Caroline Kensington feels like a fish out of water entering Grosvenor Square for the first time. A girl from the country and of comparatively simple means she feels incredibly intimidated by the lavish balls she must attend in pursuit of her family'...
Songs: Standing Next To Me- The Last Shadow Puppets Badaboum-Hooverphonic Pink in the Night- Mitski I'll Haunt You- Tennis
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Endless bellowing of conversation echoed off the towering vaulted ceilings above the grand ballroom of the palace. The gold moldings, paintings, and magnificent statues that decorated the ceiling went unnoticed either due to the disinterested audience below more focused on gossip or the limited lighting provided by the six large chandeliers, bathing the entire room in golden warm but still faint light. In the center of the circle of six lit candle fixtures was a gigantic unlit decorative chandelier, cascaded in crystals that sparkled off the orbiting candles and shimmered all the way down to the dance floor below.
"Mother you can't possibly be serious!" Eloise whined.
"If he asks you to dance, as you must with any suitor your brother sees eligible," Violet coaxed ignoring Eloise's disgusts as she subtly flattened the fly-aways of her daughter's elaborate hair.
"He sees eligible?! He's not even listening, Mother!" Eloise shot Anthony the familiar glare she had plastered across her face each moment spent together since he ruined her tea party yesterday.
Anthony's eyes had grown misty as he stared up at the chandelier above him ignoring the conversation occurring before him. The twinkling lights tickled his eyes in illusion making the room slowly fade around him as his vision adjusted.
"Anthony, sweetheart you were listening weren't you? I wish for you to introduce Eloise to the baron tonight and you must encourage her to dance. I am sure you have picked out many other suitors for your sister as well, of course?"
"Of course," Anthony answered distracted, purposefully this time hoping it would hide his obvious lying. It wasn't that he hadn't put any effort towards finding a perfect suitor for Eloise it was just that no man seemed 'perfect' or even adequate for that matter. Very few men he knew were searching for wives with opinions and fortunately for the happily single Eloise, she was bursting at the seams with her own ideas and opinions on everything. As he had learned last year when matching Daphne with Lord Berbrooke, shirking his responsibility by choosing the easiest or seemingly 'safest' match possible was not only a weak but cruel act as well and certainly not what this father would've expected from him. He intended for Eloise and him to be equal partners in choosing her husband, but so far she had shown no interest in actively participating. Especially now that she was furious with Anthony, losing the little trust the two held.
Eloise rolled her eyes her arms still firmly cross in front of her. "I do not wish to meet 'the Baron' I hear he is a brutish man!"
"He is not! He is a soldier and of high honor, you will be polite, young lady!" Violet nagged.
They continued arguing in hushed tones but Anthony could hardly hear them as his own thoughts continued to overwhelm his mind. As his eyes remained fixed on the chandelier in front of him. Both sound and sight of his surroundings became secondary as his mind wandered to emotions bottled up just yesterday, realizing once again he would be confronted with the truth he still had not once allowed himself to actually slow down and process since the opening of the season over a week ago, and of course the arrival of Caroline.
