Chapter 5: Bargaining

It was five minutes to six in the evening, I was losing my mind. I had never been restricted to a single room ever before, all my life I’d had access to gardens and entertainment and libraries. I had friends I could see at any time, I never had to be bored. The isolation and confinement was driving me insane. The dreadfully urgent need to pee was only making it worse a thousand-fold.

At this point I was pacing around my room. Every lap or two I would stare at the clock or go the window and watch for anything at all. The sunset was beautiful, but even at this time where I might have been able to sit and watch the scenery the urgent need for a bathroom made it impossible to sit still. There was only one thing constantly on my mind.

They had told me that they would bring me dinner, I had thought it would be at four, when that passed I assumed five, now I simply begged for it to be served at six. Once I had dinner it would provide food, and the chance to use the bathroom, surely they would permit me that, surely. . .

I continued to pace, trying to find any escape in moving around. Lap after lap of my room, there was simply nothing else to do. I had already rifled through the clothing that had been given to me. All of it was similar to what I was currently wearing, bright or pastel colours, simple and childish. The best of it was short white dresses not dissimilar to ones I’d worn before, but nothing that I would have chosen myself. Minutes more passed before finally I heard the nob of my door squeak and suddenly I was no longer alone.

Truly I had expected it to be Cynthia who would come back to torment me, but instead it was Lena who entered holding a dinner tray. It had a plate full of food and a small ceramic cup. It looked like the food was sausages, buns, and a baked potato. It was quite delicious looking, but despite that there was truly only one thing on my mind.

“Oh thank gods!” I exclaimed abruptly as soon as the door was wide enough open to see her face. “Please I need to use the bathroom right away!”

Lena heard me but continued into my room to place the tray down gently on the bed. “Evening Christina, I hope you’ve had some time to reflect. Please eat up, and don’t worry about the dishes, you can bring them down tomorrow when breakfast is ready.” She was seemingly ignoring everything I had to say. I’m sure I would have been slightly annoyed at it all, but my mind was of singular focus.

“Yes, okay I will do that but please! Can you take me to the closest bathroom?” Lena was now walking back towards the door, but she turned to me before she had reached it and finally graced me with acknowledging my urgency.

“You know what your punishment is, you’re not allowed outside your room for the rest of the night. You’ll have to wait until the morning.” Lena started to resume her direction towards the door and suddenly the fear that they would simply leave me was being realized into reality.

“Please, Miss Southgard!” I was begging at this point, desperate to the point of abandoning my pride.

But still Lena simply continued out the door. “Goodnight Christina.” She bid me farewell. I felt like I was suffocating, this couldn’t be happening, I won’t let this happen.

“I promise I’ll behave! Please Lena, I’m sorry!”

I realized my words struck her differently for some reason, as her hand now paused on the doorknob. Despite her previous requests this was the first time I had used her name.

Lena looked back over to me, staring softly for a few moments. I stood there silently, pleading with her with every muscle in my face just begging her to take pity of me.

The moments felt like hours. I could tell she was making up her mind, but the fact that she needed to do that at all was proof that there was a chance. After what seemed like an eternity it finally she finally responded, “Okay Christina, I’ll escort you to the bathroom, but in turn I want you to continue to show me that you know how to listen, okay?” As she spoke I was already nodding early.

“Now what I mean for this is I want you to continue to behave as well just did, and continue to call me Lena, as I’ve asked. No more ‘Miss Southgard’ or any other name, Just Lena. Am I clear dear?”

As she clarified her demands I felt irked. Why did she care so much I referred to her by her first name? Despite my own desperation, despite how easy of a task it would be the wish got under my skin, and I wasn’t even sure exactly why.

But thankfully for my dignity it wasn’t enough to stop me from agreeing. “Yes, I understand I promise.” I said with urgency.

“Yes what?”

