the watching / florentine, day one

i watch the fools, one by one, from where i'm hidden.

they come, and they yank away at the sword in the stone as though they might be the chosen one. none of us are graced by god, not here, not today.

i, for example, am a tangled mess of lies and bandages, laying between shattered rock, the rubble remains of a monster passing through, a thousand tombstones in a graveyard that will one day commemorate me. not yet, though. first, i have things to do. 

i suppose i should have snapped august's neck when he'd entered the room. would it have been easier, to do it quickly? would it be merciful, to let my hands be the one to do the deed, rather than letting him wander off into the trees, green-cheeked, a useless robin-hood replica, destined to fall into the arms of someone who is really rotten, not just pretending, like me? even it would be kinder, i couldn't do it. instead, i talked to him, let him ask his endless questions, as though my answers are worth anything at all. 

i told him i'm a liar. i told him, but he wasn't listening. 

he sat at my feet below the throne, offering himself up to the slaughter. trust is a very dangerous thing in a place like this, but everyone else is blind to it. they don't want to believe that their friends are enemies or that their enemies are friends. luckily for me, i invented this game. i've been playing for it for a decade now. that's how i know i've got them beat. 

another set of sticky fingers wrapped around the hilt, another sharp intake of breath as they struggle, a tribute who has grown up believing that the world is made of gingersnaps and buttercream. i'd laugh, but my silence is critical; if i do not return to andromache and eulalie, the foundation i have laboured to build will crumble around me, and so before dawn i must be sleeping at their sides. 

if the other flo was here in my place, the girl i am pretending to be, the sword would slide right out of the rock like it was candle wax, glorious, a perfect fit in soft, unbloodied hands. the people would cheer and clap, and the babies would turn in their cribs, nightmares replaced with dreams of sweet milk and buttercups. 

i feel farther from her than i have ever felt, right now. more so than the day i climbed out of my bedroom window armed with nothing but my nightdress, eight years old and alone in the world. i have departed completely from the person i once was, that doll of a child with the world at her feet. she is unfamiliar. we are estranged, and yet, i must continue to play my part.

_[DARS]