Rebellion (Lies)

I figured posting my fic here couldn't hurt.

Being working on this for a week or two, writing snippets during class and Phi Mu meeting.

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Rebellion (Lies)

People say that your dreams,
are the only things that save ya.
Come on baby in our dreams,
we can live our misbehavior.

I. You've torn your dress, your face is a mess

Lizzie is pouting.

She stares silently at the pale cream wall in front of her face, eyes blank. Her mother always said white was too harsh for bedroom walls. Too stark, too blank. Like little Lizzie’s face.

She absentmindedly picks at the mud-encrusted ruffle at the knee of the dress. Her silk ribbons are loose, tangled – just like the curls that were so perfectly arranged an hour ago.

The noise of the Easter party echoes throughout the empty house. It reminds her of that movie she saw when the babysitter wasn’t paying attention. A big ancient hotel with ghosts hidden in the walls, tiny little girls with ruffles and lace and blood matting their hair.

Her filthy patent leather shoes click gently against the metal frame of the bed. She swings her Mary Janes through the air, breathes out when they hit the frame. Click. Click. Click.

She had tried to grab the prettiest flower at the edge of the puddle, bright yellow center shining out at her like a beacon. She could just imagine what color crayon she would use to draw it. Buttercup. Maybe saffron. Two steps later and she’s fallen. Mud splatters like judgment onto her pristine crinoline and she feels almost a fierce sense of victory at the rising fury in her mother’s face. She didn’t want to wear the pink dress anyway.

Lizzie is five years old.

II. You can't get enough, but enough ain't the test

Elizabeth stared at her left thumb, tapping it rhythmically against the side of the table. The sliver of crimson ripples, reflecting the light in the room. She flexes the joint in the appendage, analyzing the varying tones in the solitary color.

Her mother is complaining, the scolding swirling about in her head and fading to a dim cacophony at the back of her mind. Elizabeth can feel Sarah’s eyes boring into the side of her head, her perfect nude nails laying still on the tabletop. Her nails are still tapping.

“Honestly Lizzie, what were you thinking, getting that garish color on your nails for the benefit dinner? I only allowed you and Sarah to get your manicures alone because I thought that you would be responsible! Why can’t you follow your sister’s example? Sarah knows how to follow the rules. Why can’t you?”

Elizabeth can see Sarah’s mouth quirk upward ever so slightly due to the praise from the mother. A stabbing spark of jealousy inflames her, and she stamps it down as she bites onto the edge of her thumb. Sarah’s questioning eyes remain trained on Elizabeth’s visage.

She keeps her gaze away. She doesn’t say that the color looked so rich and luminous in the bottle that she couldn’t take her eyes off of it. She doesn’t say that she felt grown-up and important as the woman delicately painted the shade onto her nails. The manicurist said she had beautiful fingers. An artist’s fingers.

She doesn’t say a word.

Elizabeth is ten years old.

III. You want more and you want it fast

His hand felt sweaty clasped in her own, small fingers sliding against palm. She bit her lip sharply as she darted her gaze over to his face. The faintest stubble darkened his upper lip, making his boyish face appear older than his seventeen years.

As they walked along the path, Elizabeth couldn’t dampen the thrill that coursed along her spine. Her family was back at the lodge with the other guests, sipping hot chocolate and exchanging bon mots with frozen faces. And here she was, sneaking out with the Johnson’s eldest son. Ducking behind wooden posts, turning her face from the windows, devilish glint in her eye.

She jolted to a stop when his hand grasped hers firmly and held it still. Her breath hung in the air, a murky cloud that briefly obscured the brilliance of the stars.

His hand reached up to cup her cheek, and Elizabeth licked her dry lips with the tip of her tongue. She felt utterly lost, and yet somehow found. It was either the anticipation of doing something slightly illicit, or the biting chill in the air, but Elizabeth shivered in body and soul.

As the boy closed the distance between their lips and her eyes closed to preserve the moment, Elizabeth smiled. Not too bad for a first kiss.

She is thirteen years old.

IV. You've got your transmission and your live wire

She zips the bag closed with a determined air. It sticks in the middle, requiring her to lean over it and use her slight body weight to force the stubborn metal shut. She hisses out a curse when the teeth catch her finger, and she sucks on her injured digit.

Elizabeth is getting the hell out of dodge.

It’s actually Colorado, not dodge, wherever that may be, but considering the circumstances they might as well be the same place.

