Sorry I didn't update yesterday, but in return, I made it twice as long. Happy? So without further ado...
Chapter 4: Of Memories and Ministrations
Clara regained consciousness slowly, and the warm glow of an incandescent light hit her eyelids, turning the black of her sleep a warm orange glow. Carefully, she opened her eyes, blinking rapidly in the bright light of the room. As her eyes focused she gazed around at her surroundings. The bed she was lying on was a soft peach color, and the gauzy drapes surrounding is canopy were of a lighter shade with gold embroidering. The room itself was enormous. There was a large window seat with several fluffy pillows and a floor-to-ceiling bookcase filled to bursting with books of every shape and size. There was a small round table and a delicate chair for breakfast positioned near the grand fireplace where a fire burned merrily. Groggily pushing herself up from the pillows, she shook her head lightly, trying to remember how she had gotten to the beautiful room. She remembered snow and cold and numb feet, and then, suddenly, like a bucket of cold water dumped over her head, she remembered the events of the day before…
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Clara's red stiletto heels clacked noisily on the tile floor of the large apartment building as she followed her father into the large elevator. The operator was outfitted in a maroon suit that complemented the décor of the building, and even had a small cap to match.
"What floor, sir, madam?" he asked as the doors shut.
Her father did not even spare him a glance as his perused the contents of the manila folder in his hands. "Floor 12," he said briefly. Clara looked over at the operator, and watched press the button before turning to indiscreetly stare at Clara. Clara inwardly groaned. That the bellman thought her sophisticated enough to call her madam was encouraging, but his wandering gaze and the immodest fire in his eyes that lit brightly as he stared at her long legs and curvy figure reminded her jarringly of her role in the afternoon's meeting: a bargaining chip, a trophy to be awarded to the highest bidder. And though it was her father putting her in the position, Clara was not disgusted with him so much as with herself. That she could not stand up for herself, giving in to her father's wishes without so much as a convincing argument was humiliating. All her life, Clara had thought she was a strong girl: life had forced her to be that way, and she had successfully risen to the challenge. But when it came time to show that strength, Clara was incapable of doing anything but give in. and as the elevator rose higher and higher towards the fateful office, Clara's hatred for herself grew greater and greater. The elevator gilded to a stop at the twelfth floor, and the doors dinged open. Her father strolled out and motioned absently for Clara to follow him. As she stepped out of the elevator, her nausea intensified, and she wobbled a bit before steadying herself. Refusing to meet her father's glare, she walked meekly behind him, every so often glancing around the hall before returning her gaze to her feet. When her father stopped in front of a closed mahogany door with the gold plaque, Charles Newport, President, her breath caught in her throat and she had to school her breath to stop the frantic hyperventilating caused by her nerves. Her father knocked on the door and a small young man opened it almost immediately, revealing the interior of a sparsely decorated office where an overweight, aging, balding man sat in a large leather chair behind a bulky wooden desk. He gestured impatiently to the hard, high-backed chairs across from him without looking up from the paperwork before him, and Clara thought briefly how much he resembled her father in demeanor. But her father refused to sit, clearing his throat loudly to force Mr. Newport to look up at him. Mr. Newport's double take would have been almost comical if the situation were not so serious. He first glanced up briefly, his rat-like face angry and disgusted with Clara's father attempt establish seniority. It wasn't until his gaze was once again rooted to the paper that he realized that the two men were not alone in the office. He slowly raised his head, his hard black eyes skimming up Clara's body, meeting her hard gaze and then running back down her curvy form. After about a minute of silence as he stared at the bargaining piece before him, Mr. Newport said in a stunned voice.
