I’ve never been one to travel with my father and brothers before now, they always said it was too dangerous for a young girl like me; however, when our government requested that our entire family travel to a country in the East as foreign diplomats on peace and to forge an alliance for trade; father couldn’t refuse. Even my older brothers, Stephan and Edward, couldn’t go against the government; nor could my step-mother, Elizabeth, and her son, Jeremy. The two of them married into our family six months after my mother passed; Elizabeth was a widow with a son, and father needed the companionship.
To get away from our home country and explore the world, that was my greatest dream. When we left our home and began to make our way to this “new world” by train and boat, The train ride itself was uncomfortable; the heat from the area we were traveling through made the air hot, including the company of Elizabeth, it was unbearable. To keep my mind off the discomfort, I took up my old hobby of needle-point embroidery; something my late mother taught me.
“What are you making, my dear,” father asked me after three days had passed.
“I’m trying to make a Chickadee on a willow branch,” I grunted and squeaked as the needle pricked my finger for the millionth time. Of all times to forget my thimble, it was on the one occasion that I needed it.
I hear my step-mother laugh at my expense, like my moment of pain was her only source of amusement on this trip. She never once tried to do embroidering, saying it was a waste of time and would be easier just to buy a garment with the embroidery already done; I do not care for Elizabeth. I haven’t yet to call her “Mother”, and my brothers don’t seem to want to call her that either. Jeremy, on the other hand, seems to be fine with calling my father his; we aren’t blood; I don’t see why he feels the need to act like we are.
Jeremy is two months older than I am, making him seventeen; just three years younger than Stephan. Edward was twenty-two, he should already be married and living with his new family back home, but decided to work on his studies more than finding a wife; Stephan just didn’t care about marriage, he’d rather fool around while he’s young than settle down and raise a family.
I would be turning seventeen on this trip; hopefully, my family would remember and not get caught up in the politics of this trip. I also hope that Elizabeth won’t make me out to be a, as she would put it, “sad excuse of a woman…not even a large dowry would get her a husband…”; why does she dislike me so much, I’ve tried to like her when she first married father. Why can’t she make an effort?
I squeaked again as the needle punctured my little finger and began to bleed a little; once again Elizabeth laughs this time she hides her mouth behind a ruby red silk and white lace hand fan she brought from home, but she looks out the window in hopes of hiding it from father, who glanced at her. Jeremy, who sat between me and Stephan on the train, looked at me with pity. Edward, who was next to father, glanced at me and after a moment of silence laughed, then Stephan began to laugh, then I started to laugh; for no reason other than the silent comment I could hear them thinking: “Taking the literal meaning of putting yourself in your work again, huh?” Stephan and Edward always seemed to know how to make me feel better; especially if it’s after Elizabeth’s hateful thinks about me, usually in public or in front of father and myself.
“Marie, what are you going to do with your chickadee once you’ve finished it,” Jeremy asked me, once the laughter died down.
Even though I don’t care for him or Elizabeth, at least Jeremy was making an effort in trying to see us as a family; though I still don’t like it. “I don’t know yet,” I answered, “if Uncle Charles is in the country like his letters said, I might give it to him,” I smiled softly.
“Charlton, Marie. His name is Charlton,” Elizabeth scoffed at my comment, “honestly, I don’t understand how disrespectful you are!” she growled out that last sentence. “And he’s not your uncle!”
“Elizabeth, Charlton and I have been friends since University. In a way, he’s like my brother,” father spoke calmly, trying to calm Elizabeth down as well, “He told the children to call him ‘Uncle’. He says it keeps him feeling youthful.”
It’s true I guess; Uncle Charles was at least 50, two years older than father, yet when my brothers or I call him ‘Charlton’ he looks like he ages dramatically within the time it takes to say his name in a greeting. In fact, he prefers father calling him ‘Charles’ more so than “Charlton, old boy” like he used to do.
Elizabeth huffed in irritation and looked out the window again fanning herself with her hand fan faster. Jeremy looked down, almost ashamed that he had asked the question in the first place. I kept my eye on Elizabeth, who looked like she wanted to say something along the lines of:
“No one would want a rag like that…”
“Marie, why not give it to the ruler of the country we’re going to,” Edward said; Elizabeth abruptly stopped fanning herself, she sat up straighter in surprise of his suggestion.
Father nodded in agreement with the thought; however, I just stared at them, then down at my work. It wasn’t like the embroidery done in the shops back home; it wasn’t elaborate or exceptional as many I’ve seen, but it was modest and showed the time it took me to make. Mother would have been pleased with the progress I’ve made since first starting this hobby; before a daisy would look more like an infant had spit up their meal onto the fabric, now it was almost on the same level as some of the more experienced apprentice seamstresses in those shops.
“Alexander, speaking of the emperor,” Elizabeth said in her usual sweet tone when she wants something, “why did our government want all of us to come with you, as appose to just you and our sons.”
Father took a long exhale, “Well, the government feels that if the emperor sees that we, as a whole country, are comfortable with sending an entire family with children to a new and known place that it's supposed to set him at ease and be more willing to open up to the idea of a trade alliance, a possible a colony in his land.” He explained as minimally as possible; perhaps just to extinguish Elizabeth’s growing annoyance with having to travel to a different country. It wasn’t working very well.
Soon after sat back into the cushion of the train car, Stephan mumbled something too incoherent to make out, and was probably just him talking to himself over a thought he had, but sent Elizabeth into her usual overly dramatic fits.
“How dare you!” she screamed, “if the government hadn’t ordered your father to bring all of us on this God-forsaken trio, I’d be having afternoon tea with my friends, shopping for the perfect ‘welcome home’ gifts, or taking a walk at the park,” she rambles off her would-have-been plans, “but no! I’m stuck on a train, riding couch no-less, to a strange country where I’ll have to dine on strange foods, buy strange gifts for my friends, and get lost walking down strange paths where…who knows what could happen! And for what?!”
The tension that seemed to have been building up within the car finally dissipated with Elizabeth’s outburst; though it did feel like if anyone spoke again Elizabeth would start her tyrant over again. So for the remainder of the train ride, no one spoke. Father and Edward read the train’s newspaper, Stephan turned onto his side and slept, Jeremy and Elizabeth began reading books they brought with them, and I continued my needlework.
Next to mother’s funeral, this is one of the only times we’ve sat through silence and the shortest. The remaining time we had on the train was another two and a half days, but I doubt Elizabeth would last another hour in this confined space. And for our sake, and for the sake of everyone else on the train, I hope we arrive sooner rather than later.
Comments (0)
See all