Cinderella by Helen O’Neill
I watched her face as I sat in the velvet box, dutifully bored. She sat in the cheap seats below. Clearly, an opera virgin, overdressed in blue, the swing label of her dress protruding slightly at the nape of her neck speaking of tomorrow’s return. Her ears sparkled with costume jewelry; her eyes sparkled with tears. I was immune to La Bohème, but she was rapt.
She followed Mimi, and I followed her.After, she walked alone out into the night, teetering slightly on those impossible shoes, her incongruous duffel coat gathered to her chin against the cold, but still she smiled.
I trailed her at a distance, not wanting to unsettle her, but pulled along by her pleasure. By the third street back, she had slipped off the shoes, tucking them into a carrier bag and replacing them with flats. By the sixth, her hair was released from its chignon and shaken down her back. Two more corners, and she pulled on a woolen hat and mittens, melting into the banal, losing her glamour, street by street. Yet, in the light of a shop window, I caught her face again and she was still enthralled.
She turned up into the dark alley, grabbing for the railing and picking her way easily up through the detritus which was scattered across the cobbles. Here, I hesitated as I watched her climb. The waft of boiling cabbage and urine met me on the breeze, the in and the out of life. The funneling wind rattled loose, peeling drainpipes, the tympani of the working classes; clothing flapped overhead on zig-zagged lines, longs, shorts, nothing disposable, everything is for something; graffiti gardens planted outside the high windows. The heaving of life behind those high windows and doors, where some people who believed in this country, still hung their flags, with what was left of their pride.
She hesitated as she reached the top, and lifted her hair to tug off the earrings, just as a loud voice called from an open window.
“Is that you, Mona? You’re very late.”
She closed her fist and pushed it deep into her pocket, fixing her hair back underneath her hat.
“Sorry, Daddy. It was busy.”
She pushed a key into the door and stepped across the threshold. The dull light from inside was enough to illuminate her face one last time, and yes, her eyes still shone, remembering.
I was about to turn when my eyes caught a glint of something outside her doorway. Each of my steps upwards lingered too long on the greasy cobbles. To my rising shame, I couldn’t bring myself to touch those bannisters.
I could hear singing as I bent to pick up her single earring.
Would I knock and return it to Mona? Would I be welcome here among these people whose flags were different to the ones I flew?
I slipped it into my pocket and walked back to the palace.
