Unmasked

Chapter 18

~unedited~

Chapter 18:

He sent me another letter. I didn't read it. I'm not allowed to anymore. Any contact with anyone outside is strictly prohibited now.

Not that I had any more strength to do so anymore.

My mother was not only getting remarried, but everything that was my father's is either going to be given away or to the new man. I'd rather die then have any of the two happen.

"Mary?" Harriet's voice rings through my wooden door, I can only stare at the newly put bolts that were placed as soon as my mother found out.

I didn't answer to Harriet, I wouldn't know exactly what to say. So I remained still on my bed, staring at the letter that can never be read or responded to.

What would he think of me?

Suddenly, Alexandra's words rang through my head again. Would he still love me even if he saw how pathetic I was?

Harriet tapped on my door, "Mary, only you can open the little slot to get your meal, which you better be a getting."

No, he wouldn't. I've accepted it.

"I'm not hungry, Harriet," I said in a voice to low even for myself to hear but somehow she heard.

"Don't you be givin' me any of that now, Mary," Harriet responded in the best way she knew how, "now come and get this food."

If only Harriet knew... No, there was no way she can know.

Slowly, I inched myself to a sitting position, pain shooting through my body as I did so. It was hard for me not to cry out as I made my way toward the door, open the ever so tiny slot my mother decided to leave me with, and take the food back onto my bed.

The food: leftover bread and so little soup that wasn't meant to be this cold. This was actually the most Harriet had stolen for me.

"Thank you, Harriet," I manage to say as loud as I could take the pain in my lungs.

Harriet says something I don't manage to catch and leaves.

As soon as my mother's marriage takes place, everything that belonged to my father with belong to him too. The mansion, the money, the property, and the slaves, which I have become a part of.

I can only bring myself to eat only half of the bread and a spoonful of the soup. Just knowing that my mother is going to give everything I have left of my father to another man seems to ruin my appetite.

I look back at the letter on that's at my side. I wonder if he's given up on me yet, I can only hope so. I can't bear the thought of hurting him any further.

~*~

"Wake up, penniless moron!" Suddenly I felt a blanket if ice cold water be thrown onto me, not only making me bolt up in surprise but also stinging my wounds. I screamed.

I look up to see Alexandra grinning over me. She's still wearing the clothes she sleeps in, but what does that mean?

"I got up extra early just to see this," she teases as she begins to skip out, "get everything you'd need and get to the front gate."

The front gate?

I don't take anything with me, instead I only take the read letter and hide it within my clothes. I follow Alexandra to the front gate.

A sudden heavily feeling entered my chest as I saw my mother, her fiancé, Elisabeth, and almost the entire staff stepping into a hoarding carriage. The ones meant to carry house maids without a job... And without a home to go back to.

"What is this?" My voice is shaking as I see Harriet take her turn in and squeeze for whatever room left in there, "w-why?"

My eyes meet my mothers, her are unmoved, as if all if this means nothing. As if she hasn't had these employees for over twelve years.

"What is this?" I shout at her. She looks at me shocked but I no longer care. This all has to be a misunderstanding, this can't be what I think-

"I'm getting rid of all your father's belongings, they serve no use for me."

It was as if she had thrown knives at me. In that moment, I could've sworn, my heart stopped beating.

No... Use?

"The new master of the hall has his own most tolerable employees, non of which will be as lazy as they were," she gives a cold glance back at the truck, then back at me, meeting my eyes for what seem liked eternity, "not as pathetic as you are."

"P-pathetic?" I whisper to myself, looking down at my shaking hands.

Pathetic?

"Here," Alexandra, still in front of me, hands me a paper at the bottom is my mother's signature. She tells me before I can read it.

"You will be joining them, too," she teases.

This paper, officially states, that I am now and forever more a slave and that my mother, or once mother, has nothing to do with me.

"Get in the carriage, Mary." Mother orders coldly.

"No."

"What was that?" She takes a threatening steps towards me. Suddenly the pain came back to me and I'm reminded if what she has done to me. Of what she as always done to me.

"How can you.." For the first time, I don't hold my words back, "how can you have the heart to even consider doing this?"

"Getting rid of unwanted property?"

"Of getting rid if you're daughter?" The paper scrunches up in my still trembling hands. Tears begin to flow, I don't know if they're from sorrow or anger, perhaps both.

"You're not my daughter-"

"Yes I am!" I push past Alexandra and make my way towards my mother only to be held back by the men in charge of the carriage. I tried to fight from their grip but failed.

I still fought.

"No matter how much you try to deny it! No matter what papers you sign! I came from your womb! I nursed from your milk! I am your blood!" She only stared at me.

Don't you feel anything?

At that point I felt hopeless, the men began to push me father and father away from her and towards the carriage. I cried even harder.

"My first words were your name!" The image of my mother smiling with joy when hearing me say 'momma' suddenly appeared in my head. I didn't know if it were a memory or something out of my pure imagination, but I kept going.

"I loved you like any daughter would a mother!" It's true, even when she suddenly turned cold to me, maybe she was always cold, but I always loved her. I still do.

"You were the woman I wanted to be when I grew older!" I remember imagining myself wearing fancy, bright shinny jewelry, getting married to the man I loved, and baring his children so we could raise a family together. Living happily ever after.

It wasn't supposed to be like this.

"Momma!" She didn't seem at all fazed by my words, instead she turns around and embraces my sisters and their new father.

The image is cut short by the sudden slam of the carriage door in my face. I never noticed when the men finally got me in here or when my heart began to beat again. I didn't look through the heads of my father's old employees to find Harriet, instead I stayed where I was; on my knees, crushed against the carriage door, and crying my heart out.

Maybe now my mother can have the family she wanted and the man to raise a family with. She can finally have her happily ever after, the one without me in the picture.