4 years old, 1797
Estelle had never not been cold while in her maman's arms. It was simply something that was at this point, one of the first things that came to mind when she thought of the brilliant woman that never failed to draw warmth to her heart despite all this. Another thought was pretty yellow eyes, a yellow like golden sun rays and hair a long brown that was the opposite of her own pretty blonde. It was one of the many things that reminded her of her mother.
She questioned it all the time, why she was so different, so warm and soft compared to her mother and uncle, with eyes an electric blue, that she wondered if the kids her age were right -- that they weren't really her family, that she wasn't pretty enough to be their family.
Because pretty was the word her mother used when she described her, spoke her name with it attached as though they were always intended to be paired eternally together. The young girl could never quite fit together how it matched when she knew she only looked average in her home, average in comparison to what was presented to her at each waking moment passed in her home.
Her maman always said she was silly when she asked such things though, always told her that she was prettier than she ever was and than they ever could be, and that the cold, the cold was something she as lucky not to have. Estelle believed her. She always believed her maman.
So when the cold weather hit and snow began to line the earth, she believed her maman when she said that she needed to wear a coat, that she would fall ill if she didn't. Estelle didn't really understand, couldn't really put a finger on how when the cold was something that had permanently chilled her bones from too long hugs with her mother or bedtime cuddles with her uncle, but she listened anyway, loving the feeling of joy that filled her when she spotted her maman's happy smile that she sunk into her coat and held it close to her as she played -- occasionally running her hand over the material just so she could recall the way she had made her maman happy. Estelle loved when maman was happy, she always wanted maman to be happy.
It was in the cold weather that she dragged her maman out into the snow where the day was brightly hidden behind the clouds to play, with the help of uncle Hugo it was a job easy done that often called her to giggle and shriek with laughter as uncle put snow in maman's hair. Estelle had wondered why they never got cold, why their fingers were never nipped pink from the kisses of Jack Frost like hers were, but she never asked, never even mentioned her own -- because how could she ruin the fun when she was only a little cold. The cold was something she was used to anyway.
And she was four now. A big girl that knew when she had played too much, and she just wanted to play a little bit longer, please, maman?
(But maman was always there with a watchful eye ready to whisk her away to the warmth of their small fire, monitering her in case she pressed her chilled skin too close to the flames that were ready to lick their way over her, burning her up in angry kisses that sometimes haunted her dreams. Estelle's nightmares told her that this was what maman's kisses would feel like if her love ever ran out -- if the cold was ever gone and she was no longer given the happy, pretty smiles that made breathing so much easier.)
Estelle was lucky to be cold in the summer, when the heat was high and her skin was so sticky with sweat that it caused her hair to cling to her skin and her cheeks to grow red. She was able to lean back, able to attach herself to her maman and breathe a sigh of relief as the coolness that she was so familiar with lifted the heat from her lungs, washed away the summertime dryness that burdened her in a way that it never bothered them.
She never wanted to say anything, opting to keep quiet because they never complained about being too hot in the summer like she was, but they always seemed to know, letting her wear only her thinnest dresses and held her in their laps at night to help her fall asleep comfortably because they were never really tired, were they? Was it something that happened when you got older, that you no longer needed to sleep as an adult? Estelle did not understand but she wanted to be like that, like the adults that could stay up all night and not waste hours that could be spent playing on dumb sleep no matter how tired she became.
How could anyone stand missing out on anything when there was so much to be done in the world? Estelle liked it when her maman took her to different towns, always saying that the previous one wasn't right. She wasn't dumb. She was four years old and could tell when maman was scared of something, but she never said anything, why would she when she could show off how she never got cold in the winter and could hold her breath the longest in the summer because her maman could hold her breath the longest and her uncle would tell her funny stories about how maman was a magical mermaid.
Estelle was four and she knew that something about her family wasn't right, that it was different from her friends family's, but she would kick anyone that dared say that her maman was anything but the best because her maman could be queen of the world while your maman could not boil proper potatoes. She knew that she hated secrets, but she knew that she trusted her maman more than anything in the world and that she would be told the big secret one day because her maman loved her just as much as she loved her maman.
