My Highway Robbery

Enjoy xox

~Liv

Prologe:

1724:

The carriage jerked up and down making my head bob from side to side in time with the grave road leading away from the house. My house, well it once was.The heavy sapphire and silver hair combs were becoming loose from my bun and tugging at my black brown curls. I fidgeted in the uncomfortable velvet seats. Slowly the English countryside skitted past us, each tree and paddock that guided the road from house to town familiar.

"Stop that" My mother scolded, giving me a sharp look. I gritted my teeth against the resistance to scream at her and attempted to take a deep breath. "Ow!" I gasped. The breath in had caused me to push my stomach against my corset, the bone lining ground against my own skeleton, silly thing. I hated it, just as I hated every bit of this fashion. I absolutely refused to wear those mad wigs other women wear.

"Elaine!" snapped mother, her own powdered wig's bobbing synchronised with her chubby frame.

"Yes, mother?" I questioned, fixing my dark eyes on her shallow blue.

She had been the one to organise my travel, on her arrangement I was to pass through the town she would get out in and continue alone. The suitcases in the rear held the silk and wool dresses that had been saved from sale. The bag on my lap held objects much more precious to me; pressed thyme from six springs ago, a porcelain dancer with cracks belted with layers of glue. The travel took my bags and I to my mother's brother, who lived beyond the hours of forest. I had been once before when I was too small to remember the important details. I remembered a gold and mirrored room that had coloured glass as a ceiling, my aunt's shaking voice and timid posture, the fact that even though there were four women in the room only my father and uncle's voice was permitted to echo off the ornate walls. These memories were caption shots and blurred frames as early memories are, but the ball of stress in my gut tightened with each passing of the memory in my mind. I knew that my position in the house would be to replace my late and timid aunt, to sit and act as another feature of that glistening manor. 'not much different from your own home,' my mind reminded me. I sighed quietly.

"...and you are to be above all well mannered, did you comprehend everything Elaine?" my mother finished, had she been talking?

"Yes, Mother," I said.

The carriage jerked to a sudden stop, making my head snap back and hit the polished oak wall. That would bruise, making a nap against a window impossible for the coming seven-hour trip. My mother fidgeted with her wig, glass diamond rings catching on the horse hair and pulling it into more of a state than the carriage ride had inflicted. She stilled, then with sudden determination she seized the door and threw it open into the poor coachman who was about to escort her out.

'Goodbye for now Elaine' My mother said, in a quick inspection of me before departure. Her gaze held the judgmental tone of a customer deciding if a dead fish is off or not. Seemingly satisfied she made to depart before falling and catching the arm of the coachman. She straightened and sauntered up to the lady's social rooms, in a gate swerving slightly to the left. The arid smell of her hung in the air, strong brandy and wig powder.

I nodded my reply to her tipsy figure as it disappeared into the lace curtained tea rooms. I imagined her as I had seen her a thousand times. Laughing among all the other women that were worth knowing in the region. Her tea cup would shake on its saucer that chimed out her condition to the lady's frowns. Her silver flask, hidden in layers of skirts, would adeptly flicker from hiding into the bone china cup. The women suspected but never saw, I sat underneath that table as a child and admired how the sunlight flashed against the amber liquid and shining silver. When I saw the effects of it after I had felt sick every time it danced out from the lace of her frothy gowns.