Family and growing up-
After the conclusion of her father's proposal Lillian had forced herself to sleep. The complete gooeyness injected into those diary pages was enough to make her gag, and yet she did find a certain amount of relief surrounding her too as soon as Isabelle described what was in the box.
She wasn't sure why she felt so relieved, considering she knew her parents had married before she was born-there wasn't any doubt in her mind that it would happen.
The next morning she started her routine, pulling on a t-shirt and a short skirt that stopped just above her knees.
Lily eventually found herself sitting upon the bed, contemplating the relationship she seemed to have suddenly formed with her deceased mother. Knowing what she was like…
Silently she shook her head, shoving away the dreaded sentiment her father always bemoaned whenever he did something for his children-though he always smiled while doing it.
She took the book off the nightstand and let it rest, spine down, in her palm. It slid open revealing a page (which had clearly been chewed on by the rat) detailing the following days.
She couldn't stop herself from reading further if she tried.
The next day Isabelle went into work feeling euphoric, and upon seeing Madelyn Ross her first reaction was to (quite frankly) shriek, "I'm getting married, I'm getting MARRIED!"
Madelyn's eyebrows rose, "I take it Mycroft came back."
Isabelle sent out her hand, waggling her fingers and allowing Madelyn to examine the ring. She was quickly congratulated and then told to get to work because there was still no meeting with Katlin Donohue.
Isabelle watched her boss leave for her office and smiled. She needed to invite Mrs. Ross to the wedding whenever it was to happen. Which (in between calls) sent her spiraling into the twisty tunnel of "Who else would she invite?" and "would anyone care in the slightest?"
She had little to no family, very few friends, and the same seemed to stand for Mycroft (well, except maybe the family she really had no idea). The only people she was certain she would invite were people from work!
Curling her hand into a fist beneath the desk Isabelle thought hastily about her sisters. It wasn't pleasant, imagining her wedding day with Maria on her right telling her she looked like some sort of sickly creature beneath the white dress, and Gloria on her left with a pair of scissors ready to slice uneven hunks of her hair to finish the picture.
And in truth she knew this was unrealistic, but still painful and frightening.
The thing was though…despite this, they were family. And if there was one thing Isabelle abided by, it was family.
"I'm going home today."
Isabelle rested with her back pressed against the refrigerator, a dishtowel held tightly in her fist and her arms crossed across the lower part of her ribs. Mycroft was washing dishes, every so often giving a plate or pan for Isabelle to dry.
"You are home," Mycroft commented lazily, scrubbing at a collection of burnt brownie Isabelle had accidently seared to the bottom of a pan.
"Oh, no I mean…my old home," Isabelle cleared her throat uncomfortably. Mycroft released his hold on the pan, letting it sit halfway in the soapy water. His hands came free, fingers slightly prune-y.
Isabelle saw the slightest touch of alarm cross his features, and she found herself hastily reiterating the whole thing, "I'm going to visit my sisters!"
He relaxed, "And why would you want to do that?"
There was definitely bitterness in his voice, which made Isabelle smile. He well and truly hated them now for the way they treated her, having someone upset on her behalf was something she'd never really experienced before.
"I was going to invite them to the wedding," she said, handing the dishtowel to her fiancé.
Mycroft frowned, "Again I dare to ask-why?" he scoffed, wiping at his hands.
Isabelle raised her eyebrows, "Because they're my sisters, you're inviting Sherlock to the wedding aren't you?"
Mycroft snorted, "That's hardly the same. Sherlock hasn't abused me."
Isabelle fought back the urge to comment on the general way his brother treated him, but decided it wasn't the same. Sherlock was cruel, but not in a way that was truly on purpose. In most cases what upset Mycroft the most was the things his little brother did to himself. Those were the things that led to sleepless nights and general all-purpose stress which had frightened Isabelle on one occasion -it had taken hours to actually get out of him what the problem was, which led to an overly long hug that he eventually reciprocated.
Pursing her lips Isabelle tried to come up with a solid argument as to why she should invite Maria and Gloria, finally ending in, "I guess I need closure."
His eyebrows raised, "Closure?"