For a second all the physical stress of my situation melted away and I realized that I was now being forced to commit. “Yes Lena, I understand. I promise.” I said looking down. I still didn’t quite understand what evoked such shame or irritance in me, but I could feel it in my head and my chest.

“Thank you Christina. Now I want you remember, if you don’t follow through please remember how you’re feeling right now, remember what kind of relief was given to you for agreeing to this, and remember what it would be like if that kind of relief was taken away.”

She finished her warning and extended her open hand to me to take. I shuddered for a moment and looked up at her as I was basically pressing my knees together to manage my needing to pee. “Do I have to hold you hand?”

She looked at me with a genuinely kind smile, and a look of almost…admiration? “Yes dear, you do. Now come along”

I let out a tired sigh, anxious to simply be free from my physical distress. I grasped her palm in my own, and not a second later allowed her to lead me out of my own room by the hand and further down the hall.

************

A short amount of time later we both arrived back in my room. Lena still insisted on making me hold her hand on the way back, and frankly I didn’t have it in me to complain. Once more, after I made it I learned I had leaked a small amount onto my underwear, and that fact alone made me so embarrassed as to be silent for the rest of the trip back, and simply do what she told me too.

“Okay, now why don’t you go eat something darling. And remember, tomorrow morning you’re to get dressed, make your bed, and bringing your laundry to the chute, and as well extra from tonight please bring your dishes down.”

I still wasn’t making eye contact with her as she reminded me of all of my duties. I hadn’t even told her about how my underwear was slightly wet and I hated the thought of her knowing. I instead nodded a small amount, now eager to get back in my room despite how badly I longed to get out of it.

“Use your words darling.” Lena demanded of me in a maternal tone. The ask made me inhale of mental exhaustion because I knew exactly what she wanted me to say.

“Yes Lena.”

“Good, now what do you say for letting you out of your punishment briefly?” Her tone was driving me through the roof, but my own hidden situation forbade me from expressing it in any way but defeat.

I simply sighed heavily and gave her what she wanted. “Thank you.”

“Thank you, what?” She said clearly still expecting me to live up to my end of the bargain at every single turn.

“Thank you Lena.”

“Thank you Christina, good girl!”

The comment made me wince. ‘Good girl’? What was I some kind of pet to them? Anger flared in my chest. My pride, my resolve, it was being kept down before. But now it was to much and I had to let it escape.

“I hate this entire place,” The words slipped out of my mouth but as they did I looked directly into Lena’s eyes and finished my thought “And I hate you all.”

I don’t know what I expected, anger? Annoyance? More punishment? But what ever it was, Lena just let her face fall in a look of sad disappointment she released my hand. And just spoke earnestly without a single hint of matronly or mocking tone.

“I’m sorry you feel that way Christina. But this is just the way things are now, and its for the better. I know you’re used to a very different life, but me and my family are trying to show you a better way.” She sighed deeply, clearly looking for the right words. While she did I simply scowled at her. I had nothing else to say myself.

“I know its hard right now, but this is what you need. And please if you can, reflect on yourself. You’re angry because right now you don’t feel cared for. But look at your actions, look at all you’ve done since the short time I’ve known you.” She briefly closed her eyes and shook her head, then reaching over to place her hand on the doorknob in front of me, getting ready to let me back into my isolation. Lena looked back at me one time before allowing me entry.

“How can you treat people the way that you do and expect them to care for you back?”

The words stunned me, and I momentarily was shaken from my scowl. But before I could do anything else she opened the door and motioned me inside. “Goodnight Christina.”

Being thrown such an insult, part of me wanted to snap back, but instead I took the escape she offered. Without looking back at her or waiting a single second longer I sped into my room, and around a corner to be secluded, desperately trying to ignore Lena’s words. Not a second later I heard the door click shut. Finally, I was alone.