"Peter, get a chair for Miss…"
"Little," her father replied for her. "Mr. Newport, may I present my daughter, Clara Little." The introduction was said through the biggest smirk known to man. George Little obviously knew he had already won. Charles Newport stood quickly and rushed around the side of his desk, grabbing Clara's hand and kissing it loudly. He came up to her shoulders, and even without the tall heels, she would still have been taller than the short president of Newport Advertising. Only her father's hard elbow in her ribs stopped Clara from pulling her hand away in disgust. As it was, she was forced to leave her hand in his clammy one as he led her to a large loveseat that had just been brought into the office. Sitting down beside her, Mr. Newport gestured absent-mindedly to the original stiff chairs for Clara's father, his eyes never relenting in his visual probing of her body. Her father began to talk about his proposal, though neither Mr. Newport nor Clara was paying attention. The former was too busy studying the woman in front of him and the latter was too busy avoiding his avid stare. Halfway through the proposal Mr. Newport's hands began to wander. Clara first felt the pudgy, clammy hand on the small of her back where she sat ramrod straight, trying to dissuade him through her body language: she would not become his toy, no way, no how. But that didn't stop him. No, on the contrary, it served to make him more excited. Little did Clara know, but her posture accentuated her curvy form in a most appealing way, and Charles Newport was having a hard time retraining himself. From the small of her back, the pressure began to move, creeping around her ribcage, all the while gripping her hand tightly in his. Clara inched away slightly on the leather loveseat, but Mr. Newport moved with her. Soon she was forced up against the arm of the couch and he was becoming bolder with every passing moment. His hand roamed her body, caressing the side of her back and under her arm, while his eyes continued to mentally undress her. As his hand moved farther around the side of her body, a touch that would be classified in any high school as a grope, her face turned from a nervous ashen color to a bright angry red. But her father had finally finished his speech, and Mr. Newport was forced to pause in his conquest to address Mr. Little.
"Anything, my good friend, anything for you," he said readily, and Clara's father's smile broadened. "As long as the girl is included in the deal," he said happily, both hand squeezing tightly in their relative positions. Clara's face turned even redder as she stared at her father, pleading with him.
But her father refused to meet her eyes, instead watching the president's greedy grin as he made his reply. "I am sure, Charles, that we can come to an agreement that would be," he paused, glancing briefly to Clara, with a smirk on his face, "mutually beneficial." At that, both men shared a loud guffaw at Clara's expense, and Mr. Newport stood up, dragging Clara with him. Clara's face was a bright red, and the anger that she held in check was close to exploding. As the two men began chatting about trivial events, Clara felt Mr. Newport's hand travel from its position on the small of her back, to the inside of her thigh. That was the last straw for Clara. All the anger and disgust and humiliation she had bottled up inside of her came pouring out in a fiery torrent of rage, and she pulled away from him abruptly, slapping him loudly across the cheek.
"You are a disgusting, revolting man!" she cried, pushing him away from her to land in a heap on the loveseat. "Completely and totally abhorrent! You treat women like—like—mindless creatures made solely for your enjoyment. Uggh! And you know, I pity the woman you married and the children you bore. How do they feel, do you think, knowing that they don't even matter to you anymore?" Without waiting for an answer, she spun to her father, looking him over before throwing her hands up in disgust. "And you! I don't even know what to say about you! You're my own father, and I think you're disgusting! That you would sell off your only daughter to a sick, perverse man to do only God knows what, just so that you can make this business deal like a stupid, ignorant bargaining chip is revolting. Is that all I am to you, a piece of property to sell to the highest bidder? Well, this isn't the 18th century anymore! Women are allowed to have a mind of their own! I don't belong to you! I'm a legal adult! I don't even have to be here, but I listened to you, trusted you! Well, I'm done. I'm done here in this hellhole of an office, I'm done talking, I'm done with this wretched existence I have, and most importantly, I'm done with you, George Little. You aren't my father, and you never have been! The only real parent I ever had was my mother, and she's DEAD!" And on that note, she stormed out the office, slamming the mahogany door shut behind her, and ran out into the street…
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Clara came back from the memory abruptly, and glanced around, trying to see what had caught her attention. There was no one in the room, but the curtains seemed to be opening themselves. Clara stared, wide-eyed, before figuring they were on a switch, one of those fancy, expensive and useless pieces of machinery all the rich people were buying these days. Clara began blindly fingering the bedside table and the wall behind, looking for the switch. At that moment, something flipped back the covers, and Clara shrieked at the sudden movement. She tried to back away from the 'possessed' sheets, but in doing so, she moved her ankle, and the pain caused her vision to swim. She shuddered, and looked down at the offending limb. The ankle was firmly bound in a large amount of white wrappings, but any movement caused sparks of pain to shoot up the length of her leg. She fell back on her pillow, momentarily forgetting the strangely animated objects and focusing on the pain caused by her snow-bank injury. However, when the wrappings started to unwind themselves, tugging slightly on her ankle, she cried out and tried again to back away. This time, however, there was a pressure on her shoulders, keeping her immobile. Clara started to hyperventilate, sure that she was going insane. At that point, a damp washcloth lifted itself from a bowl on the table and began to run itself over her face. Calming slightly, Clara, assessed her options: either she could stay here and let the currently peaceful animated objects tend to her, or she could try to run. Glancing down at her swaddled ankle and then out the window at the fierce storm still raging, Clara made the most logical choice. Closing her eyes and breathing slowly, she gave in to the objects' ministrations, letting them wash her face and arms, and rewrap her ankle. With that taken care of, a pair of crutches detached themselves from the wall, and made their way over to the side of her bed. Clara began to shake her head, sure that she could not move from the bed, when she noticed, out of the corner of her eye, a piece of toast floating in midair. She turned her head to look more closely, and found that there was a large breakfast laid out on the table by the fireplace. All misgivings abandoned, Clara sat up, and swung her legs over the side of her bed. She gripped the crutches close to her sides, and though they were obviously made for a much taller person, managed to hobble over to the table. When she reached the chair, it seemed to back away from the table on its own, turning to her to let her sit. She sat gingerly, and the chair scooted loudly back in, bringing her to face the table. Eyeing the food made her stomach growl menacingly, and she giggled before digging in ravenously.
