Part Sixteen

Blue looked from the woman to her sister and then to their hands. Confused by all the information, she took her hand back and held it to her chest. The woman laughed – the same laugh Blue remembered from before.

“B,” said Georgeanne, her hand still on the table.

“You remember her?” she asked, and her sister nodded. “How do you know her?”

“They’re not solid memories… like fencing with you or doing silly needlepoint with the other ladies.” Her head tilted as if trying to hear something – perhaps a distant memory. “I’ve seen her once or twice… when I was younger,” she said. “During some of your lessons, Nanny Deanna would occasionally take me to the kitchens for a snack. Deanna was fond of one of the cooks… Lionel. While she was off flirting with him, I would be left alone with Aggie.”

Did she feed you any boiled frog legs or raven eyeballs? wondered Blue thinking back on all the potions and such in Agathea’s room. The woman looked at Blue then – almost as if she could read her thoughts – and feeling strange, the princess turned her attention back to her sister and said, “I never saw her when I went to the kitchens. Marcella took me several times, but most of the time I went by myself.” Georgeanne shrugged, and they both turned to Agathea.

“It would draw too much attention for me to come to both of you,” explained the woman swallowing a bite of sandwich. “Devon and I split the two of you up. I watched over Georgie here,” she said patting the young woman’s hand, “while Devon watched over you.”

“But I don’t have any memories of him like Georgeanne has of you,” said Blue.

At that moment Devon leaned toward her in his chair and said, “Do you remember how you loved the gardens when you were young?”

Blue thought back to her childhood and recalled playing in the gardens with Georgeanne. Sometimes she’d sneak away from lessons or her ladies-in-waiting and run off to be by herself. She’d go to the gardens and look at the flowers in full bloom with their gorgeous colors and fragrances. Her favorite things in the garden however were the topiaries. Some of them were in the shape of animals like horses or sheep. Most of them were interesting shapes – artistic achievements made by the gardener.

Her eyes turned to the man to her left.

“You were the gardener,” she said, and he simply nodded. “I remember you. I ran away from Marcella who was trying to get me to practice the piano. I had run out to the garden and saw you working.” Her eyes squinting as she recalled details. “You were making a giant fish. I remember it looked like it was jumping right out of the water, it was so lifelike.” Coming back to the present, she realized something was off. “But how could that have been you? You looked then just as you are now?”

Georgeanne looked at Agathea then and stared at her face. Before her stood the woman from her childhood memories of snacks in the kitchen while her nanny tried to make a love connection, but compared to Devon she looked to have aged. Staring more intently at the woman’s face, she noticed a smudge on her cheek and without realizing it, reached out to wipe it off. As she did so, she smudge only got bigger. She tried a few more times, but it never went away. Georgeanne took her hand back and stared at her fingers, rubbing the creamy consistency between them. She looked back up at Agathea and said, “Makeup?” The woman said nothing. Georgeanne rose from the table, her kerchief in hand, and began wiping at the woman’s face. When she was done, her cloth soiled, no longer its brilliant white. The woman’s face, on the other hand… it looked like years had been erased away. “Aggie?”

Blue stared up at her sister who was just as surprised as she was seeing that the woman was not as old as she had claimed to be. She stood, moving to her left side and reached out to touch her hair. The woman now looked vastly younger than she had before though she still appeared older than Devon although Blue wasn’t sure by how much. “When I saw you,” she started to say.

The woman took her hand as it ran through her ragged hair. “It’s a glamour, my dear.”

“Pardon?” said Blue.

“You’re seeing what I want you to see.” The woman ran her fingers through her hair and all the grey disappeared leaving only beautiful soft brown waves.

“Then why the makeup?” asked Georgeanne.

“I was never good with features,” said Agathea. “Hair’s easy – just pick a color, and you’re done. The face – ahhh, that’s different. You have eyes, nose, mouth, teeth… then there’s the issue of the skin itself.”

“Don’t bore the girls, Aggie,” said Devon.

“No,” said Blue.

“This is fascinating,” added Georgeanne.

Devon smiled and waved his hand toward the woman who returned his smile with one of her own and a nod of her head.

“What else can you do?” asked Georgeanne.

“We can do all sorts of things?” she answered.

Blue’s face turned to confusion when she asked, “We who?”

“We us,” said Agathea waving her hand about the table. The girls stared at her for a moment, then looked at each other before turning their heads toward Devon. He merely smiled at them.

“Us?” asked Georgeanne repeating the same gesture Agathea had.

“Yes,” replied the woman.

“All of us?” asked Blue doing the same gesture as the other two.

“Yes,” Agathea repeated. “It runs in the family.” The princesses turned back toward the man, the only one of the four who had remained seated all this time.

“Family?” Georgeanne mumbled.

“Ladies,” said Agathea, “I would like you to meet Devon - my son and your uncle.”