My Dear Sweet Murder-A Murder Most Unladylike Fanfic

Daisy

Interesting...

  As I studied a strange beautiful woman who was near Hazel and I, I almost didn't hear the sound the ship emitted.

  "Daisy," said Hazel, reaching for my arm. "I think I need to go to the bathroom."

  "What?"

  I broke my gaze from the lady and turned to face an already green Hazel. "All right, go on."

  She nodded and stumbled to the stairs that led to the bottom deck.

  I sighed, and swivelled around to find that the exquisitely-looking woman was gone! I don't know why, but I felt something was wrong. I searched in my mind. The woman looked English...of course she was. Her white skin. Anyone would've thought she was English. Wait. Thought?

  What if she wasn't white?

  I know that is quite a silly question. I have never met anyone who pretends to be another colour. Racism isn't that bad in China; I have been there and met lovely people who were also intelligent. However, the racism was bad in England. Could she....Could she have possibly wore that thick layer of powder to cover up where she really was from?

  It was only five minutes on the ship, and the cobweb had already begun to unravel...

Hazel

I wiped my mouth and looked down at the mess I had created in the bathroom. I flushed and unlocked my door. I stepped outside back into the bathroom and looked around. Plain. The only word in my mind.

  As I washed my hands, a tall lady came in. I gasped. She was, undoubtedly, the most prettiest person I'd ever laid my eyes on. She saw me, and plastered on a smile.

  "Hello there," she spoke. Her voice was rough around the edges, but you could barely hear it. Inside, the softness of the sound as she spoke was like melted milk chocolate. Mixed together, that was somehow the most melodic combination of a voice I had ever heard.

  "Um, hello," I squeaked, unsure if it was really me who she was talking about.

  The lady glanced in the mirror and huffed. "On your way to China? Gosh, it really is quite hot in here."

  "Yes," I said, answering technically both questions. I hadn't noticed the heat in the bathroom until she said so.

  The lady sniffed. It wasn't a snobby 'sniff'. It had an air of care around it. "Sorry about that," she said, breaking her glance from the mirror and looking at me. "It's just...I come to England to visit since the last I'd been here and find that the treatment of...others...are worse than it seems!"

  My ears perked up. "You mean, like me? And the white?"

  The woman opened her mouth as if to correct me, but shut it the second after. "Erm, yes. Like you. Not that I don't appreciate the beauty of Chinese people." She sighed softly and fanned herself a bit. "Quite wonderful, they are."

  I nodded slowly, unsure of where this conversation was leading. The woman, still eyeing me, swept some hair out of her eyes. Where her fingertips had brushed, I noticed, had a different colour than the skin around it. It was a bit darker. More like...my skin.

  "Y-You're Chinese!" I blurted out.

  The lady jumped. She whipped out a small foundation compact and dabbed in onto the place where it had gotten smudged.

  "This is our secret," she hushed to me, looking a bit frightened. "If only I hadn't been discriminated so many times, even by one of my good friends, I wouldn't've needed to hide."

  She checked her reflection in the mirror and turned to leave.

  "Wait!" I called.

  "Yes?" she asked, her hand on the door.

  "What is your name?"

  "My name?" she repeated, looking at me with a strange glimmer in her eyes. "My name. My name is..."

  I craned my neck forward, beckoning for her to answer me. I mean, if I were her, I wouldn't reveal my name to some child I just met.

  However, luck must've been on my side, because then she said, "Amber. Amber Liu."

  The last name 'Liu' circled somewhere in my mind, but I couldn't remember why it sounded so familiar.

  "Is the name 'Amber' your real name?" I questioned.

  "No," Amber said, shaking her head. "I chose it because it's young and most people think it's English, even if the origin is another. No one would know. My real name is in Chinese."

  I nodded. She didn't also hide her skin, she also hid her name. Maybe this piece of information would come useful. Somehow.

  She opened the bathroom door. "Oh, and by the way," she said, looking back at me. "If anyone asks, say it's Amber Campbell."

  "Okay."

  She left and I was left alone in the bathroom. Such a young name for a woman who looked in her late 20s. It didn't exactly seem fitting to me, but it wasn't my business. I headed back to the top of the deck, where I'd left Daisy.