Dance With Me, Ma Cherie

"Must I do this, Grandmére?"

"But of course, my dear Amy!" Grace seemed taken aback at the implication that it wasn't necessary. She felt that her granddaughter, though now eighteen years, was not quite prepared for the critical and scrutinizing eyes of London. So she had set about it by travelling through all those miles separating their estates, followed by carriages containing an array of materials that had flooded Amy's bedroom. She arrived not long after Hamilton Holt's visit, her many servants bustling in and out of the Cahills' manor.

"This...corset is –"

"—simply wonderful and fitting for such a beautiful young lady as you are!"

"Quite right, Ivan," Grace said. The dressmaker she had brought seemed to be in the throes of happiness at the first syllable of her praise. Amy did not feel the same way.

"It hurts," she whispered to one of the maids who were tightening the strings.

"Will you repeat what you have said, Amy? Ladies must speak softly, but not as softly as you do. When you speak, you speak eloquently but with caution, taking care to voice even the most vulgar of opinions with poise and delicacy." Grace pointed her elaborate painted fan at her granddaughter. "However, vulgar opinions are most unbecoming."

"Yes, Grandmére," Amy said. She winced as another string was pulled, and another strand of her hair was tightly curled and arranged in a towering hairdo. It seemed like the pins were digging into her scalp, making her head scream with a thousand protestations, none of which were spoken aloud.

"Now what was it you were saying?"

"I was remarking that the dress is…extravagant," Amy said. The dress in question was a puffy pink ball gown, adorned with ribbons and glitter; and, she imagined, it had many layers.

"This is only for practice, my Lady," Ivan said, picking up the dress and brandishing it at the Lady's face with a flourish. Amy caught a glimpse of at least five layers stiff with starch. She swallowed back a wail.

"For practice?" She could only wonder at what the real thing was. Would it be twice as enormous, twice as suffocating, twice as repulsive? Pink was not her color, and never would be. Ball gowns she hated with every fiber of her being. The shoes, spiky and clunky and all over the place, were things she would rather avoid. And the hair – the hair made bouffant; the hair curled and practically glued to her head; the hair that smarted at the slightest touch – it made it her want to flee.

"Yes, my Lady," Ivan said. He gave the dress to one of the maids attending to Amy. "Now take care to not ruin the hairdo. Put it in place properly – yes, do it slowly. No, that ribbon isn't quite tied the right way. Do it like this." He proceeded to loop the ribbons with an air of excessiveness. When it was done, Amy could feel it flapping along with her rustling skirts whenever she moved.

"Call in Matthews," Grace said, clapping her hands. The fan fell, forgotten, to the floor. A servant picked it up and placed it on a side table; Grace did not seem to notice. There was a knock, and Dante opened the doors. Matthews turned out to be a young man in the same black suit that most male servants wore, his hands covered in white gloves. His arms cradled a stack of books. Amy brightened somewhat.

"Am I to read them?" she asked, thinking that it must either be a reward or an exercise in speech. Perhaps she would be asked to sit and read out the words. There was nothing she would have liked better. At least it would be an exercise that would serve her own desires – getting lost in the book – and at the same time, she would be fulfilling the role that Grace wanted her to play. A lady benefactor, giving to society's homeless and unfortunate, educating children by reading to them. It would take her mind off the scratchy dress, the pinching shoes, the painful hair, and the heavily made-up face.

"Non, Mademoiselle." Matthews lowered the books onto the table. "These shall be placed on your head. We will be learning the proper carriage today. The books must not fall off; if they do, it is ten minutes added to your lesson, and another book on your head."

Every last bit of romantic notions left straggling behind in Amy's mind escaped. She had not known, until this moment, that books would be distasteful to her. The mere idea of carrying them on her head, walking while they tottered somewhere on top of her hairdo, and the very minutes of discomfort ticking by – they made it all the more impossible for her to restrain her instinct to run.

"Ready, Mademoiselle?" Matthews had a book in his hands, what looked to be a heavy volume bound in red leather and gold engravings. She did not have time to decode the fancy script that swirled across its cover before the book was on her head. She felt an odd sensation in the base of her spine. Was it fear?

She closed her eyes and, despite her misgivings, nodded.

"Are you tired, Amy?"

Amy's smile was weak. The ball room was deserted; there was little that remained of her session. Grace had dismissed the servants a few minutes ago, and only Dante stayed on the other side of the doors. She kicked off her shoes. They glanced off the tiles, landing with a sharp thump somewhere on the floor. She could not remove the dress, not in front of Grace, but she contented herself with removing the earrings brushing against her neck, and the pins that bound her hair. Her tresses were twisted, flowing down her shoulder in a mass of disorganization, sighing with relief when they were released. She sighed with relief, herself.

"I apologize, my dear, but if there must be a reason for my visit, it has to be this." Grace smiled at her, and the harshness that colored her words a while before was gone. She sat down on a chair. "Many of the ton have frowned and whispered that I did not guide you as I should have. In other circumstances, I might have ignored them. But there are other pressing matters, and frankly speaking, I must groom you for their henpecking ways and frivolous gossip. It is also, as you can see, a plausible ruse for the real reason I am here."

In an instant, Amy felt less uncomfortable and more intrigued. "What is it that you wish to speak of, Grandmére?" She combed her fingers through her reddish-brown locks, working her way through the tangles that had sprouted sometime during the fiftieth and ninetieth pin she had removed. Grace took out a brush from her purse and helped her with it.

"Not now, Amy, not now. We will approach it at a better time. Perhaps when I think you will not faint at a crowded dinner, or trip over a gentleman's shoes while you are dancing, or stutter when you speak to a noteworthy personage. The way it is now, you cannot even fight for yourself against your crotchety grandmother's demands. Though I did admire your quiet strength as you bore it as best you could."

When her hair was finally rid of the tangles and looked almost straight as it originally was, Amy turned to face her grandmother. She could feel the secret that floated, intangible, in the air. Grace replaced her brush in her purse and stood.

"So we shall continue like this for some time?"

"Oui. Now put your shoes back on." The harshness crept back into Grace's tone, but this time Amy understood, and it improved things somewhat.

"As you wish, Grandmére," Amy said. The shoes still pinched, and the dress was still scratchy, but at least her hair was unbound and free.

"Straighten your back! Move slowly! Speak softly but don't stutter – don't stutter!"

And it was this way that Grace spoke as they walked to the dining room.

So. I hope you enjoyed.

A Rose's Thorns will undergo drastic edits and plot doctoring. The World Ends With You will be revived at an undisclosed date (depending on Joelle8 and music4evah).

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Kissing Kabra by I Own Cody

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AN: Thank you so much to the 193 people who have me on their favorite author and author alert lists (130 for favorites and 63 for author alert). The support you give me during my time in this website - it only makes it so much harder for me to ever leave. But at the same time, it is also the reason why I had to leave for a while. I could not bear the pressure put on me because of my own popularity; people expected so much from every word I write.

And because I think it has served its purpose, I'm telling you this: I am also The Whisper of Wings. My two accounts have two different personalities; troubadour12 will always be traditional, while Wings' style will always be queer. I'm not telling you to go over to that account, though; I'm just telling you because I think you have the right to know.