Inspired by a mixture of the Help/Dry White Season and my English Teacher's comment that "Colonialism means living a contradiction". I'll let you decide whether this takes place in the USA or South Africa..I've left it vague deliberately. Enjoy and please review!
Marianne Theiss is an angry little girl. Her Papa's always away, travelling between one big city and another as he does his job keeping the country safe. She wouldn't mind that, but his being away means that Mama can't play with her like she wants her to, because she has to take care of the house and servants instead. And her older sisters, Ruth, Elisabeth and Amelia, aren't here anymore. They've all been sent off to boarding school. So that leaves Marianne the sole occupant of the nursery; the sole Queen of their little Kingdom. She likes being the only child around insofar as it means she gets everything she wants, but she doesn't like it being so boring. Being bored makes her angry.
And, like any other angry white child, she takes it out on the servants.
"No! NO! You won't tell me what to do! You won't! You're not Mama or Papa, you're just a Nigra! A filthy Nigra, born of drunken kaffirs! I'm white! I order you around! I give the orders! I won't do as you say! I won't! Now let me go! Let me go!"
Kicking, screaming, thrashing, she breaks free of the woman's constraining arms and pauses just long enough to spit in her nanny, Charlotte's, face, before dashing inside to find Mama, confident that she will be received with open arms and allowed to sit on Mama's lap as she does her accounts. Allowed to do so as a special treat for having put the help in their place.
Yet when Marianne is ill, when her eyes are bright and her skin clammy with one of her recurrent fevers, it is always Charlotte she calls for. It is Charlotte who scoops her up and carries her to the nursery, tucking her gently into the cool cotton sheets. Charlotte who sits up with her night after night, answering her incoherent ramblings with soothing murmurs, bathing her flushed skin with the welcome relief of lavender water.
And when, days later, she opens her eyes, weakly stretching out her arms, seeking the reassurance of another human touch to tell her she has survived, has made it through yet another fever, it is Charlotte who is first to her bedside. It is Charlotte who pulls her into her arms, whispering, "Thank Goodness, Child! We thought we'd lose you!"
Unable to help herself, Marianne rests her head on Charlotte's breast, inhaling the familiar scent of soap and fresh air and love. She lets Charlotte hold her tight, hoping her trusting posture will say everything that she would like to, but daren't. After all, what does it matter if she does it here, in the privacy of the nursery? As long as she behaves as society requires of her in public, who would ever suspect that, in her heart of hearts, she loves Charlotte as fiercely as though she were her own daughter?