She tried to stand tall beneath Mycroft's scrutiny but was having a hard time of it, "I-I-I guess I want to see if they feel sorry for what they did to me," she felt her face and neck burn.
Her fiancé hummed softly, "And if they aren't?
Isabelle closed her eyes, brow furrowed, "I don't know."
Isabelle stopped her car near her old building, sucking in a calming breath through clenched teeth. She felt jittery and frightened. Her hands clutched the steering wheel so tightly her knuckles looked as though they might break through her skin. With that unpleasant thought the young woman unbuckled herself and climbed free of the vehicle. She ran a hand across the large twisted bun Mycroft had done for her, letting the weight against her neck soothe her. When she'd requested it from him, she knew what he was thinking-that she wanted her hair safely tucked away from the dreaded scissors they always kept in the top left kitchen drawer. She hadn't denied it, but still gave him a cold stare.
Silently she made her way through the door and up the stairs, eventually arriving at her old door. She bit her bottom lip hard before finally putting her finger to the small round button. She almost buzzed three times just for the sake of it, but stopped after two.
There was a moment where Isabelle considered that they might not be home, maybe their schedule had changed. But no, the door clicked and then opened revealing Gloria.
She looked exactly the same, except she'd gotten her ears pierced. She had a bit of a tan too, surrounded by her usual well styled mud brown hair.
Something stirred inside the youngest sister making her throat clog with relief. Before Gloria could say anything she was swallowed into a hug, Isabelle's long arms desperately tightening around her sister's shoulders. The hug slightly awkward on one side, but Isabelle ignored it.
"What're you- Isabelle?"
Maria entered the room next, her blonde hair grown out a bit more since their last encounter. Her freckled face looked pinched when she took in Isabelle, who quickly released Gloria to hug the next sibling.
She could feel tears forming already, not a great start.
She blinked hastily, composing herself. If she was going to cry, it wouldn't be this early! Carefully the young woman removed herself from Maria's arms (the girl had attempted to hug back, unlike Gloria) and crossed her arms defensively.
"Izzy…what are you doing here?" Maria questioned, light eyebrows lowering over her deep blue eyes.
Isabelle smiled faintly despite the nickname, "I uh, I wanted to visit and say hi-"
Gloria scoffed, "Right, after what, two years, you decided to just pop in and say a quick hello?"
Maria snorted, "Right," she concluded uselessly.
Frowning, the youngest of them unfolded her arms and found herself putting her hands on her thin hips, "I know right, why would I ever want to visit you?" she snarled. Silently she cursed herself for using the same scathing tone as her sisters used on her. The look on both faces was not a happy one, something Isabelle used to fear meant being left in her room or on one occasion-locked out of the building.
"Sorry," she apologized quickly then extended her hand for them to see.
Gloria stared at the ring with sudden awareness, "Oh I see, you're married to the albatross."
Oh for god's sake!
"He's not an albatross!" Isabelle objected, and then absently thought he's a crane quite amusingly, "And we're not married yet, he proposed three days ago."
Maria scrutinized the small golden band with narrowed brown eyes, "Is that it? I thought he was rich."
"Yes this is it, he was…abroad," she cleared her throat, "when he saw an old shop, he said he found this and immediately knew to buy it," she smiled brightly at her sisters.
Gloria looked completely unimpressed by the truly soppy rendition of Mycroft's adventures in "who knows where". Maria was interested, but hardly because she thought they made a good couple.
"And you're going through with this, to what... finish off your little rebellion?" Gloria finally snapped, breaking the silence which had fallen through the flat.
Isabelle felt rather choked, "Th-that wasn't rebellion…that was escape!" she replied, pulling her hand back to her side.
Maria snorted, "Oh yes, because we treated you like our pet-isn't that what that freak said?"
"As if he knew anything about us!" Gloria concluded.
Isabelle bit the inside of her mouth hard enough to make her wince, unsure which direction to take. Defend her future husband or defend herself.
"He wasn't wrong was he?" she demanded, "I don't think a day went by that-that I didn't feel unwelcome in my own home!"
"Your own home? Shit Isabelle, you may have paid your part of the rent but this was hardly your home!" Gloria snarled.
"Oh I know, you made sure of that!"
