Rapunzel – what a strange name – sat, stony-faced and grimacing, in the driver's seat. Things could have gone better, but they certainly could have gone much, much worse. At least Elsa still had her scholarship, though it was held by the thinnest of threads. One could say that she played up the "poor girl from a poor family" angle, but it was true, and Elsa could not be faulted for it. The Dean had accepted it, much to Elsa's surprise. Or had he?
Elsa turned to look at Rapunzel.
Rapunzel, for her part, seemed concentrated on the road. Her eyes were locked forward, her hands gripping the wheel tightly. She breathed slowly and deliberately; Elsa watched the rhythmic rising and falling of her chest. It was almost metronomic, too measured and controlled to be quite natural. Rapunzel looked a bit triggered, that was it. Like a personified reaction image. That was the problem with these sorts. They preached liberty and freedom and demanded tolerance but voice one wrong opinion and they were upon you like hounds. It was hypocritical. It was disgusting. How could she not be disgusted?
They passed through a puddle. It splashed. The passengers, however, felt nothing. The suspension was good.
Elsa supposed she should say something, but she couldn't think of anything. Speaking to these kinds of people was like traversing a minefield. The silence wasn't awkward. It was something less than that and more. An awkward silence hangs in the air because both parties are aware of it, have knowledge of it, but cannot resolve it, are acutely aware of their mutual impotence. But this was not the case here; only a lingering, low-level sense of unease pervaded the car, not quite uncovered by the conscious minds of either, but it still crept through their stomachs, leaving its sticky, oozing footprints. So Elsa supposed she should say something.
How easily we are caught inside our own unrealities.
"Where are we going?" asked Elsa.
"My house," said Rapunzel without missing a beat. She glanced briefly at Elsa, blinked a few times, and turned back to give the road a dead stare. "That sounded better in my head. That's not weird, is it?"
Several minutes passed in silence. Rapunzel's eyes steered clear of Elsa all the while, practically affixed to the road, bulging perhaps unnaturally large. Outside, browning leaves fluttered down onto piles of their kin.
"Why?" asked Elsa.
Rapunzel took a hard left, the rubber of the tires screeching wild. Elsa was hurled against the door.
"That's a bad habit of mine, but I usually don't do that. The turn, I mean. Not the inviting women to my house. I mean, I do invite women to my house, but not for this! And not just women, singling out just women is sexist. Unless it's to empower them. Not that I am trying to empower you, well, I am, but I also invite men to my house. And non-binary genders! People! All people, all sorts of people, just having fun all the time. Normal, ordinary fun. Horses. What? No, nothing with horses, that'd be weird. But I could accept that! Do you like horses? I like horses. Wow. Yeah. I just thought it'd be better to talk in a comfortable setting, better than school, no listening ears, except mine! I'm always ready to listen. You should feel... safe?" said Rapunzel. She was very clear and understandable.
The woman was absolutely insane.
"I think we should put on some music," said Rapunzel. She pressed a few buttons on her iPhone.
The music came on strong and fierce. It was Rammstein. The loud, angry-sounding German voices were unmistakable. Elsa gave Rapunzel a strange look.
"So... what do your parents do?" asked Elsa.
"Oh good. Uhhh... my mom is a housekeeper, sort of," said Rapunzel.
Then they had common ground. Maids were not rich, and they had to compete with cheap immigrant labor. Cheap immigrant labor that made it hard for real Americans like Elsa to find work, that had the gall to complain about oppression when they were given money to go to college, and better spots, and preferential treatment in so many ways, and Elsa was almost the victim of a $60,000 annual bill. Poor them? Poor her.
"And my dad is a watchmaker. He could do better, but his English isn't so good. He went to some university in the Old Country. I'm glad he's white - I mean ashamed - but it made it easier on him. Because of his privilege. He has a lot of privilege," said Rapunzel.
Right. Riiiiiiiight.
Why did Rapunzel sympathize with the subhumans? The people that couldn't work and yet demanded to be coddled? The people that made life hard for both of them? They ought to be on the same side. Preferential treatment just because of skin color was blatantly unjust. They worked less and got better results. Some people called that reverse racism, but Elsa knew it for what it was - just plain ordinary racism. Reverse racism was another term used to twist the truth. Elsa was not to blame for the faults of generations past, especially when her family had never taken part in slavery. They were abolitionists. Elsa had checked. It had been third-grade history class, and they had a project to...
