Lilah-Adélaïde Theroux // D11 // FIN

◊ { appearance . } ◊

You look like an angel that flew from heaven. It's not just your natural beauty that you got from your mother - the big blue eyes, the long dark hair, the perfect smile, the soft skin, the amazing voice - but it's the other things that are you and only you that make you beautiful. Like the way you pet a horse's nose and hold out your hand to feed it. Palm outstretched, singing sweet, whispered words to the "gentle giants" as you call them. It's the way you treat them as your equal and not just some dumb animal that makes you beautiful. The way your fingers, nails painted to sparkle and shine in the sun, curl around the stem of a flower and you pull and it snaps. You bring it to your nose and the smile that follows illuminates the world. The way your nose crinkles when you giggle and your eyes gleam when you gaze at the stars at night. The way every dress you wear has stains from the berries you pick that you use to make pies and muddy fingerprints from when you play down by the creek. The way you never wear any shoes because you like to be able to see your painted toenails and because when you visit the creek you are sure that your toes are the best bait for catching fish. You are a jewel sparkling in a stream of wonder.

Your hair is tangled because your mother isn't around to brush it and braid it anymore and you are afraid that you will do it wrong if you try. You carry a book with you always because you never know when someone will need a story to cheer them up. I see the handful of glitter - yes, silver glitter - you hold in your hand and sprinkle across the fields and into the wool of sheep. The way your dresses (all so many different colors) dance in the wind when you run and dance and twirl and roll in the wind reminds me of a leaf fluttering free and wild in the wind. And I love that unconscious move you make when you are lying in a meadow, swallowed away by what seems like miles and miles of nothing but flowers and grass. That extension of your hand, opening and reaching and searching for the hand that is long gone. How badly I want to give you that hand back. How much my whole being aches to be there to reach out and take that empty hand, just to see that smile of yours and not that flat line that your lips slip into for just a moment before the smile returns and the light comes back to your burning blue eyes.

You'd think a child of eighteen would know better than to wish silently upon a star the way you do. There are no such things as angels and yet you wish to hold ones hand, to see the sparkle of her eyes again and feel her hands twisting your hair into long braids that flow down your back and a voice so silky and warm spinning a web of words into the perfect bedtime story. But I'm glad you believe. It gives me hope, to see the world as you do, to rest my eyes upon someone so beautiful inside and out.

◊ { personality . } ◊

You think you know but you don't. So innocent, so naïve, so beautifully childlike that your mind cannot quite wrap around what the real world is. It's cruel and dangerous and kills all things good - and yet here you are, frolicking through fields and bringing a dazzling light to everything you touch. Flowers blossom when you smile. I've seen it happen, watched the way the petals uncurl as you dance past them and your dress flutters seeds off the dandelions and the fluffy white follows behind you, waiting for you to make a wish and send them away. But you have no wishes. You have everything you need. I watch, though, in the dead of night when you sit beneath your window and gaze up at the night sky. You think I'm not there to see, but I do. The way your eyes glimmer, just a few tears forming but never falling from your eyes. Why do you cry child? I don't see you cry, I don't see you flinch at any words, no matter how bitter and hateful they may be. And still I watch you cry as you stare into the night and up into the stars. Is it your mother dear child? Is that why you cry? And then I hear you wish upon a star - I watch you scrunch up your eyes and cross your fingers and whisper against the window pane. "I wish for momma. / I wish to see her once more. / Let me see her wings." And perhaps that is the most beautiful thing about you, dear child. You believe. You believe in angels with sparkling wings and you believe they live in the stars and you believe that one day your mother will come back to you. It pains me to watch you cry every night, knowing your only wish will never come true, but you have what no one else has and so you only think you have to wait a little while longer. Belief.

