Chap 38 - Choices -

Eugene is with Rapunzel in her room. The door is open. The guard and maid outside.

Rapunzel is brushing her short brown hair, in front of her big mirror, still wearing her tower dress. They are getting ready for a meeting with some ambassadors from the surrounding kingdoms before the coronation.

Eugene is there to just be with her. It felt good just to be in the same room as she was. He didn't know why, and didn't really care.

He was impressed by the paintings she had done so quickly: The Tower, Gothel, herself, and flanking her bed were life-sized portraits of her parents on one side and Max, Pascal and himself on the other. He noticed that she was taking extra time on his, he was hoping it wasn't done, all that grey where his body was made it look like he was wearing armor, which made him feel funny for some reason, but he wasn't sure if it was a good or a bad funny.

"Why are you making such a big fuss over your hair?" asks Eugene, he is looking at the self-portrait she had of herself with blonde hair.

"Believe, me this is not anywhere near a big fuss. It used to take me over an hour to brush my hair before. This is pretty great, it only takes a couple of minutes. In any case, brushing my hair relaxes me." Rapunzel answers with a soft, dreamy smile.

He got up and stood near the mirror where he could see both Rapunzels at the same time. How could the same woman look so different?

"I am so sorry."

"What for?" Rapunzel paused in her brushing.

"For having done this to you." He moved close and ran his hand through her hair.

"You didn't have much choice."

"I did. I could have let you heal me and then found you again later."

"Even if you did, I wouldn't have gone with you. I promised to stay with Mother."

"I would have killed her when I found you again."

"And I would have tried to save her, and I would have, even if you killed her, I could have brought her back. I had promised."

"I know, you never break your promises. I keep thinking I would have found a way to stay with you, even if it meant to become her slave too, just so I could be with you."

Rapunzel looked down, she was gripping the brush, she had chosen it since it looked so much like Mother's brush, with both hands. Why was it so hard to stop loving Mother? She had done such terrible things to her, but not always, there were times it seemed like love, even compared to what her real parents are doing to show their love to her.

"You're different then you were when I first came to your tower." said Eugene, oh so gently. Running the back of his fingers along the side of the face.

Rapunzel panicked a little, had he found her secret painting? She looked to him and her mirror and the painting of herself behind her, with her golden hair. The secret painting that she used to feel more like herself, when she imagined she still had her hair, even though she wasn't sure if it was helping anymore.

Twisting the brush in her hands she said, "No, I'm not. I used to be a girl in a tower, now I am going to be the Princess of Corona. I used to only have to worry about keeping the tower clean, my hair brushed and Mother happy. Now I have so much more."

She went to the window where they could see the kingdom. "I knew I was bigger then the tower, I couldn't have stayed there much longer anyway, but this is so much bigger then I ever dreamed, so much more." She finished quietly.

Eugene came to her and put his arm around her as he saw the look in her eyes that reminded him of their time on the little boat just before the lanterns went up, "and its terrifying, isn't it?"

Rapunzel nodded as she put her arms around her new dream and hugged him tight.

"You're my new dream."

"And your are mine." they said to each other, in their alternative way of saying "I love you." It was so hard inside of Rapunzel's mind to figure out how to love her parents and Eugene. Mother had mixed things up so badly inside of her. She didn't have the words to describe it to anyone yet. Mama called then snakes in the grass of her soul and they kept finding new ones. They made life hard; giving them a name made them manageable, a little.

All the people she meets say they love her, and it scares her so much. She wants to be a good princess to them all, but she just doesn't know how. After the first day they limited the amount of time she spent out with people. She understood, she had felt so strange and then fallen asleep while talking to mama and papa, how could she fall asleep while telling an exciting story?

She wanted to meet everyone, to help everyone, to be the best princess ever. But, she acknowledged, she had grown up with just one other person in her life, just getting used to being around hundreds of people was its own challenge.

Papa was right, you couldn't learn how to steer a sloop, if you didn't first learn to steer a skiff, and it takes time. Well, at least she understood when he had shown her what a sloop and a skiff were. She felt so stupid all the time. She didn't feel like she knew anything anymore.

