Isabella Foster
I like a look of agony
because I know it's true
T
he evening is unremarkable. Typical Terrastellan fall evening. There is a warm front that finds itself blowing across the ocean, winding through the streets. It graces against my hair a little less than a lover, little more than a friend. It smells like salt and sea. My siblings and I used to pretend to be pirates when we went to the beach house. Bennett pretended to have a peg leg. We haven't played make believe in a long time. I don't even know who I would pretend to be anymore. (Maybe a rainstorm, that makes the ship creak and rock and groan.)
(Flood it. Sink it. Destroy it.)
We are going to a charity event, always going to a charity event. Our family gives money to one cause after another. I know there are ulterior motives, we give enough money and everyone else keeps quiet in any regards to our family. We have a free pass. It is rare though to see a Foster actually get their hands dirty though.
My eldest sister braided my hair, as if I would even be noticed in a room full of important people, when really all they want to do is look at my parents. We, their children, are their accessory. Our job is to smile for the second they look at us, all ducks in a row, before we are dismissed. Still, it looks nice I suppose, not a hair out of place. I looked up at her, leggy, tall, with impossibly dark eyes and cheek bones that could cut glass and I wondered if I will ever be as beautiful as she is.
There’s no buffet, and I am not to drink until my next birthday, so I ask for a water. It is disappointingly bland. I’m used to my water with a squeeze of lemon. I drink it quickly before handing the glass back to one of the servers. They offer me wine, but I politely decline. I’ve had champagne before, for big celebrations: New Years, weddings, graduations. The first time I had it I squished my face as it bubbled on my mouth, I had just been coloring before being dragged away to this party. The next time I remembered being scolded and so I made the same face, but I made it inside my head, I had been playing in the gardens when I was brought to that graduation. Another time, I was handed the glass and sipped it, for the first time finding it pleasant, I had just finished an archery lesson. And still one more time, I took the glass and drank it in one swallow, the gardener’s daughter had just told me this was the last time she would have tea with me, she couldn't see me anymore.
She has her back turned to me, but I recognize her, it is the duty of every Foster to know the current run of politics, who is who. She is unbothered and I really should leave her alone, let her enjoy her evening, but I’ve always been a bit of a hopeless child. “Commander,” I say when I reach her. My smile still feels cold no matter how I try to to warm it. Fake something enough and you no longer remember what genuine feels like. “I…” I stutter, it’s unbecoming of me. “I hope you don’t mind the intrusion, everyone seems to be mingling and I guess I have given into the peer pressure,” I try to jest, no matter how dreadful I am at it. I blink steel grey eyes.
“I’m Isabella Foster.”
I wont remember all the details of this evening, just as I do not remember the details of a lot of evenings. Someone, one of my classmates, at my lesson tomorrow will ask me: ‘What did you do last night?’ I will shrug halfheartedly, offer little more than a simper and say “Not too much, a charity event with my family.” And then I will pause and think back:
“Oh, but I did meet the Commander.”
picture colored by Elidhu
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