You believe that the world is filled with nothing but perfection. Everyone is perfect just the way they are, everything is beautiful, and you refuse to cannot see the dark side of anything. A murder you hear about is sad, but you must make sure that you make cookies and pick flowers to take to the freshly buried soul. (Because they might get hungry on their journey to heaven.) I hear the whispers about you. You sit in the front row at school and the kids in the back all whisper things about you - "stupid, mindless, insane" - but you don't hear them Or you do but refuse to listen. Some of the farmer boys come by your house and shout at you. Your father hears to and yet he does nothing to stop them. You open your window in the attic with a smile and ask what they want ("Greetings my dear friends. / I heard you calling for me. / Speak and be heard boys.") and they say, "We heard you could talk to animals! We were just wondering if maybe you could show us how you do that exactly. Teach us how, y'know?" And the smile on your face widens at the thought of impressing them with your special talent. You don't hear the sarcasm or laughter that follows. It doesn't even register in your brain because you do not believe in it. Who would want to hurt someone so badly that they would pretend to be your friend just to tear you down? "Told you she was a freak." they say. "Was dropped on her head a few too many times I think." But I'm glad you don't hear. I can only imagine how much it would hurt if you knew that what they said was meant as a joke.

You are special. Your mother told you so and she was right. You talk to the animals because you say you can hear them asking you questions. You pet the horses when they are sad and feed the rabbits special treats when they are having a bad day. Sometimes I even watch you speak to the flowers and listen to them tell their stories that only you can hear. You are simple minded child, but you don't even realize it. Your mother told you that you could make anything shine brighter than the sun and so you make sure to always have a bit of glitter hidden in your pockets to sprinkle across something you think could use a bit of sparkle. You chase butterflies because you think they hold a sort of magic that can make you fly. You think that everyone that you capture will give you a better chance at soaring through the sky. You keep mason jars filled with rain in your room because it is the only liquid you can drink - someone so special cannot drink anything but angels' tears. You read all about fairies and magical lands and you believe that hidden under the under side of every leaf is one of those hidden worlds, even if you cannot see it. The things that you believe are real ... aren't. But I watch you smile and laugh and explain the world how you see it, and sometimes, I just can't help but fall for magic and illusions you create. So keep on dreaming dear child. Keep believing and never let it go.

◊ { history . } ◊

Never let it go or I can't imagine what you would find out. Would you find out that as soon as you were born the doctor's said there was something different about you? Would you find out that your father took you out in the woods and planned to leave you there? Would you find out that so many times he has tried too kill you and that the yelling between your parents at night was always about you? It would break you dear child, to see the world so cold and cruel, your father so sinful and violent. But with eyes that can see nothing but beauty in even the ugliest things, I am not worried about you. You will never know your past as it truly was.

Your mother did not die of natural causes when you were younger like you believe. Your father wasn't in love with her like you believed either, or at least not like love is in the fairy tales you read. Your father - despite what you believe - is a very bad man. His hands are stained red but not from the berries you pick in the meadow. His mind has wandered to the dark side and I do not mean the dark side of the moon on a special adventure. Your father is someone to be feared sweet one, not looked up to. Their is no love in his heart, only hatred, and your poor soul does not deserve to be tainted by his presence in the house. And you may love him (and we all know that is because you are incapable of hate) and you may think that he loves you despite the angry words he throws at you but the truth is he hates you. Despises you. You see, you aren't what he wanted or asked for. He wanted a strong son who looked just like him and able to train for the Games and be someone he could be proud of. Instead, he received you, a peculiar girl who he could not boast about or train to be a merciless killer or be proud of ever. He wanted to throw you away. He would've too, if not for how much love he had for your mother. She begged and pleaded when he took you from her arms. She hissed and spit and kicked when he tied her up and walked you into the woods. You didn't even cry. Not when you were torn away from your mother's arms, not when your father screamed profanities, not when your mother screamed and cried from the house, not even when your father set you down in the middle of nowhere and walked away. You only stared into the clouds, reached up with chubby little fingers and giggled at the white puffs in the sky. Or perhaps you were already reaching for those fairies that aren't there.