Her parents are off doing what they do best – ignoring their youngest daughter – saving the underprivileged of the world. Elizabeth is stuck in Boulder, stuck like moss on this damn rock of a town. Everyone has left to live their own lives, experience their own adventures, and Little Lizzie is supposed to stay like stagnant water.

Her teachers say she’s free-spirited, rough around the edges. It’s code for uninspired, bored, and sullen. The only faculty member who doesn’t ride her ass is the art teacher, Miss Wickre. She praises Elizabeth’s use of color, her quick eye for detail, the way she utilizes the paper.

She’s the only one who calls her Elizabeth.

The thick canvas strap of the bag slides her shirt off her shoulder, and she rolls her eyes as she yanks it back into place. The bus ticket is tucked into the pocket of her purse, alongside the emergency money her parents left for the neighbors. A one-way ticket to Port Charles, New York. No stops, no worries, no looking back.

Grams and Sarah better get ready. Port Charles better prepare. She’s on her way.

She’s fourteen going on fifteen.

V. So what you wanna know Calamity's child

Her pulse beats so loudly in her ears that she’s sure he can hear it through the door. She runs her hands down the front of her pants, smoothing out invisible wrinkles. She’s stalling, waiting, afraid to take that last leap into the unknown.

Elizabeth never shied away from danger, from dissenting opinion when she was younger. She leapt at every change to shock her family, startle them into consciousness, pay attention to her. But with the taking of her innocence, and her virginity, she became safe. Cautious. Fearful. Her past behavior was treacherous with far too many perils lurking in the shadows. She stopped taking even the tiniest of risks, terrified of the consequences. She lived in her safe little box. Tiny little box filled with ticky tacky Elizabeth, her spirit squashed along with her dreams.

The creak of the door opening made her hands still and her breath catch. As the wooden slab gave way from the matching frame, she darted her eyes up and met Jason’s surprised gaze.

“Can I come in?”

He nodded once, slipped to the side to let her slide past. She can feel the sleeve of her shirt brush against him, and that slight contact is enough to clench her stomach into knots.

He has barely shut the door before she’s already turned to face him and talking.

“I think I’ve made a huge mistake.”

For some reason she can hear Ron Howard’s voice in her head, and she has to shake herself out of her reverie in order to catch the last bit out of Jason’s mouth.

“I’m sorry, can you repeat that?”

His forehead wrinkles at her, and he stares at her for a second or two as if analyzing her very being. She wants to cross her arms in front of her chest, ask him to shutter his piercing gaze before he finds the crack in her bones, shatters her.

“Are you okay?”

Elizabeth nods once, twice, before she realizes that her knuckles are alabaster. She loosens the grip she has on her purse and sighs. Covering her face with her hands, she sinks down onto the couch and groans.

“God I used to be so much better at this.”

She can feel his body sit beside her, sense his eyes staring at her profile. She can only imagine the confused look on his face.

“Elizabeth, what’s going on?”

Tilting her head back, she looked up at his ceiling and focused on play of shadows on the surface.

“I used to be so good at doing what I wanted. I didn’t care what my parents thought, I didn’t care what they said. If I wanted something, I went for it. Society be damned. And somewhere along the way, I lost that bit of my self. I thought it was stolen when Tom Baker… when he hurt me. But in reality I just locked it away. It was easier to do what everyone expected of me. To do what everyone thought was right.”

Elizabeth took a deep breath and chanced a glance over at Jason. Their eyes locked, and it seemed like the words were pouring out of her. The stopper was gone.

“Except you never did that to me. You never made me feel like I had to be this perfect person, this paragon of virtue. You just wanted me to be me, whatever that meant. And I don’t know if you knew how much that changed me. Changed my life, for the better Jason. You’ve made it better, made me better.”

Jason looked at her, and reached out to gently tuck a lock of hair behind her ear. He was so gentle, she almost didn’t feel the pressure of his fingers against her cheek.

But she did.

“Elizabeth…”

It was now or never. Time to take the plunge.

Jump.

“Jason, I don’t care if it’s dangerous. I know you’ll protect me and the boys, I know you’ll take care of them with every fiber of your being. I know you’ll watch over them, and love them, and be there for them. I… Jason, I want to be with you. No matter what happens, I want to be with you. I love you.”

When his lips claimed hers, she felt like her feet were on solid ground, even as he pushed her back against the sofa cushion. When he pulled her tightly against him, anchoring her, she felt like she was as light as air.

She knew that her Grams would be furious, that Lucky would lose it, that everyone would stare and talk and judge. She was rebelling against everything she knew, everything she had believed she had to do.

Elizabeth Imogene Webber is 24 years old.

And she is happy.