In This Hell ( V i o l e t ) [Kuroshitsuji 2] {Completed}

Chapter I : A Game of Cricket

Late dawns and early sunsets, just like my favorite scenes,

Then holding hands and life was perfect, just like up on the screen.

If I had to curtsey to another of my father's business partners, I was going to abandon the prim and proper lady that my mother had trained me to be, and scream to the high heavens about how sickeningly bored I had become.

Weston College's traditional cricket tournament had commenced, as always, on the fourth of June. I had never attended it before, and had not once planned on attending; however, this year, my brother Joanne had been chosen as a representative of the Red House. And my parents had forced me to go.

So, if I had to go, then I was going to go the way I wanted to; draped in black.

"Grace," my mother spat now, underneath her breath. The heat was blistering down, roasting everyone in their heavy, silken dresses and their expensive tweed suits. But I especially; because as most sane people know, black attracts the sun. "Are you really planning on wearing those ridiculous funeral velvets all day? You know we had Deidra bring that beautiful new dress that your father brought back from Singapore. It's in the carriage, waiting for you to make a suitable decision."

"I don't care if Papa brought it back from Lewis Carroll's Wonderland, this is what I want to wear." I folded my arms and shook my head, stomping away from the group that was my parents and oldest brother, Anton. My heels wobbled as they sunk into the grassy field, but I didn't care -

I stopped. The grass was...actually, quite beautiful. Some sort of glistening emerald colour that looked too healthy for even a public boy's school. Pretty. Some gardener who was an expert at his trade, I imagined. Around me, the afternoon break went on uninterrupted.

Young boys, first and second years, were serving teas, biscuits and cakes, smiling away politely and offering words of flattery. Everyone had converged according to their social status; the highest of the high and so forth and so on. They'd broken away to continue their conversations about trading and shipping and who was wearing what to Queen Victoria's annual garden party. That would be the sort of thing I would call vulgar, wasting breath on conversation topics such as those - not simply wearing black to a cricket tournament.

I looked out on the field where the boys were resting. They looked to be having fun - with their shirts hiked over their heads, splashing water at each other, laughing, rolling in the dirt. It appeared to be a lot more amusing than what I was doing, anyway.

"Miss! Uh, be careful!" Someone shouted.

I looked up from my thoughts to spot a cricket ball - and it just so happened to be flying right towards me.

"Oh."

"Is the lady alright?!"

I snatched the ball from the air and tossed it upwards, twisting it in my hand. With a flick of my wrist, I sent it spinning back to the boys.

"Thank you, ma'am!"

"Gee, where did she learn to throw like that?"

"Me," Joanne proclaimed innocently from the grass. He had stains all over his white polo shirt, and blades sticking up in his soft hair. "She's not as boring as she looks, right?"

"Don't be impudent, Jo," I sniffed, but I was smiling. "Can I..." I pointed to the field, as if to ask permission to walk across it, and he nodded.

I lifted up my skirts and strolled out into the middle of the pitch, where the team was. I felt...almost lost in them, with their red sashes tied around their hips and their crisp shirts. How I longed for the freedom - this dress, these skirts, were incredibly stuffy and weighted.