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Added Credit[headscarf design . Themangalorian] / [inspir… info
138
for parrotwax's themed writing event
———
based on the theme: ‘center your story around someone who finally achieves their biggest goal... only to realize it cost them everything’
———
au revoir | skindex [gloved version]
———
based on the theme: ‘center your story around someone who finally achieves their biggest goal... only to realize it cost them everything’
———
au revoir | skindex [gloved version]
House of Terpsichore // Story
tw; implications of death and neglect
The lilting notes of the harp danced teasingly throughout the manor, echoing across hollow halls and lavish parlors. Camille knew the tune well; Renié’s Légende had always been her mother’s favorite composition. Even in her old age, Eleanor remembered the arcane rhythms and diverse harmonies. Playing it had become second nature to her, in the same way a crying child instinctively knows to go to its parents for comfort. That’s what Camille thought, anyway.
As a young girl, the delicate plucking of harp strings became the sound she associated with her dear mother, Eleanor. In times of need, she followed the sound of the elusive, emanating notes, like vermin to the Piper. In those days, she loved hearing the harp and would spend hours waltzing by herself in time to her mother’s cadenzas. But the affiliation, so sweet in her infancy, had all but soured in her later youth. Eleanor began devoting more time to her musical aspirations than to her own daughter, and Camille had to fight desperately for scraps of her attention. Eleanor was indeed incapable of loving her music and Camille simultaneously, and as years passed, their bond frayed, becoming thinner than even the strings of Eleanor’s beloved harp.
Times had changed drastically since those days. Eleanor, once so full of life and passion, grew debilitatingly ill. She began aching in the mornings, and she seemed to forget herself at times. Camille determined that she could no longer live on her own, especially after the passing of Eleanor’s husband. It was two years ago now that mother and daughter were reunited, and a giddy Camille was reignited with the cinders of a passionate fire she thought was long extinguished. Even now, well into her adulthood, Camille held out a silent hope that her mother might love her one day.
But what had changed? Eleanor stayed up in her room, untouchable upon her lofty drum throne. She only came down for meals and medicine, during which Camille would spoon-feed her the food of aristocrats in absolute silence. Her attitude at all times was unreadable. But in the arch of her brow and the glassy stare of her eyes was a certain disdain, a kind of embarrassment, that evoked immense discontent within Camille. Were her efforts not enough? What more did she have to do to appease her mother?
These questions kept Camille awake at night, fruitlessly searching for the answers. Légende was the anthem of her despair. She could take it no longer.
“Mother?” Camille called up the curlicue staircase to the second floor. When she received no response, she tried again, wearily creeping up the first few steps. “Eleanor? I’d like to have a little talk.”
Nothing again. Camille resolutely climbed the rest of the stairs and approached the ornate cedar door that Eleanor hid behind in her depraved game of hide-and-go-seek. The harp’s regal tones could be heard, muffled, on the other side. Giving a light knock to announce her arrival, Camille swung the door open. The notes paused.
“Mother?” Camille asked tentatively. “Could we talk for a moment?”
Eleanor seemed startled, like a wild animal caught by a hunter. The great, hulking harp, in all its grandeur, loomed over them both, throwing filaments of shadow across Camille’s face. After a moment, Eleanor regained composure and said, “Well, okay dear. What is it?” Her bony fingers lingered on the strings of the instrument.
“I’ve been thinking about your harp,” Camille replied, stepping forward into the filtered light of a window. “You spend all your time up here in your room with it, when you really ought to come out a bit more. Perhaps you could spend some time with me in the parlor?”
Eleanor frowned, the lines in her face deepening. “Oh, I’m not sure. . . I thought I might just play the harp for the rest of the afternoon.”
“But you always do that!” Camille wailed, before remembering her manners. “Pardon. What I mean to say is, it could be a nice change of pace for you. We’ll make an occasion out of it! I can fix us Earl Grey and fairy cakes, and afterward we might go into town for supper and a drink. Wouldn’t that be lovely?”
Eleanor didn’t respond right away, so she kept going. “You play that harp for hours every day, you don’t need the practice anymore. You’re already a virtuoso! A few afternoons a week spent with me couldn’t hurt you. And besides,” Camille concluded, eyes wide. “I’d appreciate your company very much.”
