Six Feet Under

chapter three

[ 09/10/2015, Greene Mansion, 1600 ]

Adelaide tipped her head back against the lawn chair and sipped at her cup of hot chocolate, squinting against the sun on the far edge of the horizon.

"Adelaide, chéri." Cecile appeared on the back porch, a white apron tied around her hips. Her golden hair glinted briefly in the fading light. "Come in, it's getting chilly outside."

"No thanks," she muttered, and flipped another page in her book. "I'm fine where I am. Go fuss over Madison instead."

"I don't want you to catch a cold," Cecile insisted as she walked closer and put a hand on Adelaide's shoulder. "Come inside."

Adelaide shrugged off the hand.

"Let me be," she snapped peevishly. "I said I'm fine."

She heard more than saw the door to the porch close, and flipped another page in her book without reading it. She felt jittery, and her mind couldn't focus on the words on the page for more than a few seconds. After a while, she flipped her book shut and picked up her phone.

Hey, how bout going out tonite?

The reply came quickly, as if Leah was waiting by her phone.

Sure, to where?

Adelaide tapped out a reply and got up, leaving the book on the chair. The maid will come by and pick it up later, anyway.

She ran into Madison on the way up to her room. Madison was carrying a cardboard box full of snow globes up from the basement, and she was humming a little Christmas tune as she walked even though it was only September. Adelaide barely resisted the urge to glare as she passed.

"Addie!" Madison called as she was halfway up the stairs. "Where are you going?"

"New York," she lied before really thinking about it. "You know Leah has an apartment in the city."

"Why?"

Adelaide paused, thinking for a moment, and decided to play nice.

"I just like the city," she smiled, and Madison looked a little taken aback. "It's noisy there, not like here."

Madison looked at her blankly, and for a second Adelaide had the sinking feeling that Madison could see through her lie, but she just turned away without comment and went on her way, snow globes clanking in the box. Adelaide exhaled and continued up the stairs.

On a school night? Her phone buzzed. What bout ur mom?

She made a face, before answering:

tmr's last day of school idc. if she bitches when i get home i can always sleepover.

She tucked her phone into her pocket without looking at the reply, opened the door to her room, and went in. She felt strangely restless and she wasn't sure if it was the PMS or the anxiety, but nevertheless she knew she needed a drink.

She looked around the room, which suddenly felt too small for her, and tried to identify the reason for her moodiness lately. She traced it back to the conversation with her mother in the study two days ago, and her fists clenched.

Cecile wanted to sign all of her money over to Madison in case of her death and her few properties to Adelaide, but only if Adelaide was fine with it.

Fair's fair, she supposed, since Madison didn't get a cent from the death of their father and she got enough to last her three lifetimes, but she was still angry. Here it was again, Cecile's blatant favoritism that in Adelaide's mind split this household apart. She wasn't angry anymore, but she had been moody for the past two days to the point that her friends had started to pick up on it.