Sometimes, in the afternoon before dinnertime, it got to be so hard to keep going. She just felt like she was going to fly apart and never be able to find all the pieces. She wasn't sure who she was any more. Even looking in the mirror was hard sometimes, knowing she didn't look like how she remembered herself. Later today she was going to be crowned Princess of Corona, but what did that mean?

Quiet time alone in the afternoons helped, painting or napping or reading or talking to Pascal, who was so understanding. She wasn't sure if she liked being alone in her room when there was so much to do and learn, but it was the only way she could feel like herself again. It wasn't like the tower, she could leave and return as she wanted and that wasn't so bad, but she didn't want to stay in her room too long.

She wouldn't trade a tower for a room in a palace, if all it was was change in prisons. Most terrifyingly, what if she couldn't leave, because one of Mother's snakes wanted her to stay, or worst of all because she herself wanted to stay?

The gardens were nice, but only for a little while, she wanted so badly to know what all the plants were, the Botany book had been nice but real plants and flowers made it different somehow, but it was so hard because there was so much to learn.

She wanted to know everything, all at once.

Rolling in the grass was still fun, and so was the swing.

Mama and Papa promised lessons to help her soon, after the Coronation and the celebration. She believed them. She trusted them. She was trying to love them like she had Mother, but she couldn't, it wasn't the same. Was she broken? Had cutting her hair changed her that profoundly? She didn't think so, picking leaves off of a plant didn't change it into a rock, but picking all the leaves killed a plant.

Rapunzel knew Mama and Papa loved her, she knew that. They came every morning to save her from the nightmares, which helped so much, how could she not love them? They helped keep her safe from the foods she was learning to eat. It scared her to know Mother had been right in so many ways, that the world was dangerous, but you could learn how to be careful and not be hurt.

After dinner they sit together on the sofa and just hold each other and talk quietly. Hookhand playing on the piano. Eugene nearby. It feels so good, and she doesn't even have to earn them. Mama corrects her gently and lovingly when she makes mistakes, but there is always something else to do wrong.

Rapunzel loved Eugene so profoundly, just like she did Mother, well almost. Whenever he was gone a tiny voice, that sounded like Mother's, would ask, if he had left her like he did on the beach. She always countered that he had come back, even from the dead to be with her. But she would be so relieved when she saw him again, and smile to him, and the panic and the pain would fade. Why did it feel like her skin got too small when he was away for a while?

Rapunzel, her parents and Eugene had worked out ways to express their love with other words for now. And in time it would be worked out, maybe she just had to find the right word or song. Hopefully the lessons would help her find it.

But to tell them of Mother's ritual of love was so hard, it was special, so personal, so very, very personal. She gave Eugene an extra hug.

"Your Highness, it is time to change." came the voice of her chambermaid from behind them.

Author's Note: Rapunzel is skating so close to insanity it is terrifying. Heck, she's rail-grinding the Cliffs of Insanity. The betrayals of Eugene and Gothel and then loss of Gothel and Eugene and her hair deeply effected her and so did leaving the tower, but she did that voluntarily.

She lost almost all her anchors. She has established some new ones and now she has Eugene, Pascal, Max, her dress and and even the Pub Thugs to help hold herself together, and of course her parents, but sometimes it is a bare thing. The transition Rapunzel is going through is so rough, she is becoming a new and different person.

After that first night at the palace they have stayed away from the words 'I love you.' Which is so hard, but they are trying to make it easier for Rapunzel. It has become obvious that she still loves Gothel even though Gothel betrayed her so profoundly and utterly. The Queen desperately wants to hear those words from her daughter, but loves her enough to wait and is determined enough to do whatever it takes to help her daughter.

But the things Gothel did to her, left snakes in the grass of her soul, emotional land-mines really, since they didn't have land-mines back then, that they are dealing with. And some of them are terrible.

The sequel deals with this in detail.

She'll be painting Eugene in full armor, he is her knight in shining armor. She'll even paint the Pub Thugs, but not at full scale. They'll be cherubs along the ceiling.

Thoughts?

Feelings?

Reviews?

Did you share with a friend?