The Shadow Sisters

[E1] Chapter 24 - Elizabeth Cole

As Elizabeth drove home, she switched on the radio. She was in the mood to listen to some music, but at the present hour, every station was either playing news or a talk show.

One was an interview with a well-known celebrity, notorious for selling self-branded candles and wax melts for extortionate prices. Tonight she espoused the benefits of her new diet, The Colour Diet, where she only ate things of a certain colour on a certain day.

"For example, Monday is my green day, Tuesday is my red day, and Wednesday is my yellow day."

"Well what if something is half green and half red?" the host asked. "Like an apple?"

"Usually I'll avoid multi-coloured products, but if I ever happen upon a stray, usually you can cut something up and share the rest. Your red day might be someone else's green day, for example."

The host joked that it probably took an entire village just to finish a bag of Skittles.

"Oh, no, Marvin, we never eat anything artificially coloured. It has to be the colour nature intended. Otherwise what's the point?"

"Indeed."

When Elizabeth found a different station, a dramatic voice introduced Episode 57 of They Hide Among Us. It focused on the invisible cults of today's society, those which lurked in the shadows and silently pulled the strings as they attempted to indoctrinate people through social media, mainstream media, and modern education.

"That's horrible, Jerry," one disembodied voice said. "It just goes to show what sort of crazy things are out there, trying to take advantage of gullible people."

"Exactly, Alan. It's all these liberal elites who form the societies. Then the stuck up, liberal middle and lower class enable them by burying their heads, cancelling freedom fighters like you and I, then spending all their money on avocado and toast and drinking their expensive lattes."

"Hear, hear," Alan said.

He then talked at length about how the Roman Empire, the moon, dinosaurs, and tectonic plates were all part of the same elaborate hoax.

"That's about enough of that," Elizabeth said, sighing as she turned it off. She patted her steering wheel like it was a drum, a backing track to the music that existed solely in her head.

When she returned home, she kicked off her shoes and hung her coat in the coat room. As she entered the foyer, it was like she'd been swallowed by a whale; the house felt ten times bigger than usual. It was utterly massive and yet so quiet that she could hear the birds on the ceiling, hear their feet pattering.

Wandering into the room that she and Marie called the living room, but Hannah referred to as the parlour, Elizabeth settled down and switched on the wall-mounted TV, in an attempt to give the place some artificial life.

But as the series she was watching progressed deep into the pilot episode, she realised that she had no idea what'd happened to cause all of these melodramatic people to shout at each other, explode into tears, and dramatically storm out of rooms. Eventually, when she just shut it off, she was surrounded once again, in that oppressive cloak of silence, which somehow felt even heavier than before.

Upon returning upstairs, to that deathly quiet hallway between the deathly quiet rooms, she could hear every creak of every floorboard that fell under her footfalls.

She wandered into her own room and was drawn to her wardrobe like a wasp to white. Her red dress hung there in the back, standing out as if under a spotlight. Earlier, she'd taken it out and ironed it, before neatly returning it to its place. Now she lifted it out by the hanger, just to see, just to see, and decided she wanted to try it on, just to see if it still fit, just to scratch that itch of curiosity.

She was most surprised when she did put it on, to find that it fit perfectly.

As she regarded herself in the mirror, she felt like she'd turned back the clock, to a more carefree period of her life.

It felt incomplete without the rest, without the trimmings. It was like a washed spot on the floor in that respect. It forced you to clean all of it, only so that it'd match. That's all she was doing as she applied her foundation, mascara, and lipstick, before straightening her hair. It was all simply to justify the outfit.

As Elizabeth returned to the front of the mirror, the version of herself that she saw within the reflection made her beam. That was mostly because she thought it no longer existed. But it had always been there, asleep in a cave that was buried beneath so many layers of pain.

Tonight she was in the light.

Tonight she shone.

Tonight she had her sparkle back.

Finally, she collapsed onto the big living room sofa and opened a bottle of wine. She poured some crisps into a bowl, and nuts into another, and cut up cheese on a platter, before setting them out and munching on them. She didn't need to go to any fancy bar or party when she could just stay and have her own party here.

After so many years of her daughters being tiny and reliant on her, of them requiring every ounce of her love and attention, they were all grown up and out late, socialising.

She could play the TV as loud as she wanted. She could eat and drink until she was full to bursting. Heck, she could even stand up on the table and dance and feel beautiful.

But even as she was having all of these thoughts, her actions, which were on autopilot, contradicted her. She flicked through her phone. The results from her search brought up all the different taxi services in Willow Town, of which there were at least a dozen.

What are you doing there, Elizabeth ol' girl? A voice in her head demanded of her.

Willow Cabs were the highest ranking result. When she clicked the link, it expanded, bringing up their phone number. This is stupid, she thought. Was she really contemplating this? Was she really that much of a loser?

But her thumb already rebelled against her thoughts and pressed the call button. With that done, she brought the phone to her ear.

"Hello, you're through to Willow Cabs," the dispatcher said.

"Hi," Elizabeth said, like some desperate weirdo who'd merely rang the service for a friendly chat. "I'd like a taxi," she quickly added. Duh, she thought. It'd be slightly concerning if you called a company named 'Willow Cabs' looking for a pizza.

"Eh, where are you, love?" The dispatcher asked.

She gave him the address in Meadow View.

The dispatcher sighed patiently. "Uh, and where are you going, love?"

That was when Elizabeth swallowed and said, "I'm going to The Lost Treasure."

"Where's that, love?" the dispatcher asked.

"Just leave me in Old Willow Town, please. I'll find it from there."