The Burning of the Palace at Versailles (or, Butterfly) [REWRITING]

Chapter 14 - The Romance of Certain Paints

At dinner, Puzzle threw a balled-up sock at Diana to get her to smile. If Melody had been in Diana's shoes, she would have been pretty pissed, but Diana gave Puzzle the smile she wanted and continued eating her slice of homemade pizza. Melody thought it was strange how at Versailles, everything seemed to lead back to Puzzle. When she entered the room, everyone looked up. When she spoke, people listened. She was a sun with her own gravity and brought everything into her orbit. Diana was clearly shaken by telling Melody some of her story. Since they had spoken in the library, Diana had been quiet and withdrawn. As far as Melody knew, she had only spoken a few words.

Everyone else seemed to be normal that day. It was the first time everyone had been at the dinner table at the same time. Even the doctor was there, even though she, Jim, and Heidi were in the kitchen. Jordan was an interesting addition. Even though she never said a word, she seemed loud. People talked to her, and she responded with facial expressions.

"How is everyone feeling tonight?" was answered with an enthusiastic nod.

"Who would like to share their feelings?" was answered with a deep frown.

"Is the pizza sauce too salty?" was answered with a death glare. That one did not make much sense to Melody, but Key seemed to understand. He and Colt had gotten into an argument over music before dinner, so they had met in the middle and Sinatra was softly singing from the kitchen.

When everyone was done eating or picking at the food they weren't eating, they seemed to move as one to put their leftovers on Jordan's plate. Every time, the girl grinned and happily ate it all. Throughout the dinner, Jordan must have eaten the equivalent of seven slices of pizza. Melody was both amazed, disgusted, and jealous. "Does she ever gain weight?" she whispered to Colt.

"Nope," he said without looking up.

After, Puzzle stood up and literally skipped around the room, dancing lightly on the balls of her feet. Everyone watched her as she did it. When she stopped, Jordan clapped like a little girl at the circus. Puzzle grinned, her face pink, bowed. She looked at the clock. "Let's go," she said.

There were a few groans from around the room, but Melody watched as everyone else stood.

"Where are we going?" Melody asked.

"It's Wednesday night," Cypress said. "Mother Brigham is here for our study."

Suddenly, Melody felt indescribably angry. There was so much happening that she didn't understand and no one was explaining to her. Melody felt her face heat up and she tapped her fingernails on the underside of the table.

"Who is Mother Bringham?" she asked through clenched teeth.

"The priest," Cypress said. His eyes were wide, questioning. Curious. "Didn't the girls tell you about her?"

Melody stopped tapping. She recalled one of them mentioning a priest on Wednesday nights. Maybe they had told her. Why had she gotten so angry? "They did."

"Are you going to come along?"

"I thought it was optional." Melody's clipped, angry tone that she tried to stop even as she was saying it didn't seem to ruin Cypress's mood.

"It is," he said. "But she makes some damn good cookies."

So Melody went to Bible study.

As it turned out, Mother Bringham did make some damn good cookies. The smell of shortbread and chocolate chip hit Melody in the face as she walked into the small room that made up the chapel. The priest herself was a kindly old woman who introduced herself to Melody with a firm handshake and a wrinkled smile. She said she had a daughter Melody's age, which made Melody feel uncomfortable.

It was pretty obvious some of the others were only there for the food. Jordan consistently mowed down a cookie every other minute and didn't listen, Key was paging through a book on the science of cooking, and Diana in general seemed tired and distracted, her eyes downcast to the ground. Puzzle was leaning into Diana and had her head on Diana's shoulder.

Unfortunately, the "Bible study" part of the Bible study ended pretty quickly. The lesson had been talking about a story. Melody had let her mind stray, so she hadn't picked up much. The story had been about when Jesus entered the temple that had been taken over by merchants and became furious, saying the house had been ruined.

"Was he right to be angry?" the priest asked.

All the inmates looked down at the ground, avoiding eye contact with the Mother. Melody was reminded of a class that avoids eye contact with a teacher. It was juvenile, and it made Melody hide a smile with her hand.

"When have you felt angry before?"

Diana's eyes go up, sharp as a knife directly into Melody's eyes. Melody swallowed and looked away, at the cross. It was simple, plain, simple metal.

But eventually, Melody had to look away, and back at Diana. Puzzle was still leaning to her as she hung on every word the priest said, but Melody realized Diana was also leaning into Puzzle. She was bone-dead tired, and Melody suddenly felt as if the bone-dead weight she had felt earlier wasn't really all that odd.

Still, even with the tiredness, Melody could see the clear message in Diana's eyes. You've been that angry before. So have I.

Diana had been interrupted before she could tell Melody what really happened to her, why she had called herself a "ragefest," and Melody definitely hadn't told her what happened with her, but there was a mutual understanding there.

"How about this," Mother Bringham said. Her black suit with the white clerical collar was so tight around her throat, Melody wondered if it was choking her. "No one has to say anything, but think about the last time you felt really angry."

Melody closed her eyes and took a deep breath. She could do that.

The morning after the murder, Melody stared at the clothes in her closet for over an hour. She didn't know what to wear to meet her father's murderer. Black would probably be best, for mourning. She would have liked to wear her black jacket with a skull on the shoulder. It would have been fitting, given the gory fantasies going through her head about what she wanted to do to the bastard. But the jacket was in her closet at school. Eventually, she went to her mother's closet and pulled on an old black dress. It looked right out of the nineteenth century, and Melody wondered if her mother had intended to wear it. She tied the black sash around her waist. She walked to her dresser and looked at the makeup and perfumes there. Melody took a deep breath and felt the oxygen in her lungs. Concealer. She needed concealer. She found one that matched her skin tone and dabbed some on. Second: eyebrows. She filled them in. Foundation. There were three bottles. Melody applied one of them slowly. Then she took a step back, looked in the mirror, and gasped at her reflection. The color of her skin was gone. Melody looked dead. She grabbed the second bottle and covered her face with it. Now her skin looked splotchy. She dropped the bottle. It landed with a dull thud on the carpet. Powder. Melody needed powder. She dumped some on her hand, forgoing a brush, and patted it into her skin. Tears fell from her eyes, creating wet rivers in the dry powders. Blush. Four different shades of pink, red, and mauve went onto her cheekbones. Every shade of eyeshadow in the palette went onto her eyelids. Mascara instantly washed away in black droplets. One lipstick went on, was smeared away with a palm onto the chin, then another went on, which was covered with another, and then another. Then Melody picked up a bottle of perfume and hurled it at the wall. The glass shattered into a billion imperfect little pieces, and she grinned.

"Melody!" her mother shouted from somewhere in the house.

The perfume was sickly sweet as it reached Melody's nose. She knew what she was going to do. She was going to kill the fucking bastard.