One day, when I was about 9, my father came home after being away for several weeks. While Ms. Cline was patrolling the grounds, I made my way to the third floor, and knocked on the tall white door with guards stationed outside. His office was the room I was never, ever allowed in. I had tried to get in a few times, and every time I was escorted away by the guards, or my father would yell at me. They glanced at me and then fixed their gaze straight forward again, deciding I wasn't worth their time. I tried the knob but the door was locked, and I heard rustling inside, then a click. My father stepped out, careful not to let me see past him into the office, and closed the door quickly behind him.
"Where do you go Father?" I asked. His gaze shifted to the guard closest to us and took my hand, leading me into a room nearby. It was filled with filing cabinets, with old newspapers and documents about the city lying around. My father sat on a wooden table in the center of the room, running his hands through his hair.
"What do you mean, puppet?"
"Why do you always leave me?" Father sighed and rested his head in his hands. After a moment, he looked up at me, his bloodshot eyes filled with an emotion I didn't understand yet. Regret.
"Puppet I'm sorry. I thought someone told you." He paused, gathering his thoughts before continuing. "A group of people I work with and I, saved the city a few years ago, when you were too little to remember." I did remember but chose not to say anything. The sound of his voice frightened me. Like he was trying his best to sound gentle, but his cruelness was just behind it. "We stopped the bad people that took..." he gulped, " the people that took your mother. And now, I'm in charge of the city."
"Oh." I took a second to process that. I hadn't been to the city in years. Not since we drove through it on our way to the mansion. I wondered if my father has rebuilt the city to
Its original glory. I thought for a moment before speaking again. "Are you a good leader?" He paused and then his expression hardened. Sliding off the desk, he pulled a black box with an antenna sticking out of the top and pressed a button on the side before speaking into it.
"Cline, get in here." He demanded. A few minutes later, Ms. Cline appeared in the doorway, her posture perfect and her outfit perfectly pressed. "Take the girl back to her room." He ordered.
"Yes sir." She replied and looked at me. "Come on then dear." As she and I headed for the stairs which would take us to the second floor, I heard my father enter his office again and the lock click behind him. On the way to my room, I thought about how my father referred to me as "the girl" instead of "my daughter".
"You got me thinkin' dearie," Said Ms. Cline in her thick Scottish accent. " it's a big and scary world out there. You need to know how to protect yourself." I looked at her in awe.
"You would teach me how to fight?" I asked hopefully.
She held a finger to her lips and her eyes darted to my father's office door, which was still shut tight, and then to the guards posted on either side. Pointing down the stairs, she mouthed "let's go" and I nodded. We made our way down to the second floor and into my room. I'd improved it a little by adding my belongings, which aren't all white. Since my father never came in here, I had incorporated as much light purple as possible. Ms. Cline closed the door behind me and turned the lock.
"So what were you going to tell me, Ms. Cline?"
"Oh please Dearie, call me Isla. And what I wanted to say was, I'm not just going to teach you how to fight, I'm going to show you the truth."
"What do you mean "the truth?" Is there something I don't know?"
"There is always something you don't know. You've lived in this place for most of your life. The only people you ever see are your father's men, and you have no TV, no internet, and no access to the outside world." I considered this for a moment. I guess I thought someone would always tell me if there was something I needed to know. But then I thought about how I didn't know about any other place in the world. Scotland was new for me. Ms. Cline was my only teacher. I understood how to read, write and simple math, but I didn't think I needed to know anything else.
"Okay. Let's do it."
