CHAPTER FIFTY-EIGHTReady your bomb shelters, the full backstory of Beatrix Royale has arrived! I know that some of you are probably going to scream when you see just who she's related too...%%%%
To: [email protected]
From: [email protected]
Subject: Happy birthday!
Izzy -
Happy early birthday, little sis! It's hard to believe that you're turning seventeen tomorrow! It feels like it was just yesterday when dad brought you home, and now you're practically an adult! Where has the time gone?
I hope you are doing well. Cas told me that you were having trouble adjusting to living in such a small apartment at the wedding (you looked amazing in grandma's dress, by the way!). I talked it over with Cecilia while we were in France, and she agreed that you should come and live with us instead. I think being in familiar surroundings will help you.
Let me know what you think!
- Alex
P.S. Has Cas had any success in tracking mom down? Also, tell Miss Erickson I said hello!
I sighed as I read the email over again. I was turning seventeen tomorrow and everybody except for Miss Erickson was going to be busy. It's rough when your birthday falls on a Monday rather frequently; everybody is too preoccupied with the weekend being over to realize that it's my day.
Oh well. I clicked on the reply button and typed up my message to my older brother.
To: [email protected]
From: [email protected]
Subject: Re: Happy birthday!
Alex -
Thanks for the early birthday wishes. I'm also having a hard time realizing that I'm turning seventeen, too.
Cas still hasn't heard any word on your mom. She works pretty much all day nowadays, so she only has time to look on weekends. Miss Erickson suggested a special form of time traveling that won't create paradoxes to make it as though she never vanished in the first place, but Cas doesn't trust it. She is a scientist, after all...
I've been giving it some thought lately, and it actually sounds like it could work in some sort of way.
Thanks for the offer! I would like to go back home. This town is really strange. I'll think it over and let you know.
- IzzyWith that, I clicked 'send'.
I sorted through the spam that somehow kept finding its way back to my inbox, frustrated with how slow the computer ran. I really shouldn't complain, though, since it isn't even mine. It belongs to our landlady, Miss Erickson, and she lets me use it while she's out. She isn't very good with technology and is stuck in the past, so the model is old and has almost no memory left. It's all bogged down by novels and I'm pretty sure that it has a few viruses.
Miss Erickson is an odd duck. She used to have a huge amount of money and a big house, but for some reason she left it all behind and came here to run an apartment complex. There were times when she was cheerful, but whenever she thought nobody was around she would sigh and drink a lot. Mostly coffee, but sometimes juice or nectar. She also talked a lot as if she had gone through certain experiences that were impossible for her age. I'm pretty certain that she's younger than my older sister, and yet she seems to understand how loosing a spouse or marrying the wrong person feels.
With her knowledge of safe time travel, I knew that she had most likely gone through all of that and possibly more. Speaking of which, she had told me all about this discovery about time travel that she had made a long time ago and had given me detailed instructions on how I could use it to put my family back together. Like I said in my email to Alex, Cas didn't trust it, but Miss Erickson had confided in me that she had done it. Apparantly she had been married to a rich heiress while she undertook the task.
My dad's first wife, the mother of my older siblings, vanished before I was born. Cas tells me that he was never the same afterwards. He thought he found love again in my mother, but in the end she ran off with Cas's husband and all of our money after my father died. I was about five years old when they left, not even in kindergarten.
My brother is about ten years older than me while my sister is about twenty years older, so they were affected by it much more than I was. Alex had to get a part time job while Cas worked overtime, and I had to spend a lot of time with a distant cousin of ours who lived in an apartment downtown while they got work done. I barely remember her since I started going home with friends after school, but I do recall that she was an extremely bitter, lonely woman. Kind of like an elderly version of Miss Erickson.
I was about to close out of my email when another message popped up. I could feel my stomach drop when I read who it was from and briefly considered just ignoring it, but before I could I had subconsciously clicked on it.
To: [email protected]
From: [email protected]
Subject: Birthday Wishes
Hello Isabella. I hope that you have a nice birthday. Call me sometime tomorrow.
Love, MomI didn't even bother replying. I just closed out at let my head hit the desk.
I had told my mother to stop trying to contact me numerous times and yet she always ignored me. I wanted absolutely nothing to do with her, and here she was trying, yet again, to get back into my life. If she wanted to be involved in my life, then why did she leave in the first place?
