angelique dunn | d7 | fin

She wasn't one for nicknames. Not that she objected to having one bestowed upon her, but she wouldn't insist on being called anything either. Her sister called her Angie. Her parents called her Angelique (well, most people called her Angelique, really, that was her actual name, so that didn't count). The exception, though, was when people called her Angel. She was nothing remotely of the sort.

Angelique hadn't caused too much mischief since she was young; in fact, her troublemaking days ended when she was about twelve. Her father had scolded her for it (well, more like criticized, as he always did), in the way that fathers do, and she had slowly ground to a halt. Yet, no matter how mild-mannered she was now, she didn't consider herself pure or angelic in the slightest. That title was only reserved for the best of people, and she wasn't there yet.

"You're too nice," Hayward would tell her.

"I'm altruistic," Angelique would respond.

The world was already too terrible of a place to not be nice to people. She'd try to help her neighbors run errands, tutor her classmates although she was barely getting by herself, and always say please and thank you, even if she wasn't feeling grateful in the slightest. Part of this was influenced by her grandparents; they were rather well-to-do people and wanted well-to-do grandchildren, although there wasn't really any reason they had to prove themselves to anyone else in Seven. Her father was a bit of a pain when it came to etiquette as well, even though he worked in the forests like everyone else and acted gruff when the time came like everyone else. Frankly, Angelique didn't see the point, but she'd grit her teeth and bear it anyway. She wanted to improve herself, to be a better person, not spiral backward like her sister was in the midst of doing.

Her sister. While Angelique loved her dearly and even admired her gusto, she often found herself secretly criticizing her behavior. Hayward shouldn't act like that, she'd think, it's not becoming of her. It wouldn't be becoming of Angelique if she had done it. She'd never be allowed to live like that, even if she wanted to. So she'd stay behind, watch her sister go, run behind her when things got too wild and try to reign her in but ultimately fail. Their mother would get stressed, and she'd cast longing looks out the window once the storm was gone, and Angelique would wish that things were different, that her mother didn't have to chase after her little girl, that her mother would remember that she had another little girl right here. But it was alright. She would be the girl her sister couldn't be, even if it didn't matter. And Hayward would be the girl Angelique could never be.

Although she squeezed herself into the role of the mediator, quite frankly it was hard not to let herself ooze out. In a sense, some part of Angelique had always been mutable, wanting to change even if there was no true reason why. She'd see something that another kid at school had and she would want it, not to outshine them but just because it looked cool. Ever since she was little, she would venture out into the woods alone and just absorb the scene, feel the breeze dance through her reddish-blonde hair, absorb how familiar it was yet how different it was from where she rest her head every day, never feeling at ease even though she was home with the people she was meant to love.

Once she wished aloud that she had blue eyes instead of hazel, only for her mother to gasp in shock and remind her of how beautiful she was. It wasn't that hazel wasn't beautiful - it just wasn't blue. Blue was cool. It was like the sky that hung over Seven like a loving blanket. She wanted to be cool. She wanted to be the sky and everything underneath it, because well, sometimes just being one thing, one regular little thing that people cast their eyes over without a second glance just wasn't enough. She didn't want to be judged, but she didn't want to be forgotten either. So she smiled, and tried to be there for others, because at least being remembered for being altruistic would be something. It wasn't extraordinary, but it was good.

She wanted to be good.