"What will it take for you to love me?"
Athanasia stared at the person in front of her with a face stained with tears. However, her father, emperor Claude, only stared down at her sobbing, kneeling form with no emotions in his eyes.
"Should I become like Jennette? If I do, then will you call my name dearly like you do hers, and watch me with warmth in your eyes?"
Her beautiful half-sister. The lovely Jennette gained a glory that Athanasia had never had before when she made her debut, even taking the love of her father away from her.
Having the nerves to mention that name in front of him, she had already mentally messed up.
"Will you hold me in your arms...without pushing me away?"
Claude didn't hesitate to answer: "Such a thing won't happen until the day I die." He wasn't the slightest bit surprised to see his always calm daughter being that pitiful in front of him.
Taking up all of her courage, Athanasia begged, "Why is that? I'm your daughter too, father. I was by your side much longer than Jennette." However, her king and father remained unmoved by her tears and only continued to stare blankly at the pitiful girl in front of him.
"You fool."
That piercing contempt in his voice dug a cruel hole into her ears, making her hands lose their strength on his pants and fall listlessly to the floor.
"There was never a day I considered you my daughter."
Faced with those words, the deepest of despairs like never before flooded Athanasia's eyes...
-"The Lovely Princess" Chapter 8: Twisted Fate-
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"Ugh."
The sudden thought of that scene in that novel shocked me so much that I dropped my rattle.
What's this? Why did I suddenly think of that novel? The romance novel I read because a customer left it behind at my previous place of work. I remember that it was a tale of childish content befitting the title of "The Lovely Princess." Did I recall this book because the princess that gets executed in her eighteenth year...has the same name as me...? Argh. Get out of my head this instant! What a jinx!
"Hmm?" The lady sleeping on the chair suddenly jolts up at the sound of the rattle falling to the floor. "Oh, bother. How clumsy, she keeps dropping it."
Babies don't have a good grip, dummy! Of course, I'll keep dropping it, besides this is the first time it's fallen, not that you noticed.
"Don't be a nuisance and play quietly with your toy, miss." She picked the rattle up from the ground and gave it back to me without even wiping it. Is she belittling me for being an "outcast" of a princess? I sure hope not.
"Uwaa." I dropped the rattle again.
"What's wrong?" Seeing the rattle on the floor again the lady maid stands up. "Ugh, I already have my hands full with all this sewing!"
Ignoring the maid, I flip onto my stomach and try to crawl, but no matter how much I try I can't.
"Here, let me get that for you."
"Nyo!"
I don't want this, it's not what I want! Do you really think a rattle that I dropped on the floor twice would be entertaining at my age?! Even if my physical body is that of an infant, I'm mentally too old for a rattle to be any fun!
"Are you bored with it now?" Tilting her head in wonder, the maid picks me up off of the floor. "Let's lay you down," she says before walking me over to the crib and putting me in. She tucks me in before leaving the room.
Is she going to the head maid? If you're coming back with another rattle, don't bother.
Laid down the way I am, I reach towards the mobile and sigh. No matter how many times I look at my hands, I can't get used to it. I'm sure I went to sleep after taking some sleeping pills...and then woke up to all this. This makes no sense! Me, suddenly becoming a baby?! And to top it off, I'm a princess?! This is just plain crazy!
With a cry of "Princess!" the maid from before suddenly bursts into my room. Arg, this girl does this all the time.
"The head maid said our budget is low. You'll just have to play with this," she says as she hands me the rattle.
Is she allowed to just abruptly open a door to a baby's room like this?
"I won't cuddle you if you start crying. I'm really busy right now!"
How cold! I'm a baby...she should be nicer to me...! Ugh. I guess not every princess is treated as one. From being an orphan in my previous life, it's nice to be reborn as a princess...But why did it have to be a princess that everyone hates?! Uwaa!
***
I was an orphan. An older girl from the same orphanage I grew up in once told me that when I was a baby I was wrapped in a piece of cloth and laid out in front of the orphanage. I first heard this in February, before I started elementary school and the older girl was nineteen, the age you leave an orphanage. Since I wasn't given a name by my birth mother, the director of the orphanage used a phonebook to come up with my name: Lee Ji Hye.
