Sabella Martine // District 4

It is not dark when you wake, the room list by a small light just under the sewing machine. You groan, grunt so very quietly as you sit up, brushing a loose curls from your face as you try to gather your senses. Looking to the Cuckoo clock that no longer has its cuckoo, you see, eyes straining in the dark around you, that it is almost midnight. You sigh softly- again, is all you think shaking your head just slightly as you turn back to the half finished dress at the sewing machine in front of you.

The sound of the wheel turning fills the empty shop as you continue to sew.

It is not the first time you have woken at such a time, in the middle of the night, hunched over unfinished work with a tacking pin tucked between your teeth for safe keeping. Several times, in fact, you woke to the sound of the man who delivers the can of powdered milk and eggs to your door every morning. On one occasion, you woke to someone knocking on the shop window only to realise that you'd slept til opening time and a customer was waiting for you.

You work so hard Sable, you hear your father saying, his voice dripping with pride as he brushes back your cloud like hair and smiles.

The thought of your father makes you tense and you turn your mind back to your work. It only makes you think of your mother. She taught you how to sew, just as her mother did with her. How she would guide your hands, her warm tawny skin matching yours, as she taught you how to weave a needle so delicately that you'd never notice there was any thread there at all. She taught you how to best drape fabric and which fabric was best for a reaping gown or a Sunday dress. Which colours to use and which patterns would look good with the ribbon she got at the market. You had listened with such eagerness, desperate to fill your mother's shoes as the best seamstress in Four.

You still can’t seem to fill her shoes. No matter how hard you have tried.

She is not here to guide you anymore, nor your father. No matter how hard you try to push them from your mind, they are everywhere around you. You see your mother's face and your father's eyes when you look in the mirror. You see your mother's hands when you watch yours move over fabric as if it is an extension of yourself. You hear your mother's voice when your sisters speak and your father's laughter when they laugh. They are everywhere, and you can never rid yourself of them no matter how much you will it to be so. When you close your eyes, you can see the Headmaster calling you to his office and your sisters faces when you entered the room.

You knew, or at least you think you knew, at that moment what must have happened.

Your remember how your sisters wailed, their screams echoing your mind. You- you did not even make a sound. You have always been quiet, and you are quiet now, watching as dark dotes begging to grow on the fabric in your hands. You remember how it was to be a family, and how it felt to be without one. You had your sisters- but you were now in place of your mother. You had dropped from school, you spent all day in the shop, working from dusk til dawn until your fingers bled or your youngest sister found you draped over the sewing machine in the early hours of the morning. You spent all your money on the rent, and what little there was left over went on food to feed your sisters- you went hungry for them, and sometimes part of you felt like they did not understand what you were giving up, that they did not notice how their plates would be fuller than yours, or how you would take the hard ends of the bread instead of feeding it to your sisters.

You loved them so much and yet, somedays they would make you so angry.

You remind yourself that they just did not understand.

They just…

You shake your head, wiping away the tears before you pull the fabric through the sewing machine again.