Who made me Penelope Judith?

7. Claude's troubles

As I ate breakfast today, I noticed the slight enthusiasm count Judith had. He's to take me and Roselia shopping today. I'm a little touched to see how much he's looking forward to it. With all his work we almost never see him. Roselia didn't seem too disturbed by that since she didn't really seem to have a close relationship her father and I myself didn't care either since he isn't my real father. Even with that, it does appear obvious to me that he really wanted to spend time with the two of us today. Well we shall indulge him.

For some reason, he also invited Roger.

At first it annoyed me how many times he summoned Roger to our estate. Whitey is actually a very obnoxious person when you get to know the real him. Roselia also made a crisis about how Joseph Judith seemed to care more about his nephew than his daughters, taking time to talk to Roger once in every while but only eating with us once every month or so.

Yet whenever the count is here, Roselia didn't seem much interested in him. I suppose she just likes complaining about the little trivial things.

Then I realized why Roger came by so often. Since both of count Judith's children, me and Roselia, were girls, his legitimate successor was Roger, his nephew. That is why he sometimes comes over to discuss business. We're in a society where it's the closest male family member who inherits your wealth. That is why father takes more time with him. The Judith's wealth would go to him since me and Roselia would marry into other families.

It does horse me a little bit since I come from a time and country where men and women were equals, but since I'm fast to adapt, I didn't find it too hard to accept. I had to bend myself into two to live in a society like this one, but it wasn't too hard. Besides, I'm not sure I need the Judith's wealth. Roselia wouldn't take good care of it either. She'd spend it all  within a year. Roger seemed the the fittest person for this indeed.

I suppose that also settled my question on why Penelope ran to the Alpheus's home estate when she had to flee the Emerald palace. It was because the Judith estate was then a propriety of Roger's so she had nowhere else to go. That almost sounded sad to me.

I also realized that Penelope actually has a good surrounding. A moderately okay family. She was treated well by her father, her sister, and her cousin. She wasn't like Jeannette who had to wait her whole life to be with her 'family' one day. Penelope had people she could already rely on.

The count seemed happy to bring his daughters and his nephew to go shopping. He was a good man. I also suppose that he's making Roger spend time with us (against his will) since we need a good relationship with him if in the future things happen and we'd need somewhere to go. (Which proved accurate since the second Anastacius died Penelope ran to her cousin)

What I can't tell is whether he wanted a better relationship with us or not. The thought of accepting him as my new dad bothered me a little bit. I feel as if I'd be betraying my real dad by doing this.

I didn't even know how to feel about that. To my real dad, am I not dead? I died during that operation gone wrong... Is it even right for me to accept Joseph Judith as my new dad? Would it be morally accepted? Am I allowed to? He'd feel so betrayed...I'm such an ungrateful daughter. I'm ready to really dump away all the kindness received in my last life to live comfortably in this one...

But if I don't accept Joseph, I doubt I'd be able to move on on my present life as Penelope Judith. I need to continue my new life, get rid of the past. It was so easy, getting rid of my former troubles, my poor health, everything. But it is absolutely not the same thing, trying to get rid of the ones who used to be close to you. I came get them out of my head.

Why couldn't I be one of those orphans with crappy lives that incarnated? That way I'd have no regrets! Nothing to leave behind but loneliness and lost dreams...