Camille’s mother hesitated, glancing back to the nylon harp strings and her own poised hands, before peering into the space just below her daughter’s eyes and smiling vaguely. “I suppose tea could be nice. . . yes, alright, but just a few hours.”
“Brilliant! I’ll get the water boiled,” Camille responded instantaneously. She didn’t have the zeal to negotiate with Eleanor on the arrangement any further. In her deeply callous mind, she knew this would be the best thing her mother would agree to without putting up more of a fight.
“I’ll be just a moment, dear. I have to find my petticoat,” Eleanor responded lamely, but Camille had already departed the room and began a hasty descent down the stairs. She worked with unusual vigor, and in an instant a crimson flame was capering in the fire place, flitting like the hopeful, naïve embers in Camille’s soul.
As the tap ran, the iron cooking kettle was filled with crystalline water, so unbelievably clear that Camille could see her own reflection in its depths. The sight made her freeze; even the hiss of the fire seemed to go silent.
Who was the woman who stared back at her? It couldn’t be Camille. This woman’s hair was a greasy mess, tangled and greying like withering liriope in a drought. Her bonnet hat was draped limply over the crest of her head in an unraveling knot. The summer-sky-colored cotton of her dress frayed, and her lace gloves had new tears. The woman’s eyes and face had a certain porcelain quality that made her look like a taxidermy cadaver propped upright. How could this ever be Camille?
The question hung in the air, paralyzed, until it was answered by a new sound: the ambient, meandering chime of the harp behind the cedar door, where Eleanor was supposed to be getting ready.
The cold water of Camille’s reflection flooded over until the love-lusting fire in her heart was nothing but a wisp of smoke.
* * *
Me or the harp? The choice seemed obvious to Camille. As she ascended up the stairs once more, she weighed the options in her mind. Me or the harp? It felt so clear, how could Eleanor possibly get it wrong? And yet she had. For year upon years upon years upon—
Me or the harp? And even if she thought she knew the proper answer, the firebrand Camille wielded, offspring of the hearth below, would have the final say. Me or the harp? It mattered not—at the end of the day, there would be no choice to make.
The cedar door flew open, revealing Eleanor, reseated at her instrument, petticoat left forgotten on the duvet. For a moment, Eleanor had the gall to look annoyed at being interrupted again. Then she spotted the torch in Camille’s hands and looked fearful.
“Camille—” she began in a pacifying tone, but she didn’t seem to be able to find any more words to say.
“Dare I even ask?” Camille said, voice flat, face blank.
“Ask what?”
“You know.”
“I don’t...”
“You choose the harp. Over me. Every time.”
Whatever response Eleanor gave went unheard. The sound of fire filled Camille’s mind. She stepped forward, and Eleanor flinched violently, as though stricken.
“Leave the room, mother,” she said lightly.
“What are you—”
“Leave.”
Eleanor got up from her stool, stumbled back a few steps, and made a wide arc around her daughter towards the door. She lingered in the threshold. “Let’s not try anything rash, Camille. Think about what you’re doing.”
“I know what I’m doing. I’m making you choose me.”
And, with a steady hand comparable to that of a seasoned swordsman, she slashed at the harp with the flame. In an instant, the great wooden frame caught fire, the polished veneer bubbling and cracking in the scorching blaze. The many strings wore thin and began to snap in sequence, a final orchestra of twangs and sharps. The terrible instrument, of which had tortured Camille for so long, swayed and clattered to the ground. Its shadow no longer towered over the girl but now swam around her feet, cast to the floor by the growing flame, of which was spreading across the carpet. The fire grew beyond control, demonic tendrils leaping from shag rugs to drapes and furniture. Camille stood in the center of the room, watching the harp burn out as the rest of the room met the same fate. Flames licked greedily at the hem of her dress.
“Camille! Oh, Camille, this is a disaster! We must leave at once!” Eleanor shrieked from the outside hall.
Camille let out a small laugh. “No, I’m not done watching it burn. I need to know it’s all gone.”
“Camille, please! Don’t do this! I—I need you! Who else will care for me in my frail state? It could only be you, my faithful daughter! Don’t you know I love you?”
The fire in Camille’s heart surged with triumph. “I know. I just wanted to hear you say it.”
Eleanor sobbed and pleaded, but she could bear the heat and pain no longer and fled the manor to get help. Within her mother’s chambers, Camille beamed and laughed with mirth. She had done it! Her mother loved her now, she’d said it herself! What more was there to have? She was the richest soul to ever live, and she would be the richest to ever die.
