Chapter 17: The Reminder
"What a feast!" Quasimodo said gratefully.
Esmeralda had brought a loaf of bread and some apples. Quasimodo felt lucky to receive such a substantial meal.
"I thought you'd like it." Esmeralda said with a smile. "It seems to me that Frollo never gives you enough to eat."
"He really doesn't." Quasimodo confirmed. "But I don't tell him because he hates complaining. Where did all this come from?"
"The market." Esmeralda replied proudly. "I won a lot of money playing card games with Frollo."
"He gambled?!"
"I gave him an incentive by promising to shut up if he won."
Quasimodo laughed. It was an uncommon sensation for him, but a very welcome one. There was hardly anything to laugh about in the bell ringer's lonely life. He was happy to have Esmeralda change that.
"Sorry!" He said gladly. "That's the funniest thing I've ever heard."
Esmeralda chuckled.
"You should see what else I got." She said, digging into the bag she'd brought.
She pulled out some paper, ink, and a quill.
"What's all that for?" Quasimodo asked.
"I was hoping you could teach me the alphabet." Esmeralda explained.
"Oh, I'd love to!" Quasimodo said enthusiastically.
He wrote down each letter of the alphabet, then started to explain them.
"A is for abomination. B is for blasphemy. C is for-"
"Um, Quasimodo?"
"Yes?"
"Can I have different words?"
"Uh... Let me think."
It was hard for Quasimodo to come up with different words. He didn't know how words were spelled, so the sounds of the letters were all he had to go on. What other words started with the "A" sound? He pondered it while biting into an apple.
...Apple!
"Oh!" Quasimodo gasped. "Apple starts with an A!"
Frollo read through the quotes the Captain had written. He became more uncomfortable with each sentence.
"Maybe he will finally look out for us!"
"Frollo might just make up for his misdeeds!"
"I can't believe he saved that girl! Perhaps there's a heroic story behind that grisly scar he has..."
He threw it across the room.
Heroic... Grisly...
It was just as Frollo had expected. His scar had elicited disgust. Disgust that was only tolerable under the presumption that there was some heroic backstory.
There was nothing heroic about it. The scar and its origin were nothing but shameful...
Frollo's brooding was interrupted when Esmeralda suddenly danced into the room.
"I'm back!" She declared needlessly. "And boy do I have something to show you!"
The judge didn't have a chance to speak before his wife laid some paper on the table beside him and began to furiously write letters. She announced each symbol as she wrote it.
"A. B. C. D. E..."
Eventually she had written out the whole alphabet. She held up her work proudly.
"What do you think?" She asked. "I memorized the whole alphabet. This is exactly why you should teach me to read!"
Frollo was speechless. Had Quasimodo really taught the gypsy the whole alphabet in one morning?! Frollo looked at Esmeralda skeptically.
"Quasimodo taught you this?" He asked in disbelief.
"He certainly did." Esmeralda replied.
"Impressive." Frollo acknowledged. "But can you place sounds to letters?"
"Of course!"
"A?"
"Apple."
Frollo raised his eyebrows.
"B?"
"Bell."
"C?"
"Card."
"D?"
"Dance."
Frollo had heard enough.
"These are not the words I taught him the alphabet with." He said in disbelief.
"I didn't like your words." Esmeralda explained. "So he came up with new ones."
The hunchback was smarter than Frollo had given him credit for. So was Esmeralda.
"You should really teach us both to read." Esmeralda reiterated.
Frollo sighed aggressively.
"Fine!" He said through gritted teeth. "I'll include you in the reading lessons. But please... don't talk to me right now!"
Esmeralda was taken off guard. Frollo was in a bad mood. Worse than usual.
"Did something happen while I was gone?" Esmeralda asked.
"Never mind that." Frollo ordered. "Just... leave me be for a moment."
Although she wanted to know what was upsetting her husband, Esmeralda saw that now was not the time to test him. Maybe he needed some time alone to calm down.
Esmeralda left the room and went for a long walk around the palace. She pondered what she would do for the rest of the day and what her tactic with Frollo would be. She remembered that his bandages needed to be changed. A bath first would be ideal, and it would probably help him relax. When enough time had passed that Esmeralda thought Frollo would be calmer, she asked a servant to prepare some hot water, then returned to the bedroom.
She found her husband visibly unhappy, but seemingly placated. He seemed less angry now, but sadder. Frollo hesitated to acknowledge his wife's return. He was preoccupied.
"It's about time to change your bandages." Esmeralda informed. "You can have a bath first."
Frollo looked at her judgmentally.
"You've already irritated me. Now you're asking to wash me?"
"If you don't need me to help, I won't."
He did need it. A bath felt necessary, and Frollo was in far too much pain to possibly handle it on his own.
He cooperated. Esmeralda helped him get to the bathroom painstakingly. There, she carefully removed his bandages. Frollo closed his eyes while his body painfully reacted to the contact. They stayed closed when he got into the water, even more painfully.
Frollo felt Esmeralda's soft hands rubbing soap against his skin. She was gentle with his injuries, but he still grunted in pain. The heat was his only comfort during this agonizing and humiliating experience. It was a relief when Esmeralda withdrew her touch, leaving Frollo to relax for a moment. He breathed deeply and finally opened his eyes. But he was not prepared for what he saw.
He saw the burns that covered the skin of his hands and crawled up his right arm. He'd forgotten about them. Frollo had been too preoccupied with the pain of his injuries and fear of what everyone had seen to possibly worry about the fact that he'd been burned, and the bandages had conveniently hidden the evidence. But now he was brutally reminded. He stared at his hands with horror. Esmeralda noticed. She hoped that this reaction wouldn't last long, but the look on Frollo's face did not change even when he was back in his room with new bandages being applied.
He sat hunched over on the edge of the bed while Esmeralda bandaged him, continuing to eye his hands in paralysis even when they were covered again. Esmeralda finally saw it fit to speak to him.
"What's wrong?" She asked.
Frollo was speechless. His eyes closed.
Flashbacks played through his head of the burn he'd suffered as a boy, which he'd thought would no longer bother him...
"The burns really aren't that bad." Esmeralda assured. "They probably won't even scar."
"It's not that..." Frollo said weakly.
"What is it then?"
Esmeralda was taken by surprise when Frollo's eyes opened, revealing accumulating tears.
The fire had not left his life. Frollo didn't know what he'd done to deserve this, but he was sure of one thing:
God would not let him forget the horror of it all...
At that realization, he couldn't hold himself together. He broke down sobbing, touching his hands to his head. Esmeralda's presence couldn't stop him. The emotions were too overwhelming to contain.
Esmeralda couldn't believe what she was seeing. She'd never dreamed that Frollo would allow himself to break down so obviously in front of her, but he was crying as if the person he'd loved most had just died.
What was there to do? Esmeralda could only think of one way to react. She put her arms around Frollo caringly, remembering that this had helped him after his last nightmare. She held onto him securely while he sobbed.
To her surprise, Frollo wrapped his arms around her in return, grabbing her as if she were his last hope.
Esmeralda felt a tear in her eye. The empathy she felt was exhausting. All she wanted was to help her husband through this awful moment.
Frollo was not in the headspace to think clearly about what was happening, but he was aware of Esmeralda's warmth. She was somehow willing to comfort him in spite of all her negative feelings about him. She did not love him, and probably never would.
But she was kind.