The dewy light of morning filtered through the lace curtains. I yawned and wiped the sleep from my eyes sitting up. My sister, all of seventeen, was still asleep. She was curled into a tight ball like a little strawberry blond kitten. I gently brushed a loose curl from her face and her nose scrunched in response. She yawned, and stretched before she opened her hazel eyes to my blue ones.
"Good morning dear sister." I cooed. She snorted in response and buried her face in her pillow. "Come on now, rise and shine." She sighed and lifted her self up. Her hair was more disheveled then usual and her night gown seemed to be dirty. "Suricia, what on earth-" I threw the covers off to see her feet and the sheets on her side of the bed caked with mud and grass and leaves. She gasped and stared at the mess. "Suri!" I said in a loud whisper. "What did you do last night?"
"I- I went to the woods for a run. Or at least I thought I dreamt it because I don't remember coming back last night." She said her forehead began to scrunch in confusion.
Suricia has suffered from a multitude of sleep related ailments since she was a child. Some nights she's perfectly fine and other nights she can't sleep or worse can't remember. Sometimes she gets up and walks around on purpose because she can't sleep and other times she just dreams it. It's mornings like this that worry me the most where she thought she was dreaming and actually left the house. She has very vivid dreams, which make for ever worse nightmares and sometimes she quits breathing in her sleep.It's why we sleep in the same bed. No one outside of our parents and the doctor knows about her odd condition. When I was younger I use to play along with the delusions she manifested since I was often apart of them and I also use to sleep walk right after she was born. My governess said one morning she found me asleep in the stuffed nursery chair with Suri in my arms and she said I told her that I was afraid Suri was going to drift away.
Sometimes I still worry about that.
"Let's just get up and take the sheets off. Go wash your feet, I'll take care of this." I stripped the bed and stuffed the sheets into a canvas bag and shoved it into her closet. Suri watched me with unease but said nothing.
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At break fest we both stayed quiet as father read the paper and mother drank her tea.
"Would you look at this, a roaming circus has come to town!" he boomed. My father who was still a young boy at heart beamed at Suri. Suri looked just like our mother and acted just like father. The opposite was true in my case.
"A Circus! Mother can we go pleeease!?" she begged. My mother sighed knowing full well she couldn't say no to both father and Suri.
"As improper,and degrading as they are, I suppose if you really must go then you may." she said. Father walked over and kissed her forehead and then offered his hand to Suri. They began to dance around the room chanting. "The Circus, The Circus, we're going to the Circus!" I tried to hide my laughter but neither mother or I could quiet contain ourselves as they danced out of the room.
"I expect you don't really wish to go as I don't." She said pouring herself more tea. I glanced at the ad in the paper. Cirque de rêves rose, The circus of rose dreams. I milled for a minute about what rose dreams could be and then I said
"I do not wish to go."
