Dancing With A God

Chapter 7

Chapter 7

"Mama ! Mama ! Missy is here !" Gladly yelled over the small house a little child of six.  He ran over the wooden stairs and jumped into the warm arms of his mother awaiting for him.

"Oh really ?" She chuckled. "Then we shall welcome her as we should my dear."

"Yes mama !"

And the little ran back to the door, stumbling a few times on the way, and opened it with a gigantic smile glued to the face.

"Missy !" He cheered, jumping in her arms. "Why are do you always have black ?"  He wondered, curious as he saw the dots on her pale face.

Missy smiled fondly at the young boy she had in her arms before answering in a soft voice of hers : "Because I'm working in the mines hun."

"Daddy worked in the mines !" Beamed the young boy,  showing all his teeth at once.

Hearing his mother coming closer, he jumped out of the arms of Missy and cuddled the robes of the other woman, closing his eyes in happiness.

That was for the boy one of his afternoons. Surrounded by the two people he loved the most.

"Good day my girl." Welcomed Elizabeth Levy, smiling also.

"It is too late to welcome the good day, Elizabeth ; and yet it is too early for that." Her response was with a faint grin on her pale face.

The little boy stared unhappily at his mother and her friend, getting greedy on the attention he wasn't getting.

"Missy ! Do you wanna play ?!" He suddenly said in a loud voice, gripping the dark coat of the woman in his thin fists.

Missy chuckled lightly whilst kneeling down and holding the face of the boy in her graceful hands and told him : "I wish to talk with your mummy, hun. Please wait in your room, I shall come quickly enough for you not to be alone."

The way it was said,  Aaron gladly ran back into his room.

"I never understood how you did that !" Beamed Elizabeth, laughing with a hand over her red lips mouth.

"Ellie . . ." Gravely said Missy.  "I have something to show you."

Saying that, she took out a crumpled piece of journal. On it, we could read :

« Numerous deaths in the London mines,
more than ten men who died »

Elizabeth gasped at that sight, taking the paper into her shaking hands, before she said  in a concerned tone :
" You mustn't go back there Mary ! I would not want my friend to die under there !

Mary, or so was her true name, sighted as if she already knew here their chat was leading to.

"I know well what could happen Ellie but I cannot afford myself to work somewhere else.   People with no money can only do one thing : survive. And if you want to  win your bread instead of stealing, you have to work hard in places where your filthiest doesn't disturb. I know that I shouldn't have had to pretend to be a man, it was the only way for me. You know there is no other way for me Ellie."

Slightly disturbed by the unusual long speech her friend gave her, the mother frowned and respond with an almost broken heart at the difficult situation Mary was in : "I could give you a better work at the gouvernement, I could rent you a room in the house, I could do many things for you, sweetheart !"

The younger girl was taken aback at that surname. Her mum used to call her that way before she died in the most tragic way. "I am only fifteen Ellizabeth. I have not even half your knowledge to work in the government and you ne I know well that you have no other place in your house for me. I would be more a weight that anything else."

"Then why should you not go to work on a farm ? People of your age stop school for that !"

"I appreciate your concern Ellie but I shall not quite the town because then, it would mean I would see you less often and I wish not that becomes reality.  But if it can make you less worried, I promise to be careful."

Both of the girls smiled at each other, the smile of the younger one slightly more faint than the other one. Only, none noticed as they were too preoccupied for their future. They couldn't tell what tomorrow would be of and they feared that one day,  death would knock at their door and take away their life. After all, they lived a difficult era where poverty was almost everywhere in the town.  Elizabeth wished her son lived a long and full life where he would be happy but she wasn't selfish enough to think it could be something that would have happened. Aaron was only six, he hadn't lived yet the harsh side of life even if he saw it each time he would travel in a car.  But Elizabeth also hoped that the one she saw as he own daughter had a life as easy as theirs.

She remembered with nostalgia as she watched the girl climb the stairs in direction of her son how, they had met.   It had been a busy night in the streets, people crowded the avenue and the people with lesser money would take it as an advantage and steal pockets.

Elizabeth had been afraid for her son, scared that he wonder away.  But surprisingly enough, he had kept his hand in hers and walked almost calmly next to his mother. They had walked down a street when a loud noise made all the music of the street stop abruptly. Drunk people would stare at the whereabouts of the sound, stopping their dancing and singing, curiously looking as everyone did.

It had been her who had made the first move. She had stepped forward, her son still following her,  and went inside the narrow street London was so acquainted with.  And then she saw her.

Mary.

But that hasn't been the Mary she knew afterwards. The Mary she saw that night horrified her and her little Aaron hiding behind her. Blood dripped on her broken body, a dreadful moan to hear from the mouth of a girl who couldn't be more than sixteen.  Elizabeth had gotten closer to the injured individual and tried to wake her up, knowing that if people from the outside of that street saw her, she would be disgrace as a woman working at the gouvernement.

After all,  rich families had no reasons to touch poverty.

But Elizabeth Levy wasn't a common woman and she didn't fear to touch with a wide open hand the poor people in need of help. And so she had tried that night of May to wake up the young woman. She had moaned some more, twitched as if she was in deep pain and then she spoke to her with the voice of someone ready to die, which surely would have happened if she hadn't been there to help.

And she would always remember the first name her newly found friend
how queer it had been to her ears..

Quinn, after all, was odd.