved past me, storming toward the parlor door. I turned to my other stepsister, holding out my hand.
“Netta, please, I—”
She shied away from me, averting her tearstained face. She hurried after her sister.
Amy paused on the threshold long enough to hurl a parting shot, but she was sobbing so hard, I could barely make out the words. “N-not the end of the matter. When Mama gets home, just see what she has to say.”
The girls fled the parlor, but not before Amy slammed the door hard enough to make me wince.
I heaved a deep sigh, realizing my stepmother would have plenty to say about the ball and I dreaded the thought of another tempestuous encounter. No matter how she would scold or plead, I could not yield. Not this time.
My father had set up his will so that all control of the trust money rested with me. I hardly knew whether to applaud the wisdom of my father’s foresight or curse him for it. I had just turned eighteen when Papa died and his decision to leave me in charge of the family coffers had placed a crushing burden on my youthful shoulders. My stepmother had no more notion of economy than my stepsisters did. The knowledge that it was entirely up to me to ensure we did not end up facing utter ruin was terrifying and kept me awake many a night, worrying.
I knew this next month until the cursed ball was over was going to be a nightmare. A veritable siege of tears and tantrums, frozen silences and verbal assaults designed to weaken my resolve. For all our sakes, I could not, would not let that happen, but the mere thought of it left me feeling drained and exhausted. I retreated to the library, resisting the urge to nail the door shut behind me.
I tried to return to what I had been doing before I had been interrupted, but I knew it was hopeless. I lacked both the proper tools and the ability to unstop the chimney. I sank down on the stool by the hearth, trying not to think of my stepsisters upstairs weeping into their pillows. Didn’t they understand that I would happily have sent them to a hundred balls if I could afford to do it?
I dug my hand into my apron pocket and drew forth my mother’s emeralds. I wondered if I was being selfish to cling to these relics of the past. It was true that I never wore them and would never have any occasion to do so. But the thought of parting with my mother’s earrings made my heart ache.
I had been fascinated by those emeralds as a child, calling them Mama’s “twinkles.” Whenever she dressed to go out to some dinner or party with Papa, I liked to brush back her soft blonde hair just to look at them.
“The twinkles make your eyes sparkle, Mama. Like stars,” I would say.
She would laugh and lean down to rub her nose against mine. “These earrings were a special gift from your papa when you were born, my Ella. And that is what puts the sparkle in my eyes, not the twinkles.”
My eyes welled at the memory, and I hastily shoved the earrings back in my pocket. Leaning back against the brick frame of the hearth, I gazed around the room at the sheets I had draped over the furniture to protect it from the soot. White cotton shrouded the bookcases, the desk where Mama had taught me my numbers and letters, the large wingback chair that had been my father’s domain. I felt surrounded by ghosts of happier times.
I was a very restless child, and the library was of little importance to me in those days. I much preferred tearing out of the house to play with my best friend, Mal, who lived next door to me. This was long before the Hawkridge family had moved to Misty Bottoms. Mal and I had had glorious adventures, climbing trees to rescue imaginary royals from towers, dueling with stick swords upon boards we cobbled together to make pirate ships or grubbing in the dirt in a quest to find fairy gold.
No matter how inclement the weather, I chafed to be outside with Mal. During a particularly harsh winter, I had contracted a bad case of influenza that had obliged me to spend weeks indoors. I would have been utterly miserable but for my mother’s ingenuity in devising entertainments, wonderful picnics on the library floor, treasure hunts for colored rocks and treats she hid among the bookshelves. She even draped a blanket over the desk turning it into a cave where the dread ogre Dirty Burt lived, appearing whenever I poked at him to chase me around the room, squealing with delight.
The part of the ogre was always played by my petite fair-haired mama because my father was not the sort of man to crawl about on the floor and play. But as the evening shadows lengthened, he would light the candles and draw me onto his lap to read from what would become my favorite book, The Life and Exploits of Queen Anthea, the Magnificently Wise.
My mother would sit nearby quietly stitching and smiling over some passage she particularly liked, often asking Papa to read it again. No matter how hard the wind howled or how high the snow drifted outside the library windows, I remembered feeling safe, warm, and loved. How could any of us guess that enchanted winter would end in tragedy? The same influenza that had made me so ill would eventually claim my mother’s life.
My father was a quiet man, never as demonstrative with his affection as my mother. I tended to think of him as being like the moon, reflecting my mother’s light and warmth. When she died, it was as though the moon fell into a state of permanent eclipse, stealing the stars from my sky as well.
Lost in his grief, my father spent much of his time shut away in the library. This situation did not improve when he married my stepmother a year later. If anything, he became even more withdrawn. The library became his fortress and the rest of us were forbidden to enter there.
It probably speaks volumes about the sort of little girl I was. Tell me something was forbidden, and it was the very thing I wanted. I had shown little interest in reading books heretofore, but my father’s edict made me stubbornly determined to breach the library walls.
I would wait until late at night when my stepsisters and stepmother were fast asleep and creep downstairs. Tiptoeing to the library door, I would inch it open and peek inside. My father always sat up until all hours reading. Ensconced in his wingback chair, he would be absorbed by some heavy tome.
By dropping to my stomach and snaking across the carpet, I could creep across the room undetected. I would hold my breath as I inched past my father’s chair, keeping a wary eye on him. But when my father was lost in a book, he was oblivious to the world. My stepmother often complained that the entire roof could cave in on all of us and he would never notice.
