sinking ships - succession

prologue

Warning: mentions of rape and abortion

           The early morning air chipped away at her skin as she was in a mere dress. But she only had a couple of feet to go from the car to the entrance of Waystar Royco. The cold was of no concern to someone like her; no, the cold could never bother someone so wrapped up in the cocoon that was the high life.

        The life of the rich and powerful. The life of people like her, Rose Roy. The life that was hers.

       Sometimes, as she stared out the window of the car she wondered what it was like to feel freezing. She only ever felt the warmth that money bought. Sometimes, she thought that perhaps she caused the cold outside as she absorbed all the warmth for herself. But that couldn't possibly be true, could it?

      Sometimes, she just couldn't make sense of the world around her. After all, she was only nine. But today she whisked all her thoughts away (about the world and all its intricacies) onto the task she sought out to do as she walked into the building her father owned.

          Even though she spent most of her time in this building with her father only mere rooms away, it wasn't often she could get time with him. So she devised her own plan to get what she wanted. She called her father's assistant pretending to be someone else and scheduled a meeting.

        It was a brilliant plan to her and she smiled from ear to ear as the elevator took her up to the floor she needed to be on. His floor. The floor of greatness and she planned to be achieve greatness today as she clutched the sketchbook she'd been working on for this specific moment.

          See, her one talent was drawing. She used to draw all sorts of things that caught her eye but ever since Roman flicked on the TV to keep her out of his hair while he was babysitting, she gained a fascination with fashion.

         She watched some sort of runway model show. She watched all of these people walk down a runway in clothes that were god awful. That was the day her imagination invented its own clothes and she started to draw.

           She created a whole sketchbook full of clothes and outfits. She even wrote down what material it should be made out of so it would fit her perfect vision.

         This is why she scheduled a meeting with her father. She had a business plan and she needed a backer. Perhaps, she shouldn't have been interested in business plans at such a young age but business seemed to be all her family talked about. But they only talked about Waystar Royco.

       It was a company she should've been interested in considering she was going to be inheriting stocks in the company but she wasn't. She had no interest in Waystar. She had interest in Rosa, the name of her imaginary fashion company even though today she was sure it would no longer be just in her head.

           So she held her head high as she walked onto the floor her father was on. She walked up to the desk of the assistant, the desk that her head only barely peeled over as she pronounced, "I have a meeting with my father. I'd like to see him now."

           The assistant looked to see blue eyes peeking over the desk and smiled in amusement. Before she could say anything, Kendall spotted his little sister and spoke up.

           "Rosie, what are you doing here?" Kendall questioned.

         "I scheduled a meeting with Dad," Rose peered up at him as she flicked away her little strawberry blonde flyaway hairs that kept getting in her face and making her pout.

           "You scheduled? Scheduled a meeting?" Kendall said in disbelief.

            "Yes," Rose stated simply before walking around her brother as she looked down at her little Hello Kitty watch. "And I'm supposed to be meeting him right now. You made me late."