("Too stupid to even cry.") Your father mumbled as he walked away. But he hesitated then. He turned back and looked into the deep blue eyes that so matched your mother's. But to him, they were not his wife's eyes - they were his first daughter's (your mother's) eyes. He remembered holding your mother in his arms when she was only a few hours old and looking into those same eyes. He picked you back up then, cursing himself, a tear in his eye. But don't let that confuse you, sweet one. He doesn't love you, he loves his first daughter. He loved his first daughter so much that she became your mother when she was just 18 years old. It wasn't her choice, to become pregnant with you. She tried on many occasions to miscarry, trying everything she could possibly think of in order to lose you. She cried at night when she thought of giving birth to you, an incestuous child, a constant reminder of the night her father came into her room and gave her more than just a simple kiss goodnight. You were going to be her living hell, she could feel it.

And then she held you in her arms and couldn't help but cry. She didn't realize you would be so beautiful, so perfect. She was ashamed having tried to kill you, having been so determined to hate you, and vowed to give you nothing but love for as long as she lived. But your father, who had been determined to love you, turned to hatred. ("I needed a son, not some stupid girl!") And you would have died, if not for the one simple thing that makes us all human : love. Your father hated one daughter but loved the other. Your mother loved you despite where you came from and what you were. The night that was once a nightmare for her turned into a dream, a memory that she would hold forever in her mind.

Your mother and the love that your father had for her saved your life. But when your mother died, he wasn't sure there was a reason for you to live. I remember that night when your mother died. It's crystal clear in my mind, something that will never fade, a horror story come to life. You think your mother died in her sleep, that she was sick and died. That's what your father says at least. But she really died in a pool of her own blood after your grandmother come searching for her in the middle of the night. Your grandmother had wanted to kill your father. He was a disgrace, raping his own child for what? A son?! She came in the middle of the night with a knife. It sent shards of light across the house where the moonlight landed upon the blade. Your father, he was passed out in the couch, a beer bottle dangling from his hands. He was is scum. You were 8 years old, upstairs sound asleep in your bed. But your mother, she was in the kitchen doing the dishes and washing the clothes, her eyes tired but her voice softly singing a lullaby that would soon become a sorrowful hymn.

I watched from a distance as the knife glinted and gleamed. Your grandmother's eyes were all but filled with rage at the sight of her ex-husband. And it would've been okay if your father had died that night. You are to sweet to see this, thinking your father is the best and nicest man in all of Panem, but it would've been best if the knife had been plunged deep into his heart that night.

But I was forced to watch the knife slash out and glide effortlessly across your mother's pale throat instead, her sweet song ended abruptly as blood dripped from her throat and the life she once held in her veins pooled beneath her. There was no scream, only silence. I heard the thud of her body falling to the floor to lay there in a bloody, gleaming heap in the middle of the kitchen. "Sleep now, my daughter. Your father cannot harm you any longer, I won't let him." Those were the last words your mother ever heard before her ears could no longer hear. You didn't hear the thud from your room, you didn't hear your father when he awoke to find your mother (and to him, his only daughter) dead on the floor, slipping and falling in her blood as he staggered into the kitchen. He started to sob and held her in his arms after reading the letter from his delusional ex-wife about how "It was the only way." and "God has thanked me for this service." Her head lolled as he carried her across the field and into the woods where he dug a hole beneath a weeping willow and let her now lifeless body float into the Earth. He showed you the grave later - the only time he ever indulged in your stories and beliefs, if only as a last wish to your dead mother - and told you she was flying with the angels in the sky now, and that you better not be too sad that she is gone because only happy little girls get to grow wings and visit their momma in heaven. And he held your tiny hand in his giant ones and he didn't let go all day and kissed you on the forehead that night. "Your mother will always love you. Don't forget that, okay?" he said. And you nodded. Because you did know, you still know. You have remembered. You will always remember.

◊ { other . } ◊
Face: Anna Christine Speckhart
Palette: Cosmic
Lyrics: City of Angels by 30 Seconds To Mars
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Status: Finished ^^