Maybe Tomorrow

Chapter 23 - Alexandra

"The wedding is nearing, agori mou. You two shouldn't be doing this so neither of you gets hurt," my mother scolds us, looking at us from the bench while our sabres point in each other's direction. [my boy]

Neither one of us pays any attention to her scolding. He charges at me first and I manage to dodge his attempt to hit my arm just in time, blocking his sabre with mine with a victorious chuckle when I swiftly smack the tip on his thigh.

"You need to be more careful, brother," I tease, turning my back at him so I can get on my starting spot again.

"Hilarious," he mutters, shaking his head before he collects himself and stands upright.

"God really must hate me, doesn't he?" my mother whispers under her breath loud enough for us to hear and I look in her direction to see that she has her hands clasped together, a pleading look on her face as she looks up at the sky. "Help me, father, to get these children to stop-"

"Mamá," I groan, my hands coming to rest by my sides. "We are careful. We chose sabres so neither of us gets cut. And the wedding isn't supposed to happen for another three weeks and a few days. Anything that happens to us now will heal in time." My brother agrees and we face off until our mother interrupts us once more.

"I just want you safe, kóri. You are all I have left in this world," she sobs, pulling out a tissue out of her little bag she has. [daughter/girl]

"This won't even cut grass, mamá," Nicholas says with a confused look at how our mother is behaving right now, swinging his fencing tool towards the ground to show her.

Her behaviour is quite confusing to say the least.

"Don't be rude to your elders, Nicholas!" She scowls at him, crossing her arms over her chest. "I have been feeling slightly emotional over one of my children getting married, that is all," she mumbles, not meeting either of our gazes.

I tear my eyes away at her words, pushing the tip of my seemingly deadly weapon in my mother's eyes into the ground to occupy myself with something else other than my family so I don't have to see their faces while they talk about his marriage to Charlotte.

Keeping secrets from my mother has always been hard. She is the person who has brought me into this world after she kept and fed me inside her stomach for nine whole months. There was never a time lying to her was pleasant.

But I had to lie. Even as a young girl I had to look into my mother's eyes and pretend I am just a normal lady who will one day marry the man of her dreams.

Not knowing the man of my dreams is a redheaded queen who lives miles and miles away from where I grew up. If it weren't for her father's early passing which got her the throne, we might have never met. Perhaps the king had plans on marrying his daughter off to one of his long-time friends to form a strong alliance.

Fate had different plans and the queen was a picky lady who wasn't satisfied with just anyone, giving my brother the opportunity to court her and win her over.

Only for me to step in and steal her heart as the monster I was told I am.

However, as I got used to being open with my feelings towards women, or towards a woman I should say, my mind has finally gotten a few moments of pure clarity where it isn't clouded with the shadows of my past creeping around the corner but the light of my future which light up in red and green like her eyes.

Which I finally discovered had more green in them than blue.

I brought up the colour of her eyes on one of the first nights we shared together. Charlotte stopped any movement she was doing and faced the light, letting me observe her face, facing whichever way I decided with my fingers around her chin until I finally settled on green.