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It was a lovely day in the Flower Kingdom. The skies were a perfect, shining, cloudless blue. The temperature was warm, but not too warm. One could do anything they wished on this day, and César Dubois decided to spend it sobbing on Rumba Beach.
A few people walking by asked César what was wrong, but all left once they learned the reason for his sobbing. Everyone must’ve thought him so shallow , but to César, that didn’t matter. There were only two people’s opinions that mattered to him: Sabrina’s and his sister’s.
The reason he was sobbing on Rumba Beach was because he had a bad hair day. No matter how César brushed it, no matter how much product he put into it, no matter what he did , he couldn’t get his coiff to look just right. This set the mood for the rest of his morning routine, from running out of moisturizer to spilling rose-scented cologne all over his usual pants and replacing them with the only pair he had left: disgusting beige ones. Once he’d finished his meager attempt at getting ready, César looked at himself in the mirror.
He looked hideous .
What would his sister think of this? Awful, he was sure she’d say.
“What troubles you, my lord?” One of his attendants asked, seeing his blatantly sour mood. “Despite all of the mishaps you had, you still look remarkable, as always.”
“Remarkable? This is not remarkable ,” César muttered to himself. “I would not even call this decent . How can I show my face to the public looking anything less than perfect? My sister never did.”
“Oh, not this again, my lord. I’m sure your sister would think--”
“What do you know of how she thought? She was perfection incarnate, and I am...this. She did not deserve a brother like me.”
“My lord--”
César stood from his vanity, pushing the stool back with enough force for it to make a sound against the floor. “Please, leave me be. Don’t try to comfort me with lies. I don’t deserve it.” He rushed out of the castle’s guest room and through the main hall, hoping to leave before anyone else saw him in this horrid state. Luckily, he’d accomplished his task, and made it to Rumba Beach where he could properly vent his frustrations.
As he stared out into the ocean, all he could think about was his incredible sister. After her death, everything she owned went to him. “Light up the world with beauty” was the last thing she ever said to him, and she didn’t even say it in her voice. It was instead communicated via note, written in that lovely loopy cursive of hers. Ever since that day, he tried as hard as he possibly could to follow in his sister’s footsteps. The things she used to decorate her room with, he used to decorate his room with; however, his looked sloppily thrown together. All of the wonderful fragrances she brought back from her travels sat on his vanity, though none ever smelled quite as good on him. Even the rose brooch she always wore looked dull on César, and he eventually stopped wearing it. Every single day he tried to replicate fabulosity, and every day he fell short.
His heart pounding in his ears did nothing to ease his pain.
César was a sickly child, and that was mostly due to his bad heart. His failing heart was so bad, in fact, that his family’s doctors said that he would have to have a heart transplant. They searched far and wide for someone whose heart was compatible with César, but every investigation was in vain...until his sister had her accident. Her heart was the perfect match, and since their parents couldn’t bear to lose two children one after the other, they gave the okay for the surgery.
His sister’s heart beats in his chest, and keeps him alive. She did so much for him, and yet he still couldn’t honor her memory in the way she would have wanted.
Perhaps all the people who passed him thought it silly that César was crying over a bad hair day (a few even said it looked the same, which César vehemently disagreed with), but to him, it wasn’t silly. To him, it was just another reminder of his failure to fulfil his sister’s last request.