Page 29 of The Tyranny of our Longing

The end of his statement lifted into a question, and even though she herself would not claim her painting entirely finished, Phaedra found she did not want to deny him his request. After all, there would be no reason to waste time, and she could certainly work in tandem, adding the finishing touches as she started on something new.

“All right,” she said, pulling the pad onto her lap.

He flashed her a grateful smile, then opened the journal carefully, mindful of the dry and delicate pages. “This one was written a few days after the first. The paper is charred in some places and the words seem cut off at the end, but I am hoping it will be sufficient.”

Phaedra nodded, and he began to read.

—-day, the 20th of October, 1879

Nobody knows I had a hand in this. And as I —- —— at the wonder enveloping my body, I feel I do not care. Not for Mother’s apathy, nor for Father’s potential fury or what he may do with it. Because it is mine now.

And as I sit here in near darkness, sleep pushing down on my every nerve, I find myself unable to part with it just yet. I know I eventually must, but I also ——- —— - —— prolong this time in any way I can.

— ———- - —- - ——- to my skin, like medicine to a disease I never knew ailed me. Everything around me seems to fade out of focus, this color—this wonder—the only thing of worth in this entire house.

- —- — fingers reluctant to leave its folds, my eyes barely able to lift from its radiance to pen these lines, and I find myself grateful for the mirror before me that would grant me glimpses of it in the periphery of my vision. And I wonder anew if it was mere luck or rather the stroke of destiny that led me to Mother’s chamber that day when ——— —— ———— —- ——————- so he may take them to the dressmaker himself.

Although I should be ashamed of the envy that washed over me, both for his exquisite gift and his willingness to make the trip himself, I am not. Nor am I ashamed of my decision, for seeing the detached look on Mother’s face, one of almost dejection toward a gift she should be more than grateful for —- —- — ————— —- — ——— — - —- —— ——— —- - — —— ———- ———- ————- — — —- ——- This time it made me angry. Indignant. Outraged by her sheer ungratefulness.

So when I told her that I would be nothing less than ecstatic in her place to receive such a gift and she muttered the words:

— Then take it.

…I did just that.

I offered to deliver the note to Father, secretly exchanging it to one containing my own measurements. And when the dress finally arrived today —— —- ———- — ——— —— - —— ——- ——- ————— I claimed it myself from the delivery boy, and took it to my own room instead of hers. And when I finally opened the package, it was clear I had made the right choice. That the agony of the wait had been worth it.

For it was indeed agony to part with it. To imagine someone else touching it, cutting it, piercing it felt almost painful, even as I understood its necessity. It left me restless, as if my very soul had been ripped free of my body, and I felt no hunger, no fatigue, only — ———— ——- ———- — ——, my fingers trembling with shuddering anticipation to touch it once more. To know it safe where it belongs.

Even now I cannot imagine, cannot bear to think that someone else should ——- - - - ——— It was always meant to be mine. I know it as I know the lines of my face and the hue of my thoughts. And I know that would it ever come to it - - ——- — ——— — ——— ——— — —- ——

Phaedra looked up, the sudden silence jolting her back into the flickering darkness of the library. The shape of her surroundings slowly solidified around her, and even though her mind broke from the imagined scene, her body was still held tight, trapped in a state of disorienting turmoil.

Because she knew that feeling. That pull. Recognized the tyranny of its hold over sanity and rational thought. Knew what it meant to be so overcome that she would do anything not to lose the thing—the person—that had elicited it. To endure anything so that it—he—would stay. She knew the thorned chains that would mask their chafing into the heedless grip of longing, and knew the aching void left behind once the truth had been allowed to break them. She knew what it meant to have barely a sliver of her heart left while⁠—

“The rest of it is destroyed,” Nathaniel said, his voice soft, his movements slow as he closed the journal. Phaedra’s jaw clenched as his fingers brushed over the once smooth surface of the binding, and she wondered if the ragged edges of that void could be soothed by so gentle a touch. “Do you think it would be enough?”

She raised her eyes to his, to the green that seemed near black in the darkness, and for a moment she almost let herself hope that he would see through her. That he would indeed discern the turn of her thoughts, and the blight of her past, and would⁠—

She stopped herself, the pressure in her limbs too much to bear.

Because this was not the answer. And he was not the cure. Whatever had been before, she was long free of it. And this, however strong its grip, however surprising that it still held, was but an echo of what once had been.

She was free.

She pulled in a breath, and forced her eyes to the pad in her lap, easing her fingers from the creasing paper. She traced the dark lines of her sketch, each stroke bringing calm to the restless pounding of her heart, merging slowly into the steady anchor of renewed purpose.

Her voice was almost devoid of tremors when she said, “Yes. I shall start tomorrow morning.”

PART II

CAPTIVATION

“I had desired it with an ardour that far exceeded moderation; but now that I had finished, the beauty of the dream vanished, and breathless horror and disgust filled my heart.”

— Mary W. Shelley, Frankenstein; or, The Modern Prometheus (1831)

CHAPTER 21