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— chapter one . . . ! A N G E L I C S M I L E
IF MARIÉ WERE to have been told the chain of events that would unfold on that day she awoke, she would've thought of it as a ridiculous joke. Nothing would prepare her, even if she were warned. She would probably think of going back to Italy with her mother but she knew that wouldn't do her good anymore. Nothing was waiting for her back in Italy, not anymore at least.
Marié would be four years too late to go running back to Italy. Despite her mother still in Italy tying up loose ends, the house she grew up in was to be sold and her mother had been preparing to move to France for four years. Nothing was there to keep her from her mother pulling her back to the town of Saint-Jean-d'Angély.
It was where Marié's father grew up and was raised before he left for Italy and fell in love with her mother. The town where her uncle — her father's brother — still resided as a mathematics professor at Lycée Voltaire.
A small glow of light entered the dark quiet room from the window with a single sheer curtain. Marié was already up and ready, fiddling with the material on her black and white short-sleeved fitted gingham dress. She also wore a simple red button-up cardigan with a matching red ribbon holding the front sections of hair away from her face, tied at the back of her head.
It was a new dress her uncle had agreed to buy her for the first day at Lycée Voltaire. Despite him being a professor at a high school, the Badeaux family came from a long line of money. They weren't super rich but had more than enough to make ends meet. So it wasn't a hassle for Marié to get what she asked for.
Telling from the letter her mother wrote to her, Marié felt that her mother was more excited than she was about going to a mixed school. It wasn't known if she had processed the fact that it was an all-boys school and she would be one of the twelve girls going to the entire school.
Marié was only ever accustomed to the all-girls Catholic school in Italy with matching uniforms. Her mother thought it would be a nice change for once after she had attended the other Catholic school half an hour away from Saint-Jean-d'Angély.
Marié was removed by her uncle because of a certain . . . incident at the all-girls school. Marié never liked it there anyways especially since the nuns were too harsh and Marié would come home from school with new ruler cuts on her arms each day. Not to mention the slaps for the stupidest things.
"Good morning, uncle" Marié greeted as she descended the stairs and into the kitchen where her uncle sat.
Marié's uncle Claude was a good man who minded his business. He had dark brown hair, a clean sophisticated look, and yet had the lightest blue eyes imaginable despite his dark demeanor.
