She popped open the cork, placing the bottle under my nose, the strong scent of licorice and spice coating my senses.
I fished out my handkerchief from inside my breast pocket and coughed. “Never heard of it.”
Miriam smiled, dancing her way through Father’s study, where she fetched glasses and poured the green liquid into the crystal.
“Well, it is delightful, and it is what many call the forbidden aphrodisiac of the self. Claris found a local supplier nearly a month ago. Want some?” Miriam held the glass out aloft and without hesitation.
I did not know much about the forbidden drink, but I did know one thing, if it was forbidden, then it is for a reason. But not without curiosity did I fully intend to tell her no.
I took the glass, the green liquid staring back. “How did you find this?”
Miriam sipped her drink, leaning back on the desk. “One of the gentlemen walked into the tea shop that Mama is so fond of and asked for la fée verte, to which I overheard the man scolding the worker to hide the bottles better. I got interested enough to ask the newsboy about it and agreed to assist in my adventures.”
I sipped, the warmth coating my throat and burning its way through to my stomach. Licorice and mint buzzed against my taste buds languidly, intimate and tender upon the flesh.
“I didn’t know you were one to partake in such activities.”
“Life does get a little dull around here with Mama shuffling you around to these appointments that I ought to have a little fun, don’t you think, dear sister?”
“I assure you it is not for my own enjoyment,” I muttered into my glass.
“I’ve also gone to those wrestling matches that the men always go to. Now that was fun! Did you know that they have a whole betting system in place? Simply scandalous to lose so much money on the betting table, but, oh, isn’t it just thrilling! I can see why Father was so enticed!”
As I stared out into the endless night, the moon glittered against the faint stars, its roundness within the sky dictating the time in which I had left. No possible time to figure out the meaning of enjoyment, not the way it was nearly six months ago. The box of rosessat out on the ledge was all, but a barren box of dirt had all the time in the world to bloom and see night turn into day until a time it found its way back into the dirt from which it was born.
It had a purpose and a life to find those mysteries and adventures.
To me, I was nothing more than the box of dirt, promised to preserve others.
“Either way,” Miriam declared, “Mama is not to know. That would defeat the whole fun of it.”
“What about suitors?”
“What about them?”
“Are you not worried about what they might think of your lurid activities?”
Miriam sat her glass down. “Ladies of the ton talk, but the men do not. Besides, whenever I go out, I always make sure that I am disguised as a proper gentleman so as not to draw suspicion,” she said with a twitch of her brow, jumping off the table. She tucked the bottles underneath her bodice. Opening the door to the study, she wearily gazed back. “Better get some rest. Tomorrow is going to be a pretty important day.”
I drank down the liquor, the cool buzz carting off the burning fire of my lungs with a different fire all the same. “I wouldn’t say meeting my husband-to-be is that important.” I sighed.
Miriam lingered at the door, returning a half-hearted smile. “I am sure that he is everything you dreamed,” she said, shutting the door behind her and taking off down the hall with la fée verte.
Remnants of the drink stained the bottom of the glass in that sickly green hue. Much alike, the glass and I, remnants left within me were waiting to be refilled in whatever made me whole. Unlike it, I’d never have the sweet aphrodisiac to fill me time and time, a blissful escape from the horrors I live in.
The nightmares of living.
Father’s grave was in the further part of the cemetery. The overcast sky provided a reprieve from the onslaught of heat, and the cool morning hours offered the kind of solace unfamiliar to me. The orange lilies in my hand bobbed as I walked the path to his gravestone.
The wet grass soaked into my thin dress, darkening its soft pink shade. Even in the somber embrace of the cemetery, I felt the world around me brighten, a welcome sensation against the darkness itching under my skin. When I arrived, I coughed into my handkerchief and laid the flowers at his grave.
“Father, it’s been sometime.” I sighed. “I hope you know that Mama and Miriam will be fine because of me, and I hate that for them.” I sat, the wordsRequiescat In Pacestared back, mocking me with every ounce of my fiber. “If you had just accepted your hubris, I would still have a life to live!”
Venom spewed from my lips, and I unfolded every single grievance I held for the man. The vile andvitriol I hid from others spilled out of me to a deceased man responsible for all our pain and suffering.
Formypain and suffering.
“After everything, you’re dead, and I’m sure to follow when all I wanted to do was escape, to see the world—perhaps, at one point, play the piano on a grand stage. But now... now I’m trapped with no other choice but to dig us out ofyourmess.” I picked at the dew-soaked grounds, tearing up blades of grass.
