Fairy Tale

Mariemaia Kushrenada had always been a inquisitive child. A certain braided mobile-suit pilot had once offered that there was no such thing as a stupid question - "Only stupid people," Wufei had muttered- and Mariemaia had taken this to heart. If something eluded her, she asked the necessary questions. If she read something about her father in a history book or found a photo of him in an old newspaper, she'd wobble her way to her new mother (she was still regaining the feeling in her legs) and ask what had happened in that single moment to inspire the words or images. There were questions Mariemaia asked every day, and there were questions she asked every week. There were questions she would ask only once in a lifetime.

Tonight's first question was once in a lifetime.

She had been quietly contemplative all evening (not so unusual for such an intelligent girl), but she had not eaten the peaches and cantaloupe fruit salad that had been served after dinner (very unusual, given the girl's preference for fruit over sweets).

They had been looking at schools that day. Une had promised Mariemaia that she could begin more social schooling as soon as the doctors were certain her legs would not give out on her. It wasn't unlikely that seeing all those other children (children who had not had major coups started in their name) had left the girl feeling apprehensive.

So while Mariemaia was poking at a piece of flesh-colored melon with a fork, Une was busily replaying the day's events in her head, trying to discern what could have put the little red-head into such a state.

She looked up briefly, just in time to catch Mariemaia's eye before the girl suddenly found her fruit salad to be quite interesting, and she speared a piece with her fork and shoved it almost viciously into her mouth.

She won't have to talk for a few moments, now, Une thought to herself, and sighed. Only nine years old, and already the child was picking up the stalling tactics employed by politicians world-wide.

Mariemaia chewed thoughtfully, swallowed and looked up at Une again.

"Were you in love with my father?"

Not 'Did you love him?' 'Were you IN love with him?'

Nine years old, indeed. She was going to be a wonderful politician.

"What brought this up?" Une asked, setting down her own fork to give her adopted daughter a questioning stare.

Mariemaia looked away from her, out the window at the setting sun. "I overheard Mr. Chang saying something to Miss Po... I don't even remember what it was now, but something about it stuck in my mind and..." She looked back at Une. "Were you?"

"Yes," she answered, softly but without hesitation. "There was a time in my life when I thought I had nothing but the senseless, mindless wanderings of a soldier doomed to serve those cowardly bureaucrats who sit in their desks and sign their papers and declare their wars without a single thought for the lives they're condemning."

If Une sounded bitter, she did not seem to care all that much. Mariemaia was watching her now, studying the way her brows drew together and how her eyes narrowed.

"Then your father came along," she continued, still quiet, reverent. "Gallant as you please, and so young and handsome and full of dangerous ideas. He plucked me up from the dregs of service, polished and refined me, put his trust in me... I don't know what he saw in me that my other officers didn't. I was young, too, impressionable. How could I not love someone who became my whole world?"

"Is that why you took me in?" Mariemaia asked, trying to keep her tone unaffected. She was looking at her fruit salad again.

Another new question.

Une did her best not to sigh. When it rains, it pours...

"Yes, but that's not why I kept you."

Mariemaia looked up sharply then, but said nothing.

And for the first time in a long time, Une was speechless.

She remembered dinners with her own mother, though they were more often dinners with Susannah, the second maid, whose sole purpose in the household was to keep Une company. Her father and mother seemed to like work and social gatherings much more than their daughter's company, and Une was fine with that. All her mother ever did was tell her how she should sit up straighter, and wear her hair down, and "stop climbing those trees, you're getting your stockings all dirty!"

But she had loved her father, so very much. His secretary saw him more than his daughter did, but when he was around he was everything any little girl would have wanted. He had died in an anti-military riot two days after Une had turned thirteen. He had been a bystander, attempting to help a wounded soldier, and had been run down for his compassion. After his funeral, the military became a common fixture in her house. Her mother remarried a Colonel. The day after their wedding, Une enlisted.

Mariemaia's family was virtually nonexistent. Her mother had died only a few days after giving birth. Her father had never even known of her, and Dekim Barton had only cared for the noble blood that ran in his granddaughter's veins.

Nine years old, and she still went rigid whenever Une made any attempt at physical contact. Une wondered if Dekim had ever hugged the girl.

"It's hard, being alone," Une began, knowing Mariemaia could sympathize. "It's unnatural. Humans gravitate towards each other, towards family and love and all those things you read about in children's stories. I've been alone for a long time, and now that I've found someone who needs me as much as I need her, I'm quite unwilling to let her go."

Mariemaia's hands were shaking, her fork clacking against her plate, so she set it down and folded her hands in her lap as Une continued.

"You're young, Marie, and even thought I don't feel it, so am I," Une said, smiling across the table. "I refuse to end up an old, bitter witch, locked away in my lonely house with no one to keep me company but the cats." She reached across the table to touch Mariemaia's cheek. "It's not right that your story ends with an evil step-mother. You still have so much to do... The ball hasn't started yet, Cinderella, but when it does I'm going to make sure you're there, glass slippers and all."

Mariemaia's voice trembled as she said "I've never read Cinderella."

"Well, we'll have to amend that, won't we?" Une murmured as stood and gathered up their dinner plates.

Fin.