Rebekah sits on a couch and thinks. She thinks about everything. How things went so wrong, what started it all. When it all started to go awry, how she could have stopped it. Her thoughts are filled with 'what If's' and 'I wish'. Her dreams are filled with broken hearts, and dead dreams. Deceased lovers and lifeless brothers.
It's chilly outside, the bitter, frosty air hits Rebekah, and she turns around. The street is littered with people hugging and blowing into their palms, trying to beat the winter. Rebekah doesn't notice. She can't feel it. She's empty. But she still blows into her own palms, desperately trying to feel something.
One day, Rebekah finds herself on a bench in a park. She hears sounds of children's laughter, mothers yelling, a couple breaking up, and an old man feeding pigeons. She wishes that she could be one of them. To be a child, innocent and hiding, laughing on tiny matters. She wishes she can be a mother, who's worrying about her child getting hurt. Who has a tiny being that runs into her arms, and hugs her knees. Who has another child with tiny toes and tiny fingers. She wished to be an old woman, peacefully sitting on a bench, having time to feed pigeons. Who can die, with people to miss her, and come to her grave with flowers.
The illusion cracks. The dream dies. The wordless war inside her head wages on.
Delusional fantasies tiptoe out.
Reality slides in like a bolt.
The wordless war inside her head goes on.
There was a girl. Had all the pearls in the world. Dum. Dum.
Another day, Rebekah sits in her room, throwing darts. She doesn't know why she keeps thinking, but she can't stop. She thinks of all the mistakes, of the abrasion of trust, the destruction of her family the artifice and deception that has ruined everything. She thinks of shattered hearts, and wrecked dreams. Disloyal lovers and malevolent brothers.
Finally though, she thinks of something she's been hiding of for such a long time. She thinks of Marcel. The only one who was good enough for her. But she never got her happy ending now, did she?
She remembers telling him that she would never marry someone who couldn't beat her at a fight. Years later, he bested her.
She remembers him telling her that he'd die smiling at the hands of her brother; that he was in love with her.
She remembers the look on his face when her brother un-daggered her. She remembers his kiss, and she remembers him. And what's worse, is that she misses him.
She remembers everything. But most of all, she remembers broken promises. So, she thinks of broken promises.
One day, she finds herself walking at midnight through the streets of New Orleans. A parade walks past her, people extravagantly dressed. She doesn't notice. Performers wearing gowns bursting with ruffles, sequins and glitter. Masks on their faces, unrecognizable people. Strangers like her.
So she starts to think. She thinks of everything. The rights, the wrongs, the maybe's. The 'what if's' and the 'I wish's.' She thinks of good and bad. Of foul and fair. She thinks of cracked hearts and ruined dreams. Of deceiving lovers and malicious brothers.
