The true stories of Disney villains

Lady Tremaine

Once upon a time......

The story of Cinderella is quite the fairytale; the original fable of rags to riches. Well, things are never really what they seem to be. I am seen as the villain. The dreadful lady painted as sinister and vile for little children all over the world to be fearful of. They see me as a monster. Well, I truly do not see myself as noble or even caring but I am not a monster. I am just a downtrodden old lady vying for a better life for my daughters. I do not think that makes me evil, does it?

Growing up as an orphan in the farmer's mill I never really got a chance at life. For goodness sake, they never even put my real name, Diana into the fairytale. I have always been looked down upon as I had no one; even foster homes wouldn't take me as I was never the 'prettiest' of the children. I would always stand outside the local orphanage hoping some loving family would take me in. This, in retrospect was fairly fruitless as I was merely scoffed at, ridiculed and then thrown aside. Nevertheless I trudged on hoping I would get a bit of luck to shine down on me. But this was never the case.

I remember one time when I was just twelve. I was busy sweeping the terrain while also feeding the wild horses. I always had a love for horses but I knew I would never have one. I was content with just sneaking hits of food from my own breakfast to feed the horses. I guess they never minded getting fed by an ugly maiden. That day, I can't even explain how horrible it was. I, I can't even think about it still without tearing up. The only thing I remember was seeing a group of teenaged boys coming towards me, then I completely blanked. I just remember screaming and yelling, "STOP!" but they never listened. The next thing I saw was their backs as they walked away. One boy, turned to me and admist all my weeping and screaming, he smiled. His was the only face I remembered. Later the head of the mill carried me in and laid me on my bed, telling me to clean myself off. It was only when I found myself cleaning blood off the crotch of my knickers, that I finally realised what had happened. I had been raped.

After that day, I stopped speaking to anyone. I thought that my only hope would be if someone, anyone would adopt me. Maybe then I would find peace with myself and the world.

Almost all the other little children would get adopted, but never me. I had to do all of the chores for the foster home I stayed in. I was basically a maid. Nevertheless, my chores became a kind of escape for me. With every wipe of the kitchen floor, it would feel like I was wiping away my sorrows with the dirt. I also sometimes sang while I cleaned. It was relaxing and for that single moment I thought everything would be okay. Ugh! Fruitless childhood ambitions! Looks like I might have had something in common with Cinderella after all.

While trudging down on my daily routine, there was filthy young boy coming out of the orphanage with a family. I recognized him as one of the teenaged boys who pushed me to the ground, ridiculed me and beat me up almost to the point where I could hardly stand. Crazed with anger, I rushed at him tearing at his clothes, scratching at him with my jagged nails, ripping his skin to shreds. His foster parents tried to get me off but I could not be stopped. All the anger was building up inside me and in that moment something in me snapped. You know how you feel perfectly okay one minute then the next you feel like everything you have built for yourself has been taken away. That was exactly what I felt at that moment. It was ultimately a turning point, the moment where I switched to the other side of the hero spectrum.

After the incident, I was taken to an asylum. I believe it was Madame Mim's Mad House for girls. Can you believe they thought I was crazy? Hell, no! I never did anything wrong! He totally deserved it. After a while my anger subsided and I begged and pleaded to get out of there. They never even paid attention to me! The only good thing about that experience was that I got to live in a house of somesorts. While I was in there, things started to get a bit better. I made up my mind to never live that kind of life ever again. I would climb up the social ladder, be loved and cared for. I thought maybe then I would finally be happy but that was not the case.

The minute I got out I began to scramble my way to the top. I did whatever I could to be relevant in the society. I changed my name from Bertha Swine to Diana Tremaine because it sounded classier. I swindled people and stole to get money to go to the balls, cheated people out of their money and did many other things I am not really proud of. But in my defense, I did all that so I could finally get a taste of true happiness which is really what everyone wants. I thought maybe if I became rich I would give most of my money to charity which is exactly what I did. But I guess that didn't make it into the story. What a perfect coincidence! But I digress. On occasion I even slept with of men for money which is how I got my two "lovely" daughters Drizella and Anastasia.

I love my daughters more than anything in the world and I would do anything so that they will never have the life I had. This is why I later married into a rich family with one daughter, Cinderella. The father whom I married was away on a business trip so I took care of my daughters in the meantime. It was an arranged marriage, okay. Sometimes we, women never even got to meet the person we married. We would just be like a live-in nanny and maid all rolled up into one. I was one of the lucky ones. Cinderella was never my problem. I didn't have anything to do with making her so why on earth would I give a damn about her well-being. When I was home late one night there was a knock on the door which I answered. Would you believe that the father had returned and he was none other than the infamous boy I had mauled? Fear enveloped me and I began to sweat profusely as I said hello. My fear diffused into anger as he could not even recognize me. I smirked when I saw he had a little scar on his forehead from where I hit him. He probably thought I was smiling because I was happy to see him. Ugh! I sincerely did try to make things work with him. I did everything a good housewife was supposed to but I couldn't get over how angry I still was at him. The mere sight of him would make me get into a passive agressive rage I couldn't even control. I couldn't stand looking at him anymore. It wasn't as if he was a bad person. He was actually a good guy but what he did to me, what he made me; I can never get over.

The days went on and my girls grew radiantly and Cinderella started to look more like her father. This caused me to have a bit of disgust with her. She was practically the epitome of her father. I soon began to make her do a 'fair' share of the chores in the house. Well, I couldn't very well have my daughters tarnish their gorgeous gowns washing dishes and scrubbing floors. They were in fact, heading off to the ball of the century with me, of course to meet the prince. We would all finally get our happily ever after. Cinderella was, obviously not coming along. I couldn't have her stealing the prince and my happiness along with him. Her father had already done enough to destroy me, I couldn't let her do the same.

The ball was glorious until some mystery girl came in and carried the prince away from my daughters. I felt that I recognized her, she seemed quite familiar but I couldn't quite put my finger on it. As I was going up to see Cinderella, she stood there singing and talking to the birds and mice. She was really crazy. At least I never talked to rodents. How disguisting! I heard her singing the beautiful melody from the ball. Hastily I shut the door and locked it, realizing the mystery girl was none other than Cinderella. No one was going totake this life way from me, no one! I ran all the way downstairs trying to get my daughters to fit the shoe that Cinderella left at the ball. I kept on thinking what kind of nincompoop would leave their shoe; and it looked really expensive too. It was made of glass! Even though our dear Cindy was clearly nuttier than a fruit cake; at least she had a good eye for designer shoes.

To my disgust Cinderella ran down the stairs taking the prince, my wealth and hope with her.

To this day, I still do not know how she did it. She took everything I had worked all my life for and now people celebrate her story, calling her a princess just because she fit into a size two shoe.