Deciding that I needed some air, I left Miss Erickson's apartment and nearly collided with her on the stairs as she was coming home from...well, wherever she slipped off to when she actually left her apartment. I made a beeline for the park that was just down the street and lay claim to one of the swing sets. It was still relatively early in the day, so nobody except for an elderly woman was around .
I must have been there for hours, because I soon heard the familiar footsteps of my sister behind me.
"Mind if I sit with you?" She asked.
"Go ahead." I answered.
"I told my boss about your scholarship and acceptance to culinary school. He says congratulations."
"That's nice." I said quietly.
"You've been hanging out with Miss Erickson too much. She's starting to rub off on you."
"No Cassandra, I'm just busy thinking. I'm seriously considering taking up her offer of going back in time to fix all of this, but Alexander messaged me earlier and offered for me to move back home with him. And, y'know, I really don't like it here, but I'm torn between two things I really want. Correct the past or go home." I blurted. "And if I'm going to take up Miss Erickson's offer, I have to leave tonight!"
"Oh, Isabella..."
"It's completely up to you, Isabella." Cas said after a few minutes of a stunned silence. "I really,
really don't like the idea of you running around in the past with a crackpot convinced that she used to be married to an heiress and have two children when she's still practically a child herself, but I can't stop you."
"Maybe I want you to stop me? Force me to go to cooking school, move back home, do anything but this. The risk of failure is just-"
"Isabella Goth, for God's sake stop worrying! You're starting to sound like your brother and his neurosis."
"I'm sorry, Cassandra...I'm just...I don't know anymore."
"Listen, kiddo, I don't like that I won't have contact with you, but you need to do what you feel is right. And if that's trying to fix up the past, then it's fine by me, okay? Just take off with your scholarship, use it for culinary school in the past, and see that dynasty to its very end!"
My conversation with my half sister earlier today renewed my confidence. We said our goodbyes over a dinner of autumn salad, and I met Miss Erickson in the hallway.
"Are you sure? Are you absolutely sure?" She asked me.
"Yes." I answered. "Yes, I am."
"Alright, then lemme refresh you on what you need to do as soon as you land. First, you need to decide on a lifetime wish that you can get done."
"Then, you pick a job you'll rise to the top of. I think it would be best if you chose a lifetime wish that would be achieved by reachin' the top of a career."
"How about cooking? I have a scholarship that I'm taking with me." I replied.
"Yes, good. But remember, none of your descendants can ever become masters of cookin'!"
"Got it."
"Remember to get your portrait painted as soon as possible. Try and fall in love with a painter, and try for photographs as well."
"But I have no idea who is a great artist in this town we're going to!"
"I have connections, don't worry. There's one man there who is a real sweetheart. A bit odd, but very good at paintin' and sensitive. He works as a stylist, there, so as soon as you can, go and meet him."
"Another thing we have to consider is your name."
"My name?" I asked.
"Yes, your name. 'Isabella Goth', it sticks out. Everyone knows the Goth family no matter where you go. We need to think of something that won't give away who you are but still be unique enough to be remembered...hmmm."
"You're a writer, come up with one!"
"Give me a sec, give me a sec...Penny Farben...no..." She mused, pinching the bridge of her nose. "Estrella Polaris-wait, no I've got it! Beatrix Royale! A good name for the head of a family dynasty!"
"Beatrix Royale...I like it, it rolls off of my tongue pretty easily." I cried, my face lighting up.
"A'ight, we're good to go!"
We drove for a half hour into the night, Miss Erickson constantly reminding me that she would be living in the mountains while I fiddled with the radio. She almost always repeated herself as if it were a sort of comfort from her ever-increasing neurosis.
Soon, I found us standing in front of a huge metal box. There was no going back from here. I could very easily pull the plug and run back home to Cassandra, keep trying to live a normal life, but I knew that wouldn't be possible anymore. I had glimpsed success and I wanted more.
"I'll go first." Miss Erickson said, reaching out and fiddling with several buttons next to the door. It slid open, revealing a spinning, bright pink vortex that you usually only saw in movies.
"GERONIMO!" She yelled after flashing me a grin, her teeth nearly going through her chin.
I waited a few minutes, trying to muster up the courage to jump into the unknown. The longer I waited the more nervous I got, so I finally took a wild leap inside.
There was definitely no going back now.