When I heard that, I was like, "Okay, then." In the orphanage, a child like me was inundated, and it was too late for me to feel anything for a mother I have no consciousness of. In an orphanage, an eight-year-old is not a child.
In a small and barely hanging on orphanage I had to fight every day with kids in similar situations as me just to get a bowl of rice. So, when I was about the same age as the eonni who informed me of the secrets of my birth, I became excited. I'll finally be out of this place. However, reality has a way of crushing your dreams. Even more so to an orphan girl that didn't have any money, and... well, anything really.
After leaving the orphanage, it was hard to come around food. So, I washed dishes until my hands were swollen and worked part time at a gaming center in a PC room which smelt of cigarette smoke. I had to suffer through a heat stroke when I washed cars in the extreme heat of the summer, just so that I could eat a meal with kimbap that had passed its expiration date.
I wanted to study and date like a normal person my age, but, I didn't really have any time to spare doing any of that. It was only a matter of time before I needed to give my money away to pay the rent to my musty room.
Wow, I really have no hopes or dreams of doing any of that, with the money I have. In the middle of winter, I can't even heat up my room.
The next day I had to wake up at dawn to get to my job. Summer is better. I wasn't getting much sleep because of the cold, and I know I won't last long if I didn't get some proper rest soon. With no other choice, I ended up begging the owner of the restaurant for some sleeping pills. As sleep crept in, all my worries disappeared.
And when I opened my eyes, I was a princess.
***
"Ah, bwa."
Today is the same as any other day. For the entire day I ate, pooped, and blankly stared at things. I'm still confused if this is really my reality or just a dream.
"Our beautiful princess, Athanasia."
What's fortunate is that I didn't need to spend all my time with horrible maids.
I laugh towards the woman shaking the rattle, rocking my cradle. She's a young and beautiful eonni with brown hair and pure blue eyes, and from this month onwards, my newly assigned maid. I'm a princess. Why do I have a maid caring for me and not a nanny? That's because I'm this outcast of a princess.
"You should grow quickly and healthy," the maid says.
She's so beautiful that when I first saw her, just staring at her face would make my head go blank and drool would dribble out. Her name is Lillian. The perfect name for someone who looks like a blooming lily! So, in my own way, I call her Lily.
It's so nice to have a beautiful woman care for me. Ah, to be reborn again.
"Uwa, bah,"
But as she looked at me, Lily's face gradually filled with calm sorrow and longing. Whenever Lily first saw me, she would think of something and her expression would fall like this. Oh, my pretty eonni, you shouldn't be making such sad faces. You look the most beautiful when you smile.
"Oh. Princess, it's time to sleep."
However, it was only for a moment that I poked at joy, and at the end of Lily's murmurings, as if I thought of it suddenly, I struggled in the meaning of refusal. The sun is still floating in the sky! Please play with me more. I'm so bored here.
"No. You'll only be able to grow when you've eaten and slept well."
But my small rebellion is useless. Lily is looking at me with calm eyes as she gently laughs at my actions.
"Lillian!"
At that moment, I hear a voice calling Lily out of the room. That maid always does that. I'm a small and fragile baby so I get surprised easily, doesn't she know?!
Lily wonders for a second that she's surprised at the unconscious behaviour of the person outside the door. However, I'm moved by the gentle hand that landed on my chest when I became surprised.
"Princess, I'll be out for a while."
I shake my hands in the sense of saying farewell.
Left alone, I look at the ceiling and move my eyes about. The ceiling with the colourful chandeliers and the beautiful patterns is constantly in sight. As I shift my eyes further to the side, the shimmering furniture and ornaments catch my eye from the cradle. I wonder every time I see it, is it really gold? Later, when I have teeth, I'll have to bite it to see if it is. That is, of course, if I'm still alive by then.
"Ewya."
As I recall the rumor of the man called my father, my body shakes with terror. The only thing I know about him is the information leaked out by the maids who come to clean my room every day. From what I gather he's a real psycho.