It didn't matter. They turned onto a country road. Concrete and steel gave way to wood and dirt. The meadows rustled, touched by a gentle wind.
The country had a cancer just as surely as her mother did. No, it was much worse than cancer, spreading relentlessly, consuming all resources, undermining self-repair and defense mechanisms, despoiling countrysides even more thoroughly than locusts, hardening, building its own defense mechanisms, subverting the natural ability of the body to fight it, spreading, infiltrating, heralding one day the collapse. Elsa was lucky her mother just had cancer. And across the sea? Britain's Jihadi Johns and an inability to resist terrorists openly attacking – killing – the police. Some diseases just ran in the family.
They went down the bumpy road, traveling further and further from the gentle grip of civilization, further into the wild lands, where law and order and civility held no sway. Surely Rapunzel or a family member would have a gun? After all, they were now far from the police. Safety, security, these were things needed by all humans. Except the sick. The incurably sick. Elsa looked deep into Rapunzel's green eyes. Were those sick eyes?
They approached walls.
…
Walls? Why were there walls in the middle of nowhere?
There was a brass gate in the wall.
"You live in a gated community?" asked Elsa.
"Uhhh... sorta?" said Rapunzel, fidgeting.
The gates opened soundlessly. They drove through. The gates closed.
There was a lot of grass inside, though there were few buildings. This was... pretty ritzy. Each house got this much space? All of them had pristine white paint and tiled roofs. For the most part, they were squat and square.
A horse ran up to the car, and Elsa's eyes widened. Rapunzel, though, just laughed, rolling down the windows.
"Here Maximus! Who's a good boy? You're a good horsie. You're the best horsie! So smart and loyal. Heh. You smart, you loyal. I can't play right now, I have a guest! Say hello to Elsa," said Rapunzel.
The horse nibbled Elsa's ear with its lips.
"What the fuck?" screamed Elsa.
"That's my pony, Maximus! Well, I guess he's a horse. You didn't want a pony when you were little?" asked Rapunzel.
"Yeah, but-"
The horse took a few more nibbles and trotted off. Drool slowly dripped down the side of Elsa's neck.
"Oh, sorry! Do you need a towel?" asked Rapunzel. Before Elsa could respond, Rapunzel opened the glove compartment and gave Elsa a towel.
Elsa wiped off her face. There were no people here, or at least very few. There was all this open space. Shouldn't kids be playing outside?
They drew closer to a central building and suddenly it hit her: all the buildings had gilded sun emblems on them.
Rapunzel's necklace – a sun!
"Do you own...all of this?" Elsa asked.
"It's my parent's place, I just rent it at a very affordable price," said Rapunzel. She paused. "That was a joke. It wasn't that funny, was it? Uhhh..."
Elsa's jaw dropped.
"...Do you want to go inside?" asked Rapunzel.
Elsa nodded slowly. Rapunzel unplugged her iPhone and the music switched to the iPhone's speakers.
Rapunzel swung open the double doors, the very large double doors, the doors with golden lion knockers and fine wood and gilding set in a marble frame and sitting under another golden sun and there was just so, so much gold and the buildings all around were marble and gold and fine wood too and Elsa just stepped through mutely, stepped through the door.
And inside was no different, and why would Elsa expect anything else? It was all the same. Glamour and gold and wide, infinite space choking her, seizing her, the tyranny of too much. It was the madness of a lab rat removed from its maze and placed into a open field for the first time. There was just too much choice; when there's no wrong answer, there's no right answer either.
In short, it was large.
Rapunzel took off her shoes and socks. "You should take your shoes off too! You'll track dirt inside otherwise, and then my mom has to clean it all up, and that's really inconvenient for her, especially since Dad says we have to live frugally like Americans, fit in, y'know, and so we don't have servants. Besides, it's nice to be barefoot! You can feel the breeze between your little toesies!" said Rapunzel.
The last lines of the song echoed through the palace, amplified greatly, echoing again and again, until the echo had totally eclipsed the original utterance of the iPhone.
"Acht... hier kommt die Sonne..."
Author Notes: Have you covered yourself in honey and run out into the street
the bees come
the bees come
wwhy it 8urts