The Goose Girl
She grows.
Not taller in stature, but rather, in capability. Not smarter with facts, but wiser with truths. A princess grows so that her feet fit a Queen's shoes.
She smiles, looking over her flock, and her eyes fill with memories of grandeur, at an expense that only now she understands. Quiet girl, whom no one ever deigned to know – no one ever deigned to know truly, anyway. Quiet girl, who got along by herself, following orders. "Obey thine elders."
Her flock.
Her flock.
Yes, there was, of course, Conrad. Every day, tending the geese with her. But he always ran off, and there wasn't much work to do anyway – time yielded introspection. Time yields introspection.
Her hair hangs down, past the small of her back, and she half wishes she could simply cut it off. But it is a tie to reality. Tie to the past. Tie to herself.
The geese. Her flock.
She tends them by a stagnant pond, yet for all that it is stagnant it is beautiful. It is diamond, and she knows that before she brings chaos and sounds and flurries and currents, it is flat. Flat. It reflects the light in a perfect mirror, unless one leans to the perfect angle – the critical angle, she knows from her past tutoring sessions that have ended up meaning naught – where the whole pond floor becomes visible.
She plays with the light in this way. She plays with vanity, takes down her yellow hair, braids it, winds it around her head in what she dreams of as the fashion of gentility.
Once was.
Past life.
Her wisdom grows, and she begins to see people. She begins to realize, but still she clings to a past that is no longer. Since when must people work to survive? Since when have food and clothing been such issues? She drops her plaited hair, and it falls flat against her back. She looks into the water, sloshing with winged bodies and dirty feathers.
She giggles.
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TBC