Chapter 1 - Something Old
Before the vanity mirror Victoria sat wearing not her usual full-skirted gown but only her snow-white undergarments of a back-laced corset and long flowing underskirt, undoing her hair from its daytime bun until it fell down in long tangled ribbons around her body. In the sunlight her hair was blonde but the moonlight cast a cerulean bluish glow to it.
The already weathered scrap of paper, read as many times over as years she was in age, fell to her seat at one side. In unerasable ink it read:
To my dearest,
I know not yet what your name may be nor the sight of your face, but rather than live this unlivable life any longer, wait for me under the old oak tree by the graveyard at quarter til three, where I shall faithfully meet you and we shall run away together.
Truly yours,
Victor
The boy had passed her the already written note to her that very day, wordlessly, as though rather than let either of their parents read it, to take the secret of its contents to both their graves.
"Something old, something new, something borrowed, something blue…" she sang the old bridal ditty to herself quietly under her breath.
She looked at her reflection, the usual heart-faced pink-gowned cherubic angel transformed to a long tangled-haired white-garmented ghost. Her white corset and underskirt would have to serve for a wedding gown, though the length of sheer white netting meant for a tablecloth or curtain would serve nicely as a full-length veil to cover her very long hair, falling halfway down her body. She pinned it onto her head and then placed a blue forget-me-not flower crown on top, looking like a Grecian nymph, a spirit of nature. Her shoulders and arms were bare but for the white fingerless gloves slipped on, her hand yet ringless.
Now, as she had thought about for the past few hours while her parents slept, she would doff the name Victoria and go by her middle name, Emily. Her parents might never know what had become of her.
But she would be with him.
The price to be paid for a dream come true, like in the fairy tales she had poured over and memorized, of children wandering into the woods where they met their one true love.
She was only eighteen years old, still a child.
The clock struck twice. It was time to head out on her romantic adventure. She put on her white heeled shoes, her clammy fingers white and thin as bones. Perhaps the sight of her would scare anyone away from following.
She had stolen the bouquet from the vase downstairs and now clenched it in her chilly hands over her still-warm heart. The dyed-blue roses, though an unnatural color, would serve as the "something blue" from her beloved yet superstitious rhyme. Her favorite color had always been blue because of it.
With one last look in the full-length mirror, she looked a ghostly bride. Weddings were meant to be in the daytime, not the after-midnight hours, and in the flowered springtime, not the cold of autumn turning to winter.
But she had always been the opposite of most people, unique and unusual.
With that she crept out of her room, down the staircase, and out the front door, perhaps for the last time, at least until she returned happily married to the handsome boy of her dreams, no longer envious of her elders but proud and a show-off.
She took a glimpse at the moonlit wild woods before heading in that direction. Silently she bid her old life good-bye. She pressed the blue bouquet to her upturned nose and breathed in the sweet smell of freedom.
"I"m coming, darling," she breathed.
