(( mabel;; ))
Before Henry was ‘King Henry’, he was ‘Her Henry’. There was, of course, an inkling of reason within her that told her that she could not really own a person, and that Henry could truly never be her’s. She knew from experience, to be owned, to be kept within someone else’s clutch, to be seen as another person’s property instead of a free individual was no ideal life. But this, Mabel would convince herself, was different somehow. Mabel would utter the phrase, “My Henry,” to herself so often that even the many years after she was no longer apart of his life the words were still there on her tongue, reminiscent of the past like a ghost’s whisper. No longer sweet and tender like kiss they first shared, but bitter like the open wound he left.
How bad she wanted to blame Henry for her pain, if only to escape from blaming herself. If only to escape from feeling like the foolish girl she was. She could easily point fingers to Henry and say that he kept her employed just to rub everything in her face, as if to punish her for believing he could ever be hers. To keep her wounds fresh by showing off his beautiful wife, yet still hold the power to twirl plain Mabel around his finger with a simple look. She was a twenty eight year old hand maiden for God’s sake, any hope of suitors of her own were running out and quick. If there was one thing that’d make her family proud, it’d be bringing home a decent fellow. Somehow, Mabel never had an appetite for decent fellows, nor any man at all these days.
Something deep within her wanted to blame it on the King.
And there it was again, A ghost’s whisper of a touch against her chin. So minute, only the trained eye could spot it. Yet for Mabel it lingered for longer than it was supposed to. ‘My Hen—’ she stopped herself.
She peered up and into his dark orbs. Her gaze locked on, intense, flickering away not once. She wished from that he could see everything she could only dream of telling him. ‘You broke me,’ she hoped they’d say, ‘Did my love mean anything to you at all? Was I just collateral damage, a casualty worth made in the grand scheme of things? Perhaps, I’m just the foolish girl who thought the mountain of the molehill of our fling.’
“Perhaps, I’m just the foolish girl who thought the mountain o—” No, it sounded worse said out loud. “I thought the world of you,” no, stop. talking. She spoke the words with just a whisper barely loud enough for anyone’s ears, let alone his — A hitch in her voice involuntary sprung with the word, ‘you’. She cursed her momentary lapses of boldness. Her eyes flickered to her hands in panic, then back to Henry’s. As a quick effort to save herself, she spun in the opposite direction, “Biscuits was it? I…I…I shall hurry to get those for you, Your Majesty.” She took off.
Her words bled. In them, an honesty he could only hope to have and an emotion he had been robbed off. And perhaps Mabel was the only person who could make his heart weep even when it had turned into stone. I thought the world of you. The word echoed in him, the use of past tense made him ached even when he really shouldn’t. What was he expecting, really? For a girl he had thrown away and cast aside to still look at him with stars in her yes and waited by his side? For her to understand why he had done that when he had never spoke a word of it? His reasons, they remained in his thoughts. His feelings, locked away in a chamber he never wished to visit anymore. And his love? His love –– ah, well his love was right in front of him; even if he never spoke a word of it anymore. He had thought that love was as sweet as honey, and it had been true once upon a time. But now he thought of it as naught but a grapefruit. It was bitter in his veins despite running pink. The memory of how it used to be, when he could still dream and thought that the world was in his grasp, that everything could be saved just with a little bit of love. And when he looked into her eyes, he could see the future as a clear bright sky –– but when he looked out into the window, it’s nothing but an overcast and inclement. His hand shot up as she’s about to take off, fingers wrapping around her wrist –– it was an action done with his conscious. Deliberate, purposeful. “And I you.” When he replied, his voice shook just the slightest, like how the wind made the leaves tremble so. “I still do think of the world of you even until now. There could be no one else.” What he could not say in words, were spoken to with his eyes. It was as if something broke the spell and the frost in his eyes shattered, there was a vulnerability in them before he shook them off with a blink of his eyes. “It’s fine. Just go get something for yourself to eat, Mabel.”
