Sweet Satisfaction (Purple UGC Winner 2014)

Sweet Satisfaction - Twelve

Twelve

Over the next few days, I tried to convince Mother to recount the information Father had told her behind closed doors, after that disastrous morning concerning my engagement. (My engagement!) Why had Father said ‘her filthy mother’? To my belief, he and Rose’s parents were both Thomas and Alice Kingston.

This topic quickly fizzled out of my mind, for Father had employed me a new personal maid. Beatrice had been forgotten so quickly!  Her name was Susanna Milan, which sounded as exquisite as her shining, waist-long, wavy hair which was a beautiful mysterious mixture of brown and black

I remember the first time I saw her, this wide-eyed, dazed girl standing, shaking, before me in the lounge. I took her up to her attic room, at a slow place because of my crutch and so that she could marvel at whatever she saw. She was entranced by the crystal chandeliers; she gasped at the sweeping golden staircase and her jaw dropped right down at the view of the splendid, shimmering sea from her gilded windows.

Susanna inhaled the refreshing, cool salty taste on her tongue and closed her round like a button eyes, in enormous bliss. Meanwhile, I looked around the room. It was the same room Beatrice had, the girl who had stolen from my family. Now I had calmed down over this matter, I wondered if Beatrice had taken the bottle for a reason. Maybe Rose had drunk an exceeding amount and she had hidden it so she wouldn’t be taken ill? Or maybe she was just a little thief and was immune to all the people dying all over the world, like Percy and Alice.

“I shall leave you to get settled then,” I said awkwardly, swallowing hard, reaching out for my crutch. Her slender hand swiped between the crutch and me; our eyes connected

“Please stay,” she whispered gently, gesturing at the empty room. I nodded and helped her unpack her small, battered trunk.

I thought guiltily of my own elaborate room, whereas hers only contained a closet, dresser/table, and an unfriendly iron bedstead. I sat down on Susanna’s trunk, eyes scanning the brown walls, which matched the girl’s eyes. She finished lining up her little ornaments and then sat down on the bed, which gave an involuntary creak.

I felt rather out of place, a golden butterfly, a splash of luxury, in a world so close but yet so far from mine. Susanna finished examining her new bedroom and turned to me.

“Tell me about you,” she simply said. I felt rather startled and cleared my throat.

"Well, I’m Elsie. I was seventeen on the fourth of last month.” My face creased up as a little ache pounded in my heart. I hated talking about my birthday.

“I have a younger sister Mary,” I told her uncertainly, rubbing my eyes. Susanna’s eyes grew bigger as she leaned forward, seemingly interested. I swallowed.

“I am an heiress.” You shouldn’t be an heiress, you should be dead, you should have died in King’s Lynn, not Alice or Percy, you should have died years and years ago!

“I am engaged.” Yes, engaged. The idea was hard to get my head around. How could I marry someone I didn’t love? Just because I was a girl, my life had to be all planned for me. I knew that my marriage would probably be arranged forom a young age, it had just been sprung on me so suddenly, without warning. Could I refuse to marry him? I was still so young, even though I seemed to have aged since King’s Lynn. Gone was the smiling world I once knew. 

By now her eyes were glittering and nervousness churned in my stomach. Where had all my confidence gone, since the bomb attack? Why was my face burning with self-consciousness?

I continued to watch Susanna over the next couple of days as she helped me into my attire and preened my hair. Longing now filled her eyes when every morning she had to select clothing for me from my vast wardrobe filled with every shade of colour imaginable. She was stuck in her brown servant’s garb although she had spiced it up with lace-up heeled boots and had gathered in the waists of her dresses. That was probably due to the fact that she was extremely slender, in a good way. Mother was still little more than a few twigs but the colour in her cheeks had risen. The fact that I had made her like that taunted me. How would she have coped if I had died? Then I wouldn’t be getting engaged to John. Oh why did it have to be John Nobody Knowlbodye?

I had come to trust Susanna, this elf-like, nimble girl and one day, hidden in her attic bedroom as we watched the sea slap vehemently against the rocks in a storm, I told her about Bobby. I told her how Beatrice had met him; how he had told Beatrice he liked me; how Beatrice, being a romantic, carried notes between us and how our friendship had grown. At first it had seemed odd that a normal boy like him would want to write notes to me but eventually I welcomed them, even though it was improper.

I drew the crumpled note from my pocket. Nausea slapped me like the sea on the rocks as I thought of the end of the note. ‘xxxx’ I had written. I was an engaged woman now.

“Will you take this to him?” I murmured, studying Susanna’s face carefully. Slowly, she nodded.

From that moment on, I knew we would be bonded together for forever.