Page 3 of Velvet Chains
My wedding dress.
No… not Victor.
“Miss Thompson…” The eldest maid steps forward, her voice soft but firm. She’s a petite woman, her silver hair pulled back into a tight bun, her face lined with years of experience. “You’ll have to try out the wedding dress to see if it fits.”
I open my mouth to protest, to scream, to do something…
No.
No, there won’t be a wedding.
There can’t be.
Because Victor is dead.
I want to scream the words at these maids, these perfect little dolls with their pristine uniforms and their emotionless faces.
I want to grab them by their starched collars and shake them until they understand the gravity of the situation.
Don’t they get it? Victor is gone. He’s not coming back. And without him, this whole charade is pointless.
But I can’t say it.
I can’t force the words past my lips. They’re lodged in my chest, a heavy weight that threatens to crush me from the inside out.
So I stand there, mute and seething, as they bustle around me, holding up the dress, fussing with the lace and the buttons. They’re talking, their voices a distant buzz in my ears, but I can’t make out the words. It’s like I’m underwater, everything muffled and distorted.
This is wrong.
It’s all wrong.
I shouldn’t be here, playing dress-up like some kind of twisted fairytale princess. I—
The words stick in my throat like vomit.
I want to spit them out, hurl them at these maids with their perfect fucking timing and their pristine white dress.
There will be no wedding. No fairytale ending. No happily ever after.
Because Victor is dead.
The thought keeps cutting into me like a serrated knife, ripping me open.
I want to scream, to rage, to tear this fucking dress to shreds. I want to watch the delicate lace unravel, the satin shred beneath my fingers. I want to rip it apart, just like my life has been ripped apart.
But I can’t. I won’t. Because I’m a coward.
A fucking coward who can’t even stand up for herself.
I keep myself silent and still as they fuss over me, pinning and tucking and smoothing. Their hands are cold, their touch impersonal. They don’t care about me, about my pain. I’m just another job to them, another bride.
I’m frozen, my body refusing to cooperate as they remove the dress and lay it out on the bed, smoothing the fabric with practiced hands.
“Laura!” Eli’s excited voice fills the room as she bounds in, her eyes wide with delight. “Look at your dress! It’s so pretty!”
She runs her small hands over the delicate lace, her face lit up with innocent joy. For a moment, I almost envy her naivety, her ability to find happiness in the midst of all this chaos.
But then Ksenia steps into the room, her presence commanding attention like a queen entering her court. Her face is a mask of cold indifference, as if the earlier conversation, the news of Victor’s possible death, had never happened.