The twin flames, one in her heart and one in the room, rose to their zeniths. Her mind was satisfied and engulfed in fire, and her body promptly followed suit.
The lilting notes of the harp danced teasingly throughout the manor, echoing across hollow halls and lavish parlors. Camille knew the tune well; Renié’s Légende had always been her mother’s favorite composition. Even in her old age, Eleanor remembered the arcane rhythms and diverse harmonies. Playing it had become second nature to her, in the same way a crying child instinctively knows to go to its parents for comfort. That’s what Camille thought, anyway.
As a young girl, the delicate plucking of harp strings became the sound she associated with her dear mother, Eleanor. In times of need, she followed the sound of the elusive, emanating notes, like vermin to the Piper. In those days, she loved hearing the harp and would spend hours waltzing by herself in time to her mother’s cadenzas. But the affiliation, so sweet in her infancy, had all but soured in her later youth. Eleanor began devoting more time to her musical aspirations than to her own daughter, and Camille had to fight desperately for scraps of her attention. Eleanor was indeed incapable of loving her music and Camille simultaneously, and as years passed, their bond frayed, becoming thinner than even the strings of Eleanor’s beloved harp.
Times had changed drastically since those days. Eleanor, once so full of life and passion, grew debilitatingly ill. She began aching in the mornings, and she seemed to forget herself at times. Camille determined that she could no longer live on her own, especially after the passing of Eleanor’s husband. It was two years ago now that mother and daughter were reunited, and a giddy Camille was reignited with the cinders of a passionate fire she thought was long extinguished. Even now, well into her adulthood, Camille held out a silent hope that her mother might love her one day.
But what had changed? Eleanor stayed up in her room, untouchable upon her lofty drum throne. She only came down for meals and medicine, during which Camille would spoon-feed her the food of aristocrats in absolute silence. Her attitude at all times was unreadable. But in the arch of her brow and the glassy stare of her eyes was a certain disdain, a kind of embarrassment, that evoked immense discontent within Camille. Were her efforts not enough? What more did she have to do to appease her mother?
These questions kept Camille awake at night, fruitlessly searching for the answers. Légende was the anthem of her despair. She could take it no longer.
“Mother?” Camille called up the curlicue staircase to the second floor. When she received no response, she tried again, wearily creeping up the first few steps. “Eleanor? I’d like to have a little talk.”
Nothing again. Camille resolutely climbed the rest of the stairs and approached the ornate cedar door that Eleanor hid behind in her depraved game of hide-and-go-seek. The harp’s regal tones could be heard, muffled, on the other side. Giving a light knock to announce her arrival, Camille swung the door open. The notes paused.
“Mother?” Camille asked tentatively. “Could we talk for a moment?”
Eleanor seemed startled, like a wild animal caught by a hunter. The great, hulking harp, in all its grandeur, loomed over them both, throwing filaments of shadow across Camille’s face. After a moment, Eleanor regained composure and said, “Well, okay dear. What is it?” Her bony fingers lingered on the strings of the instrument.
“I’ve been thinking about your harp,” Camille replied, stepping forward into the filtered light of a window. “You spend all your time up here in your room with it, when you really ought to come out a bit more. Perhaps you could spend some time with me in the parlor?”
Eleanor frowned, the lines in her face deepening. “Oh, I’m not sure. . . I thought I might just play the harp for the rest of the afternoon.”
“But you always do that!” Camille wailed, before remembering her manners. “Pardon. What I mean to say is, it could be a nice change of pace for you. We’ll make an occasion out of it! I can fix us Earl Grey and fairy cakes, and afterward we might go into town for supper and a drink. Wouldn’t that be lovely?”
Eleanor didn’t respond right away, so she kept going. “You play that harp for hours every day, you don’t need the practice anymore. You’re already a virtuoso! A few afternoons a week spent with me couldn’t hurt you. And besides,” Camille concluded, eyes wide. “I’d appreciate your company very much.”
Camille’s mother hesitated, glancing back to the nylon harp strings and her own poised hands, before peering into the space just below her daughter’s eyes and smiling vaguely. “I suppose tea could be nice. . . yes, alright, but just a few hours.”
