girl undone / mauve {✾}

She listens to the sound of spirits breaking on either side of her; and it makes her laugh — "oh, please, try spending a few nights in detention when Miss Underwood is in charge." It's like her previous school-based shenanigans happened only yesterday, just a tumble and a bump through a warp in time. Lonely girl caught in a jar for all to see. Sometimes, she wonders if she's a moth or a mantis. But most times, like now, she feels acutely aware of exactly who she is.

Mauve Dollanganger, cleverest mind her side of Three and this side of Six — heiress of a family reputation already in shambles, hated by her last surviving family member and pretty much anyone she's ever tried to hold a conversation with. Smart as she is, she often fails to realize when her honesty bleeds into pure cruelty. All she has are her facts and the stray dogs she collects along the way; little genius with no more ambition than to just simply know. Everything.

That's all she needs. The girl that foresees the ending has the winning hand. She's her father's daughter, a slippery businessman in a plaid skirt and a denim jacket, wild copper curls spilling over her shoulders. She stares at blank walls, resounding silence, the cries of confusion and fear seeping into every space until it all becomes white noise. And she doesn't flinch, doesn't waver, only casually opens her textbook and reminds herself that terrible things are inevitable. To heal the wound, you must cauterize it.

Someone sobs a stranger's name / a plea / through the static.

Annoyed by the interruption to her study of the macabre, this time in particular about the taxidermy of beetle species, she calls over her shoulder and speaks gleefully.

"They're probably going to die!"