The Periods of Being

Chapter XXXXIV

Chapter XXXXIV

Neil welcomes Olive at the door with wide, open arms. The rain drips onto the printed rug from her coat as she walks in. Despite the rain clinging to her, he hugs her tight, and she holds onto him, trying to push every loose piece inside of her back together. But it doesn't work. It's impossible for someone to push another's pieces back in place. He smiles so wide, she thinks that his lips will crack. She tries to mimic him, but he sees right through the overly dramatic smile.

    He doesn't question her about it, though. He takes one look at her soaked hair and coat— then to his now wet suit— and offers if she would like to take a bath to wash away the traveling that she's done this afternoon. She can't help but accept the offer with haste.

    "Yes, please," she replies and he smiles to himself at her answer. Mr. Sadder stands at the scene and takes it as his duty to ask one of the maids to draw her a bath without being asked to. She wonders if she looks as pathetic as she feels.

    "I'll see you for dinner?" He asks her before she is able to leave to go up to her familiar bedroom and soak her sorrows away.

    She turns to him at the banister of the staircase and tries to hide her thoughts of skipping dinner aside. He looks up at her with a promising smile on his face, making her want to tell him that she will be there despite her thoughts to tell her to stay in the bathtub for the rest of the day and become a prune of flesh.

    "I'll see you then," she promises him with a smile that cracks her lips and dazzles her eyes with crow's feet wrinkles. She leaves without another word, taking each step of care, knowing that with her luck, there is a possibility of tripping and falling going up the stairs. She doesn't rush to go into her room like she used to but takes her time going down the hallway. Her coat clings to her in a reminder of the rain outside, but also the reminder that she deserves the rain clouds and the chill.

    Do I, though? She asks herself. Do I need to keep telling myself I deserve this even when I've tried everything to fix my problems and past mistakes?

    The question runs through her mind like a plague, like a glimmer of hope deadlier than any of her darkest thoughts. She enters her room and strips out of the coat the second she shuts the door behind her. Running water echos out of the attached bathroom.

    "Hello?" She calls out.

    A maid timidly makes her presence known by walking out of the bathroom with a set of towels laid in her arms. Her friendly, yet scared, face welcomes her.

    "Hello, m'lady. I was sent to draw you a bath." She states plainly with a soft voice. Olive sends her a small smile to tell that she was sent with the right intentions of doing so and that she wasn't mistaken for her task. "It's running right now, but is there anything else would like me to do? I can ask one of the footmen to go out and pluck flowers in the garden to add to the water if you would like?" The offer is enticing, but she shakes her head, feeling like there has already been enough of a fuss with her rainy appearance.

    "There is no need, but thank you."

    The maid bows her head as you're welcome.

    "Will that be all, then?" She asks and Olive nods her head. The maid tries to ask if she is sure that there is nothing that she can help with, but if Olive needs help with anything, she can summon Julie to her room. All she needs help with is the thoughts in her mind that are telling her that she is worth it. They are strange and unusual and she finds herself stuck in a present mindset that she never imagined herself to be in. Especially after today, and especially soaking wet from the rain.

    The unnamed maid leaves the room without another word, leaving Olive to her first time of solitude since she spoke to Freya. The empty bedroom tries to pull her in. Her bed tries to coo her over to it, and the pillows long to be cried upon, but instead, she goes over to the bathroom and closes the door behind her.

    The steam of the bath risings and sticks itself on the mirror above the polished sink. Without any time to waste, Olive peels the clothes off of her. Her dress falls onto the ground in a soaked mess, creating a puddle in its wake. She takes off her undergarments, and thanks to the steam for misting the mirrors to prevent her from looking at her naked self. When was the last time she actually looked at her body and didn't see it tainted? The question clings to her as she unpins her hair, leaving it to drape and stick to her bare back.

    Olive steps over her dress and walks to the bathtub to check the water. It's a perfect temperature of warm— not cold, and not hot to the point that her skin will burn red. She smiles at herself and wishes she thanked the maid more properly as she climbs into the running bath. Her body slouches the water and sigh escapes her lips like a satisfying moan. Her hands grip the sides of the tub to keep her from sinking completely. She sits up briefly only to turn off the faucet. The room fills with silence when she does. The only sound being a few droplets hitting the water's surface from the faucet.

    She breaths out in relief, but the silence in the room doesn't last long enough for her to enjoy it.

     Freya's words creep from their hiding places again along with all the thoughts she forced away long ago when the event happened and with Mark's death. The bathroom creates a space for her thoughts to run free and to fill the room with them. She lets them, feeling like it is time to face them. Time because she is alone for the first time since her time with Freya and the first time that she can actually think everything through.

    She takes in a breath of the steam as her own gears in her mind steam with the pressure of figuring out that she's done all that she can do. It hurts to believe that she tries to rekindle her relationship with her family, most importantly with Freya, which has gone to become a tragedy alongside her others. She doesn't want to believe that she has done all that she can do to fix the past and to try to find herself again, but she has. Now, she needs to figure out what she is going to do now.

    She closes her eyes and fights to urge to scream.

    What am I going to do now?

    The question is unbearable and soul-crushing. She never thought of an after of all of this. She'll stay in her mourning period, but will that forever be an option? She grips the sides of the bathtub. Her thoughts spring out of every crevasse of her bones and pieces of her heart. She dips her full body under the water and holds her breath as she sinks her head below the water's surface. The sound of the silence under the water cancels out her thoughts and her lungs start to burn for her to go back up for air, but the silence tempts her to stay under for a second more until she can't.

    She gasps up for air and brushes her hair to the side and wiping her eyes clean of water. Her chest rises and falls at an abrupt pace before falling back to a steady one. Olive hugs her knees to chest as the echoing thoughts linger again.

    I want to run. I want to leave this place. Leave this life. I can't do it anymore.

    Her heart breaks at the confession of her thoughts, of her emotions, because for the first time since Mark's death, she is telling the truth of what she wishes. She wants to leave. She wants to start over. It's the only way out, but her life trapped behind a manor that used to belong to her dead husband who wanted it to go to their never-son. This life is Neil's now. This manor is Neil's now.

    The tears from the train slip out of their abandonment and sink down her cheeks with despair. Her heart clashes with the reality of her position and her empty hand of bad played cards. She is out of money to gamble, out of money to play. Even if she still had a good hand of cards and more money, she'll pull out of the game, because it's over. There is nothing that will put her ahead, nothing that will create a better life for her here— a better mindset, a better person.

    Why did it take her so long to figure it out?

    She sinks her head back down and lets out the scream under the water, letting all the air bubbles rise like a race to the world. She screams it all out and no one is there to hear it.