Isabelle tried to quiet her voice, uncomfortable with yelling. Her sisters were fuming, though a little out of place. Even after all that time without her, they still expected her to be yelled at, for her not to fight back. But now she was, and she was going to say her mind!
Maria's voice was suddenly added to the argument, "You keep doing this, making us the villains! Like you're Cinderella and we're the ugly step-sisters! We had lives before mum died and left you to us to watch over!"
"Yeah, we had to deal with losing our mother and raising a freaking crybaby with nothing better to do than whine about how bad her life was!"
"I lost my mother too!" Isabelle shouted, tears coming to her eyes again. This wasn't going how she wanted it to at all!
"Oh shut up Izzy, my god you're like a walking cliché!" Gloria hissed, her usually pale face got a bit red now, "You may have lost mum too but you didn't have to deal with keeping the flat, and feeding yourself and your stupid little sister. You didn't have to deal with…with losing someone and having to go to work pretending everything was fine!"
Isabelle was crying really hard now, Maria was too, Gloria wasn't. She floundered a few times on what to say, trying to force her voice past the blockage in her throat.
"I'm sorry if I-I-I made you out to be the ugly step-sisters b-but," she wiped at her eyes desperately, "The way you dealt with all of this… the way you dealt with me. I was fifteen years old! A-and I was given no time to grieve over mum's death before I was suddenly barraged by your insults and-and I was made to think I was a worthless piece of filth. The way you treated every day as another way to ignore me, or hurt me with all that stuff about being an accident and how I was too stupid to pass the driver's test, how I was too clingy and too Isabelle to keep a boyfriend or get a better job than at that stupid café!
"Well you know what? I passed the test the first try, I got a job working for the government and am doing a perfectly wonderful job at it, and I have a fiancé who is the most brilliant man I've ever meant-so there!"
Silence.
Isabelle let out a long, slow, breath. She wiped at her nose with her sleeve (an action Mycroft would have been truly disgusted by) before she spoke again, her voice barely a whisper, "D-do you remember Roger Ellingham?"
"That guy you dated?" Maria asked, her voice about the same level.
Isabelle nodded, "I thought I loved him, I really did. I spent practically every day with him, he made me laugh and I thought I made him laugh too though for the life of me…I can't remember a single moment of it. Then one day, he left. He didn't say anything to me about it, he just left town and I lost it, I thought he must have died or something," she smiled faintly, "Two months later… he came back, and told me that I was too clingy and that we weren't seeing each other anymore."
Gloria ran a hand through her dark hair, "Yeah, I remember it. What of it?"
"You said that I deserved it, that I was too Isabelle to keep a guy as gorgeous and perfect as Roger Ellingham."
Maria frowned at her, "Where are you going with this?"
Isabelle made her way to the door, not looking back as she spoke, "The point is, Mycroft and I have been going out for three years now. We broke up twice, each time we came back because we couldn't' stand being separated like that… This is the real thing, and I am too Isabelle for this… But he doesn't in the slightest bit mind."
She finally turned around and smiled, "I hope you're coming to the wedding, I'll send some invitations if you want to come. I hope you will."
Isabelle returned home and was immediately greeted with a hug from Mycroft, whether he saw the upset on her face or whether he knew just out of instinct how the interaction had gone, he allowed her to bury her face into his shoulder.
"Did you get closure My Dear?" he finally asked.
Isabelle allowed him to step away so that she could look into his stormy gray eyes, "You know what…" she said, "I think I did."
What'did'ja think?
I contemplated both Maria and Gloria apologizing, and I had a few other points I was going to put into the argument. But it naturally went this way, and I decided not to mess with it.
I realized quite early on what a cliché the two sisters being terrible to the youngest was, so I mentioned it in the argument. I tried my best to make both sisters slightly redeemable, because they aren't absolutely terrible people. They're only slightly terrible. Lol
I also wanted to make it clear that Isabelle isn't really under control of them anymore; she has mostly grown out of the abuse, and has found her place in life.
And I sound very cheesy I know, but I can't help it! I'm full of cheese, literally and figuratively.
For those of you looking for something less emotional, check out my new fic "Letters" lol
"Wedding"
In which Isabelle and Mycroft get married, but not without some cold feet and an annoying brother added to the mix.