When she was done with her breakfast, and the plate was scraped clean, the chair once again backed from the table and Clara grabbed the crutches, holding them close to herself as she rose from the table. She was about to hobble back to her bed when she felt a tugging sensation on the sleeve of her nightgown. Glancing down she saw that her long-sleeved nightgown seemed to have been gripped by several invisible fingers and was being pulled towards the open door across the room. Surrendering to the insistent breeze, she let the tugging lead her to the adjoining room that revealed itself to be a large, warm bathroom. There stood a large copper tub that must have cost a fortune steaming with hot, scented water. She was helped out of her clothes by the clothes themselves, and sank into the hot tub with a delighted sigh. The breeze gently poured a bucket of the warm water over her hair, and began to scrub a lavender shampoo into her hair. Sighing contentedly, Clara stayed in the bath until her fingers were shriveled and the bath grew cool, at which point she stepped out into a large fluffy towel suspended in midair by the breeze. As strange as it was, and however difficult it was to grasp, Clara was content to let the breeze pull her limping self around, taking care of her. For a girl who had had to care for herself for as long as she could remember, with was pure bliss to let someone else worry about removing the knots from her hair, intensified from her mad dash from the office the night before.
By the time the breeze was finally finished and let the last string drop from her dress, Clara stood before the mirror, marveling at her reflection. Her hair was brushed and blow-dried to perfection, the natural brown curls brushing over the bare skin at the neck of her dress. The knee-length dress itself was a light blue, bringing out the blue of her eyes, and its style was simple, but not understated, a look Clara pulled off with ease and comfort. Although Clara did not usually spend her mornings alone in a such a beautiful dress, something about the magnificent house demanded more formal attire. Satisfied with her appearance despite the bum ankle, Clara opened the door of her room, and hobbled out into the dim hallway, intent on exploring the house…
Thank you for all your comments, as you can see, I listened =] word to the wise, if you want me to include something or change something, you have to ask me! I can't read your mind. I love input, and though I wont necessarily use it in the story (I might though...) it gets me thinking, and you might see traces of your ideas in the story...my point, please review!
savethemadscientist: Its gotten to the point where i look forward to your reviews after i submit a chapter =] thanks so much for your comment. and yes, that brief moment of kindness on nathaniel's part was intentional. a glimpse into what could be, i suppose. Hope I answered your question about the meeting in the office. I'm not so good at writing scenes like that, but i did my best. hopefully it was enough... thanks again!
MJ: Thank you! yes, you were the second to request that (points upwards) scene. As I told savethemadscientist, I'm not so good at writing scenes like that, but i did my best. hopefully it was good enough. I'm glad you didn't think Nathaniel was out of character. that really is my greatest fear when writing. so often i want the story to go one way or another, and its hard to make that happen when a character's personality is so completely against what i want them to do. And all will be revealed about the wind, have no fear...if you look back to the end of a rotten xmas, there's comment that i did not address that hints as to what the wind is from. virtual cookie if you guess correctly. =] anyways, thanks again.
MertleYuts: thank you for your review. to be told that you like my writing style means so much to me. as for the originality of the story, i will do my best, although it wont be entirely without influences...thanks again!
There, i think that's everyone for the last chapter (only three, kinda sad). Come on guys, pretty please with a cherry on top? Even if you don't, I'll still love you guys (i guess...), but review anyway please!
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