CROWN OF GLASS ✔

1 | ACT I, SCENE I

Glass windows. A man with sea blue eyes. A lady with a voice like rivers. A green eyed woman. It was always the green eyed woman, always.

"Miss Tremont..." Sophia began softly, and a single tear rolled down her cheek.

"Just tell me," I said, my voice flat. "I have a meeting with the President in an hour. Would you rather I'd keep him waiting?"

She sighed and looked at Nathan with something like fear in her eyes. He ran a hand through his hair, a gesture I'd come to know was a sign of frustration. For once, his maniacal pride melted as he sighed deeply.

"Edna... it appears that the situation has only gotten worse," he said at last, looking me in the eye without flinching, yet his voice unusually quiet.

"How much time do I have left?"

"Don't say that... we could try another surgery, maybe that one-" Sophia interjected.

"We both know that the next time you cut me open, I'm going to bleed out to death."

Nathan paused for a moment, then whipped out another notebook, rapidly writing down something.

"Look," he said confidently, "I can do something... the odds are-"

"-the odds are one to five thousand, Nathan. You said it yourself. I have only a two percent chance of surviving it, less than one percent luck of actually recovering from it instead of getting worse."

"We could - we could find some other way..." Sophia said, hopeless. "I've exhausted all my resources, but maybe..."

"Just tell me. How much longer do I have? "

"Please, Miss Tremont - you cannot - you cannot give up," one of the other doctors spoke up from beside me.

I hollowly laughed.

"Please, Edna. You can not be thinking of letting yourself die," Sophia pleaded.

"Yes? You'd rather kill me yourself? If I'm going to die - when I'm going to die; I want to die while there's still some of me left. On my own terms. Not while I'm lying cut open on a table with my blood dripping from a scalpel-" I brushed aside a stray strand that had clung to the moisture gathered in my eyes. "I'm going home."

Everyone got up, shocked.

"You cannot mean-"

"-yes," I cut it short. "That is exactly what I mean. If you'll excuse me-" I picked up my hobo, uncrossing my ankles and standing up. "Thank you for your time-"

"Miss Tremont-" Sophia began.

"You punish me with pity, Miss Grey," I turned the handle, feeling the cold blast of air conditioning blow back my red hair. I hardly noticed the huge commotion in the room behind me as people ran at my heels. I pulled out my phone as I walked out of the hospital, and the chauffeur pulled open the door for me.

Another voice spoke behind me before I sat in.

"Miss?"

I turned around to find a little girl of around ten, with golden hair that was streaked with dust, ruddy and unkempt. She clutched a tiny chest full of wooden amulets to her heart, afraid of losing them. Timidly, she looked at me, her eyes brimming with tears that had left behind grimy streaks on her cheek.