No matter how close she got to the fire the fading embers could not keep her warm. She mused to herself that may be partially why she was so thin, she just shivered away the weight. She was awake now, though even the sun did not rise yet. And a smile crossed her lips, and she whispered, "Today is the day!"
She got up and her body cracked, sore from sleeping on the floor and staying in the same position during the day while she worked. Looking over she mused, "Oouff. I'm getting old, aren't I, Gus? Every bone in my body already complains." The rat stopped eating the piece of bread it found on the floor and scurried over. "Not old, Ella, pretty, pretty!"
"What a kind thing of you to say! Thank you, Gus." The rat nodded and scurried off into a hole in the house. She slowly pulled herself off the floor, beating at her tattered dress, soot and dirt flying up and catching in the air, making her cough. "Work to do!" She whispered excitedly, after rubbing her eyes, irritated by the soot. She went to the sewing room and began to sew, thread after thread, shiny pink fabric. She had worked so hard to get this done in time. It felt like all she had done was sew dressing together mostly for her Stepmother or stepsisters but never had she actually sewn something for herself. Even as the sun rose she couldn't tell as she was so engrossed in work, and well, the window was in the other rooms, far from where she worked. Only when did she hear steps down the corridor did she quickly throw her dress to the side and begin finishing adjustments to her step-sister's gaudy gold gowns.
The voice rang in a clear, though gravelly tone, "That was supposed to be finished by today, Cinderella."
"I know ma'am, but I was so tired from working all night yesterday and all day and night the day before, I was afraid if I didn't stop working I would do a poor job, and I know how important the ball is to my stepsisters and you, so I took a bit of a break and--" She began to ramble out of breath.
"Let me make something very clear..." The stepmother grabbed her ear and pulled making her squeal in pain, "If you don't get things done when I say they are to be done. You will be punished. There will be no clothes, no home, and no food for you, if you can't pull your weight." The she-devil released her reddening ear, and left to wake up to the two stepsisters.
Ella's eyes watered as she rubbed her swelling ear, for she knew it was true. She shouldn't have stopped working if she did so again, she would have nowhere to stay and nothing to eat, let alone the unnecessary necessity of clothes. She pushed back her feelings and worked into she no longer truly felt her hands move across the fabric to push it into place, and became numb to the stitching, and thumps and shudders from the machine. Even after she finished the ball gowns she would not be done. There were gowns that still needed to be made for her Stepmother and Stepsisters, for in their vanity, the step-mother and sisters did not believe that one dress would ever be enough and they would never wear the same dress twice, so she was stuck to sew until she became numb to the world, to any world, inside or out. If there was still an outside world at all would be nice to know. Was it the world her father and mother, though now gone and far away, had promised? Were there still fields that you could frolic in? A sea that still glittered as it pushed and pulled the sand? Or snowflakes, did they still kiss people's cheeks as they fell and blanket the world in a frozen blanket? Strange to call it a blanket when blankets were meant to be keeping something warm instead of keeping something chilled. Her reality brought back when she accidently stitched into her finger, she almost cried out then remembered to do so silently. No need to bring attention to her pain with her Stepmother around. She pretended to adjust the machine while she sucked on her bleeding finger. Eventually, it no longer bled and she could continue to sew, and sew, and sew, and sew and...
She sewed, knowing time was ticking away but there was no window in the room for her to tell the time by the sun's light. Eventually, she heard her stepsisters come down. The gowns were gorgeous though over the top (as they had designed) even with Ella's quick stitching to get it done on time. Her stepmother came down soon after in a just as equally (gaudy yet) beautiful dress. They didn't bother with a goodbye, so Ella ran after them, the dress she had made for her, carried carefully in her arms.
