SparklyHorn's Short Stories Shelf

Forgotten

[ May 2021 ]

"You're like the grandma!"

"Chocolate girl! Your skin is the wrong color!"

"Why are you here when you should be married by now?"

Tears prickle at my eyes as I think about the comments the other girls made during lunch. I am nearly sixteen, the oldest of all of them. And they picked on me, just because I am different. I hardly had the stomach to eat the small serving of food I got. I hate it here...

"Mrs. Loriell's School for Young Girls is a glorified orphanage," I remember, a fellow street girl who posed as a boy; she was the breadwinner for her family. Until she got shot. I watched it happened.

And ever since her death, the death of my very best friend, nothing good has happened to me. I was caught stealing an apple. The police came after me and beat me until they learned I was a girl. I think they felt a little bit bad, because one of them gave me a meal before I was brought to the sheriff. He ruled that I come here, to the school for young girls.

Compared to the dusty and poor town I come from, the large and old fashioned school that I now live in is peaceful at first glance. And then you see the tall iron fences. And once you meet the other girls? The school quickly looses it's beauty.

Sitting on a swing outside the back door on the porch, I'm able to get a breath of fresh air. Some other girls are in the small field playing, but they would never accept me. So, here I sit on the porch. Moving my legs I can swing back and fourth some, I hate to admit that it makes me kind of happy to be able to swing and listen to the birds all chirp.

There is a noise inside. The voice of Mrs. Loriell echoed through the halls, and I can hear her words from where I sit. "What do you think you're doing in here?!" She demands. It sounds like some girl went where she wasn't supposed to.

But then another voice rumbled. "I'm looking for a little girl. The police said she might have been sent here." The voice is male... Boys aren't supposed to be allowed inside the school!

Mrs. Loriell continues to talk to the man but I can not make out what is said until Mrs. Loriell's voice raises in a demanding yell, "Miss. Chloe come here!"

My heart thuds in my chest as I stumble out of the swinging bench. I push through the back door and hurry through the hallways until I arrive in the grand entrance of The School for Girls. I stop next to Mrs. Loriell and curtsey to the man.

He chuckled. "So are you Chloe?" He asks. I look up at him. He is a tall, middle-aged man with buts of silver woven into his dark hair. Wrinkles crinkle his middle-colored skin and he wears a semi-formal suit and brown shoes.

"Yes, this is Miss. Chloe," Mrs. Loriell responds for me and placed her hand on my head. With guilt, I look down at my feet that are in the old shoes I wear. They match my long, thick dress that makes my chest and back uncomfortable.

"Wonderful. I would like to adopt her... Or release her... Whatever it is I have to do to take ownership of this young lady I will do so," the man stepped forward and holds out a small stack of money to Mrs. Loriell.

"Oh, heavens!" She exclaims and greedily takes the money from him. "I will get the release papers straight away," she promised and shuffles away.

I take this chance to look up at the man again as he steps towards me, holding out his hand. Entranced by the kind look on his eyes, I place my hand into his. Our dark eyes meet and he smiles at me. "You are allowed to remember everything that I told you to forget," he kissed the back of my hand and let's it go right when Mrs. Loriell returns with a few papers on a clipboard for the man.

I drop my head again but now my thoughts are racing. As if by some magic, I now recognize this man as my... My father! It hardly makes sense, the beautiful images coming to my mind's eye are like something out of a fairy tale...

Mrs. Loriell abruptly clears her throat. I look up. I had gotten lost in my thoughts and the man... No, my father had finished signing the papers.

"You are dismissed, Miss. Chloe," Mrs. Loriell tells me.

Tears well in my eyes. My father kneels down with his arms opened wide. Like a child, I run into his embrace and hug him back. "Father!" I exclaim.

"Oh, my beautiful girl..." He rubs my back with warmth to his voice. "How I missed you..."

[C]━━━━━━━━》❈《 ━━━━━━━

He brings me to his home. It is not well kept, and fairly small. What else could you expect when you are discriminated against? He tells me of what happened. How, after he lost my mother, he couldn't keep up with providing for me. So he forced me to forget him and sent me off, hoping that a little eight year old could find a good life for herself in a land where people of color were almost never allowed to work.

Filled with guilt, he came back and is so happy to find that I am safe. Because I had no belongings besides the clothes on my back, once we arrive at the house he immediately brings me down to the cellar.

"Now, this is our little secret," father explains to me. "I don't know what the spell would have helped you to remember, but this doorway is our most protected secret.

My memories keep returning like boiling water spilling out of a pot. "The Golden Palace!" I exclaim.

Father smiled at me. "Precisely." Just like a magician, he reached over and pretends to pull a key out from behind my ear. I chuckle as he placed it into my hand. "I think it is your turn."

I nod and put the key in the lock of the door in the cellar. It fits perfectly, and the door gracefully slides open. Although I now remember the glistening Golden Palace, I am in awe at the sheer beauty of the magical portal that transports me into a land where dreams come true and the burdens of the day are no more.

When I step through, my rags of the school uniform morph into a flowing white gown with a slit at my knee and golden trim. My father is next to me, and he looks like a king without a crown.

Now in the hallway of The Golden Palace, little glowing fairies fly to us and circle around us. "You're back, you're back!" They cheer. "You brought the princess back, the princess back!"

"The princess?" I question them. "But I am the only one here and I am not a princess."

"Follow us, follow us!" They tell me and whisk me down the hallway. My father follows as the fairies bring me to the throne room.

"You're the princess, don't you see? You're the princess!" They cheer and guide me to the plush throne.

I look to my father. "What they're saying... Is it true?"

My father gleams. "It is, my little princess. You were chosen to become the next princess of The Golden Palace."

I gasp. The fairies bow, and so does my father. I take a seat in the throne, gleaming as I take rule of the mythical land. Princess Chloe.

[I]