The first thing I did was immediately pull off my overalls and get out of my damp clothing. I threw the pair of underwear into the small laundry hamper in disgust. Their rules, their systems, their damned magic made everything so difficult. I was a grown woman who was having a hard time making it to the bathroom in time and it was completely their fault. I had to beg and make deals to simply be allowed to go to the bathroom. It was degrading, it was humiliating, but there was not a single thing I could do.

I stomped my foot and let out a yelp of frustration to help give outlet to my feelings. But beyond that, I just meekly opened up the drawers of my dresser and chose a new pair of underwear to replace my last pair.

Looking down there were only 3 other pairs, one was solid pastel pink, another white and pink horizontal stripes, and the last was a similar full white to what I had been wearing. All of them were decorated with some simple lace around the waist band and small bow decorating the front. They all looked childish. I decided on full pink and quickly redressed myself. Feeling better and with a little bit more of my dignity intact, I turned to the tray of food that had been sitting waiting for me.

I ate, and the food was good. It tasted just as good as breakfast had, but much more savory and much more filling. The taste help distract all the thoughts that could have swarmed my head, and I was able to eat in relative peace. I decided to sit looking out the window, still getting to observe the last portion of the sunset, and now able to appreciate it that much more. After finishing I put the tray of dishes on top of my dresser and returned to watch the orange red glow of the sun disappear behind the trees.

Hours passed until the sun was fully gone, and with the new moon absent from the sky, everything was dark. Nothing else to do but stare out the window. The only thing I could do was reflect on Lena’s words. “How can you treat people the way that you do and expect them to care for you back?” For the first time in a long time, I thought of my family. My mother, my father, and my sister. They had left me behind when they fled the kingdom. We were never close, my parents always having important business to attend to, my sister wanting to follow her own dreams, eager to leave me behind for whatever came ahead. I remembered when she got accepted to do royal work for The Crown how excited she was to leave, and the day she left and went to live in the royal castle early in the morning, she didn’t even wake me to say goodbye. By the time I awoke eager to see her off, she was already gone. My parents would often disappear from home on different trips for months without giving me single notice. During that time, I was fed, had my basic needs looked after by the staff, but I was never close enough to even know their names. Was that my fault or theirs? They had never attempted to do anything with me even since I was a child, and those employed would rotate through and be replaced so fast, I never built a lasting connection with any of them.

Lena’s words rang in my head again. Was this why it had been like this my entire life? Nobody slowing down long enough to keep me in pace, was it because I was the problem?

I missed my family. Despite their absences I enjoyed having them in my life. Thinking of times being a young child, my father would play games with me and my sister. Any game we wanted to play he said yes, he never denied us anything. We were so small then, and so happy. Remembering such a cherished time, I stopped to think, what if I never see them again? I thought back to my mother, she had a beloved silver raven pendant that she wore, passed down through my mother’s family to the youngest daughter. It was symbolic of our last name, ‘Revallia’. When I was a child she told me it would be mine one day. Much like my father, my mother eventually grew colder and more focused on other things in her life rather than myself, so she hadn’t even told me how I would inherit it in years, but regardless of all of that, it meant something to me. Now I didn’t even know if she had it if it had been stolen by looters or ‘redistributed’ by the new rule. All I knew was that I would never get to wear it.

I had never taken time to properly think about everything that had happened since I learned they abandoned me. At first, I was annoyed my family would leave me behind, then furious with them for trapping me in such a horrible situation. But now the reality was starting to hit me. They were gone, they chose to leave me, and I might never see them again. I was alone.

Lena’s words still trapped in my head were now accompanied by my own.

Nobody will care for you.

I miss my family.

I am alone.

I continued to sit on my bed. I continued to stare out the window. Tomorrow I would pick myself up, re-establish myself. Tomorrow would be better, I promised myself that. But for now, I cried. I cried tears of sorrow over who I was, where I was, and what I was. I cried over everything I had lost in the process of getting to where I was. I cried tears for myself staring off into the dark moonless night. I cried for me because nobody else would.

Tomorrow would be better.