“Brilliant! I’ll get the water boiled,” Camille responded instantaneously. She didn’t have the zeal to negotiate with Eleanor on the arrangement any further. In her deeply callous mind, she knew this would be the best thing her mother would agree to without putting up more of a fight.
“I’ll be just a moment, dear. I have to find my petticoat,” Eleanor responded lamely, but Camille had already departed the room and began a hasty descent down the stairs. She worked with unusual vigor, and in an instant a crimson flame was capering in the fire place, flitting like the hopeful, naïve embers in Camille’s soul.
As the tap ran, the iron cooking kettle was filled with crystalline water, so unbelievably clear that Camille could see her own reflection in its depths. The sight made her freeze; even the hiss of the fire seemed to go silent.
Who was the woman who stared back at her? It couldn’t be Camille. This woman’s hair was a greasy mess, tangled and greying like withering liriope in a drought. Her bonnet hat was draped limply over the crest of her head in an unraveling knot. The summer-sky-colored cotton of her dress frayed, and her lace gloves had new tears. The woman’s eyes and face had a certain porcelain quality that made her look like a taxidermy cadaver propped upright. How could this ever be Camille?
The question hung in the air, paralyzed, until it was answered by a new sound: the ambient, meandering chime of the harp behind the cedar door, where Eleanor was supposed to be getting ready.
The cold water of Camille’s reflection flooded over until the love-lusting fire in her heart was nothing but a wisp of smoke.
* * *
Me or the harp? The choice seemed obvious to Camille. As she ascended up the stairs once more, she weighed the options in her mind. Me or the harp? It felt so clear, how could Eleanor possibly get it wrong? And yet she had. For year upon years upon years upon—
Me or the harp? And even if she thought she knew the proper answer, the firebrand Camille wielded, offspring of the hearth below, would have the final say. Me or the harp? It mattered not—at the end of the day, there would be no choice to make.
The cedar door flew open, revealing Eleanor, reseated at her instrument, petticoat left forgotten on the duvet. For a moment, Eleanor had the gall to look annoyed at being interrupted again. Then she spotted the torch in Camille’s hands and looked fearful.
“Camille—” she began in a pacifying tone, but she didn’t seem to be able to find any more words to say.
“Dare I even ask?” Camille said, voice flat, face blank.
“Ask what?”
“You know.”
“I don’t...”
“You choose the harp. Over me. Every time.”
Whatever response Eleanor gave went unheard. The sound of fire filled Camille’s mind. She stepped forward, and Eleanor flinched violently, as though stricken.
“Leave the room, mother,” she said lightly.
“What are you—”
“Leave.”
Eleanor got up from her stool, stumbled back a few steps, and made a wide arc around her daughter towards the door. She lingered in the threshold. “Let’s not try anything rash, Camille. Think about what you’re doing.”
“I know what I’m doing. I’m making you choose me.”
And, with a steady hand comparable to that of a seasoned swordsman, she slashed at the harp with the flame. In an instant, the great wooden frame caught fire, the polished veneer bubbling and cracking in the scorching blaze. The many strings wore thin and began to snap in sequence, a final orchestra of twangs and sharps. The terrible instrument, of which had tortured Camille for so long, swayed and clattered to the ground. Its shadow no longer towered over the girl but now swam around her feet, cast to the floor by the growing flame, of which was spreading across the carpet. The fire grew beyond control, demonic tendrils leaping from shag rugs to drapes and furniture. Camille stood in the center of the room, watching the harp burn out as the rest of the room met the same fate. Flames licked greedily at the hem of her dress.
“Camille! Oh, Camille, this is a disaster! We must leave at once!” Eleanor shrieked from the outside hall.
Camille let out a small laugh. “No, I’m not done watching it burn. I need to know it’s all gone.”
“Camille, please! Don’t do this! I—I need you! Who else will care for me in my frail state? It could only be you, my faithful daughter! Don’t you know I love you?”
The fire in Camille’s heart surged with triumph. “I know. I just wanted to hear you say it.”
Eleanor sobbed and pleaded, but she could bear the heat and pain no longer and fled the manor to get help. Within her mother’s chambers, Camille beamed and laughed with mirth. She had done it! Her mother loved her now, she’d said it herself! What more was there to have? She was the richest soul to ever live, and she would be the richest to ever die.
The twin flames, one in her heart and one in the room, rose to their zeniths. Her mind was satisfied and engulfed in fire, and her body promptly followed suit.
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