The Bright Colours of Misery [COMPLETED]

𝙲𝙷𝙰𝙿𝚃𝙴𝚁 𝚃𝙷𝙸𝚁𝚃𝚈 𝙵𝙸𝚅𝙴 -isolation-

On her 14th birthday Heidi received her first letter from Wilma. She didn't open it. When Frieda tossed it on her bed in the evening Heidi actually ripped it apart. Whether she did it out of sadness or anger I do not know, it felt more like a perfect mix of both. However, almost immediately she regretted her impulsive action and fell to her knees on the floor, scrambling to get all the pieces back together, after all she still loved and more importantly longed for Wilma. She started crying, she hated feeling this stupid. Why had she done that? What if Wilma had said something important? Or wished her a happy birthday? The only person that had bothered to do so today was Frieda, granted Heidi hadn't gone to school because of  a nasty cold she'd caught during the weekend. Tilda and Alexander had therefore not gotten a chance to congratulate her on the widely insignificant age she'd reached. 14 wasn't exactly what Heidi would have called an important age. You gain no specific amount of freedom compared to prior years at 14, and in comparison to 10 or 18 no one truly sees it as a milestone. Therefore Heidi didn't really mind the fact her parents hadn't said a word as well as her other siblings that didn't literally share a birthday with her, it had happened before, what bothered her was the clear reason for it. She'd noticed her mother drifting further away from her family recently because of her father's change in behaviour, which had come out of nowhere in the eyes of my dear Heidi. His change hadn't truly been as sudden as she believed and would remember it being for the rest of her life, but it had clearly gotten significantly worse since her brother's departure.

He drank a lot, came home after work late, if at all. He raised his voice more often, never really laughed or smiled like he used to and he had also raised his hand at Trudy a few times, but he had never hit. He had never hit. Heidi tried to remember this, to remind herself of that fact, so she could tell herself things weren't actually that bad, and that nothing had truly changed, although they had.

She wiped her tears and with slow and careful steps she went downstairs, the floorboard creaked under the weight of her feet as usual. She tossed the remains of Wilma's letter in the bright fire that rose inside the fireplace. She watched it all slowly go dark and prayed Wilma would send her a new letter soon enough, because she promised to read the next one. Quiet as a mouse, she went back upstairs and slipped into bed. She tried to stop thinking of what the god forsaken letter might have contained, but she couldn't. She failed immensely.

Maybe she'd said she was horribly sick? Maybe she had invited her to Berlin? Perhaps she'd just talked about the weather, or something of the kind?

It kept her awake until well past midnight. Eventually I forcefully sent her to sleep. She needed it like any other human being.

The next day, she was still ill enough to skip school. She watched Frieda Manfred and Gisela walk away, envious.

She really wanted to speak to Alexander, or even Tilda, although she hadn't spent much time with either of them recently. She had sort of cut Tilda out of her life if I'm being honest.

The fear of her feelings had won over their friendship since the summer 1939, but as she twisted and turned in her bed all day, she decided she would apologise to Tilda. My human was hopeful her feelings might have faded, and that they would be able to resume their friendship as if nothing had happened. I highly doubted it would be the case, but what did I know? One thing I have learnt over the years, well before having Heidi, is that humans never fail to surprise me, some are more forgiving than others, and some will hold grudges against people who hurt them for the rest of their lives. It was only a matter of hours before I discovered under which umbrella Tilda fell.

Once her siblings came home, Heidi knew it was safe to assume Tilda would be at her house as well, so despite her few coughs and her stuffed nose she decided she would go knock on her door and apologise.