Go to the Beginning of the story
< Part 43
Epilogue: Three Months Hence
Anabelle
pulled her hair back and tied it with a simple piece of yarn. She had done her
hair this way every day since she’d been taken into custody. There was no point
in putting up appearances anymore. Nobody here was going to be impressed by her
beauty. Nobody here would give her gifts or offer favors for the privilege of
being near her.
She hated
to admit, but Phineas had been right. She did treat it all as a game before.
Now she could finally see how wrong she’d been. There were places in the world
where a simple smile or bat of the eyelashes couldn’t get her what she wanted.
No matter how self-aware she had been, she could never be prepared for life as
an imprisoned woman.
She’d
gotten off easy. Most woman criminals were sent to ladies prisons. She’d never
seen such a place, but she knew that the male guards were not kind to their
prisoners. She shuddered to think of the way she would have been treated. In a
final act of pseudo-gallantry, Everton had lobbied for her to be assigned work
duty. Since then, she’d been working in the laundry at a Traditionalist school.
It was hard work and her hands would never be the same again. But she was
thankful every day that she could return to her room and feel safe at night.
She
finished her twelve hour shift and showered and was preparing herself for bed.
She sat at the small table and looked into the tiny mirror on the wall. She had
to look hard to see the beautiful woman there. Once that had been all that she
was, now she struggled to recognize that person in the face looking back from
the mirror.
She looked
herself in the eye. Those eyes had seen too many tears these months since the
accident. She had known what love was for too short a time, and it was ripped
away from her in the worst possible way. She cried for Phineas for hours on
end. It wasn’t until recently that she’d learned to remember him fondly.
She looked
at her hand, where she still wore the small ring with the fake diamond. She
wondered how her life would be different if she’d listened to him, swam to the
shore and let him drown. He would be gone either way, but she would be free.
She refused to admit that he was right about that. She had to prove to him that
a person could be genuinely kind to another, even without personal gain. She
still believed that she was right, but at the cost of her freedom.
She looked
down and noticed a small package wrapped in paper. When had that gotten here?
It must have been left here while she was on her shift. She untied the twine
and opened the small box. Inside was a small device. It had a broad tube on one
end, connected by brass valves and tubes to a small pressurized cylinder. There
was a note in the box with it. It read: Everybody’s
looking out for himself, Anabelle.
She was
hit by a flood of emotions. All this time, she’d mourned the loss of the man
she thought she loved. Now this package arrives that seems to suggest that he’s
not gone. She didn’t know whether to feel elated or enraged. He’d betrayed her,
made her believe he was dead, threw her into depression and grief. And what
for? So he could get away. Yet, he had warned her. He’d as much as told her he
would do something like that, but it didn’t help lessen the blow.
In the
end, she had her chance to get away. She chose loyalty over freedom, and paid
the price for that decision. Was it worth it? At the moment, she wasn’t willing
to answer that question.
No comments:
Post a Comment