Estelle was four when she decided to prove just how much her maman was better than the others on a winter day that burned your skin like fire when you were cold. She was four when the older kids of this new town told she had an odd way of speaking, that her words were pronounced odd, like a foreigner (as though being from somewhere else was truly a bad thing. Estelle had been plenty of places and she never loved one friend more than the other, so she didn't quite understand).
They told her that her maman was weird. That she didn't belong here with the way she was never cold (Estelle had boasted of this happily as soon as she saw the terrible turn of the weather). They claimed that it wasn't right how her maman never came out during the daytime like a demon or a silly vampire, how her Uncle was just as cursed, and that Estelle would never be welcomed anywhere.
It wasn't so much there words that upset her, but the dismissal of her maman when she said to ignore all they said. That they didn't know. That they would never know. It didn't make it any easier for the young girl who didn't understand just as much as them when she just wanted to spit in their face and pull their hair.
So she told them she would prove it in as many big girl words that she could, had wandered farther than her maman would have ever allowed until she reached the wide and endlessly deep pool that was frozen over -- a lake that would have made her gulp in the summertime because of how big it was. Estelle was four and she knew how to hold her breath, but she couldn't swim very well, not as well as maman or Uncle.
The lake, for as intimidating as it was, was the sort of pretty like that of maman's snowy skin, and just as tough when she stepped onto the slippery surface -- dropping mittens, hat, and coat as she went, toeing off her shoes and wiggling her toes in her wool socks to the sound of excitable, nervous chatter from the kids behind her.
Estelle couldn't hear them very well, she was only four and their whispering was better than hers was, but she wasn't going to back down as she knew they said she would. She was only four, but she was braver than any of them.
Her legs shook with each step, a burst of wind at her back pushing blonde locks into her face, and Estelle clenched her fist tightly as each step felt a little more unsteady.
She was only four, but she understood the concept of water turning hard in the winter when it was really cold -- too cold even for her. It wasn't yet that cold, not in the way that the entire lake would be a flat surface. She could still see the ripple of the water with the wind in the centre.
There's a crack at her feet that has her falling, splashing as she goes downdowndown with a startled shout at her lips held back only by the knowledge that her maman would be here to scoop her from the water.
Even as her limbs go stiff as she slips down gracefully through the water, watching the hole she fell through grow smaller and the bright light of the sun pull together into a mini-moon.
She was weightless, slipping away and she wondered how long it would be until she hit the bottom, if there even was a bottom.
A shadow pulled across her light, distorting the clear image, the pretty image, and like a flash she had arms wrapping around her, holding impossibly tight.
Her vision went dark, blinking out, and she felt a press against her chest -- hard and cold, and it felt like she was creaking from the force.
But then water came bursting from her mouth, spewing up on her face. Someone pulled her up, turning her to her side, and she vomits on the ground at her side, crying as it burned on the way up.
Gentle, loving hands rubbed her back, massaging her shoulder and brushing her hair from her face.
"Estelle, my dearest heart, are you alright? What happened?"
Maman! Maman! She wanted to cry to the heavens, scream her love for her mother as loud as she could, but her throat hurt and she coughed violently instead.
"There, there, my girl, maman has you now."
"I knew you would come," she manages to croak, words tumbling through shivering lips. "The other children said you wouldn't, but I knew you would, maman."
"Did you do this on purpose?" Marion gasps out. "Why would you do something like this?"
"Because, maman, I had to show that you were the best. No one believed me."
She says it like it's the most simple thing in the world, and to her, it was because she may be intelligent, but she was still a child. She didn't yet understand the fragility of the world, of a beating heart protected only by bones and delicate skin.
"Never again! Never again, do you understand? You are never to do something like this again."
Estelle nods hurriedly, bottom lip wobbling at the stern tone of her maman's voice. She didn't protest as she was scooped up into her arms and carried away as though she was still a baby, but it didn't stop her from looking back and smiling smugly to the other children that stood around watching -- cheeks pink from the cold marked with tear tracks clear from watery eyes.
And Estelle wasn't even cold, not really. She couldn't be when she had the palpable proof that her mother loved her in her tiny hands.
Besides, she was going to be by the fire soon with warm soup to fill her belly and Uncle to make her laugh until her smile hurt.
Estelle was four and she had never not been cold in her maman's arms and it wasn't going to start any time soon.
***
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Written: 2019-06-21