Chapter 190:
Vent
“HOW ARE YOU FEELING? Perhaps bringing you here was a mistake.”
“I asked to come with you, remember? Besides…I expected this.”
The moment they arrived at her old room, Violette collapsed to her knees. Yulan hastily guided her to the sofa, where he rubbed her back until she stopped shaking. She asked for warm milk, so Marin dashed off to the kitchen. Yulan’s servants all remained on standby, waiting for their next orders.
Violette’s smile was weak but not as stiff as she’d feared. She hadn’t expected to react so strongly to her trauma replaying right before her eyes, but she’d made the decision to come here, fully aware of the possibility.
“I always knew they were similar. That’s why Marin’s afraid of her. Not to imply that I’m not, but…to Marin, my late mother was the most frightening thing in the world.”
A mother who saw her husband in her daughter, and so…loved her like she would a man. It was heart-rending enough to
put into words, but to witness it with no means of intervening had been as damaging to Marin as it was to the direct victim, Violette—even more so, perhaps. She knew what life was like on the outside and could compare that to the hell they’d lived in. Long after Bellerose’s death, she still haunted them.
“I knew it wasn’t a good idea. I knew chances were high something bad would happen. Those people will gut you without a moment’s hesitation…and I knew it would hurt. Even then, it wasn’t enough to deter me.”
When was it that she first started growing her hair out? Or started wearing dresses? Or stopped deepening her voice? She didn’t transform completely the very moment her mother cast her aside. Acting like Auld had become a part of her daily life by that point. Hardly surprising, considering it was how she was raised—how she was forced to live. Then she was told it was unacceptable, and now here she was.
Her father had rejected her boyish haircut and clothes and voice. He decided it was inadmissible and corrected it. First Bellerose had deemed her a failure. Then the very man her mother had begged to see again told her to change every aspect of herself. He had determined there was no value in the cross-dressing charade if it wouldn’t appease the witch, so he rejected everything about her and told her to be a lady.
So she was. She changed herself again. And even then, it wasn’t enough.
“I didn’t want it to end like that. It’s not fair! After all the effort I had to put in to meet their demands…they got to reap the rewards? I suffered and toiled and still never got a damn thing out of it. So I…”
I want it back. Every last thing I ever gave to you people.
“I wanted to see them suffer for a change.”
She didn’t care if it hurt, if it ripped open her scars and poured salt into her wounds. She wanted a front row seat to the carnage.
Violette directed this monologue at the floor. Her tone and word choice were all over the place, as if wrestling with a flurry of emotions. The damage of reliving her trauma was surely more severe than she realized. Yulan listened to it all without a word. She was free to say whatever she liked, even if it was incoherent. He just wanted her to vent. Bottling it up with a smile had already caused her enough suffering for a lifetime.
“I’m sorry—I didn’t mean to worry you. I was so sure I’d smile the whole time. I thought I’d laugh in their faces.”
“I’m gonna worry about you either way, Vio. Not because of anything you did, but because that’s just the kind of guy I am.”
These lunatics were so unreasonable, Yulan didn’t feel the need to adhere to any sort of decorum. He and Violette had arrived at the specified time and made the announcement as tradition dictated. For that alone they deserved an award.
“You must be exhausted after all that. Once we’re done packing, we can take the rest of the day off! I’ll buy your favorite cake on the way home.”
He pulled her into a gentle embrace, patting her on the back. He felt her rest her forehead against his shoulder with her full weight, as if she were burying herself into him. With her face concealed, she might have appeared to be crying. He doubted she was now. She had a way of holding her tears through any pain.
“You really tried your best, and I appreciate that. It’s okay now. Let’s go home.”
“Home…yes, home. Thank you.”
“Any time.”
He scooped up a strand of soft hair and kissed it, and somewhere roughly north of his heart, he felt her smile.