Chapter Text
I was fidgeting with the gold charm of my pearl necklace while anxiously looking over at my husband whose nose was too deep into a book to seem to care about me. I dropped my gaze from him to scan across the table and room. Our large dining room was red with gold accent pieces I had spent the morning dusting decorating the walls. We both sat at opposite ends of the long table, ever too long to just seat two people but it seemed the man couldn't do anything at home if he was within five feet of me. A bouquet of roses I placed in a ceramic vase sat between us on the table. He loved roses, he always did, so I placed them there to brighten his day and maybe even spark up conversation between us. I polished the plates we ate on delicately and even spent the afternoon painting designs onto the back of them. I had done all this in hopes I'd receive some sort of compliment from him but alas, there was none. I sat back and reminisced on the days of our love before it was like this. Truly, when I had first married Coriolanus I had felt like my life had started a new chapter. We dated in the spring and summer time of the year after we graduated from the academy. He was top of the class and while I never matched him in intelligence he had seemingly randomly taken a liking to me. We were acquaintances at most before that and then he started talking to me any chance he could get. I would gush to my friends about his charming smile and posture and they would warn me of the rumors that went around about him. They would tell me to never get to close to him as all those who got did would end up disgraced, missing, or dead. In some masochistic way, I truly felt enthralled by his magnetic aura, danger, and the mystery that surrounded him. His bright red coat was as red as the flags that man was but the danger of it all excited me. He wasn't the nicest man out there but when he was nice to me, I felt unique. I was the exception to his coldness.
We'd go out on dates and he would shower me with sweet nothings. He would tell me how I was the light that lit up the darkness of his life. He said my beauty could turn a man to stone. I will never forget the way he kissed me on the busiest street in the capital under the dancing streetlights and how I felt like time had stopped in that moment. The way he stroked the side of my face so delicately and told me I was the only one who had ever made him feel so alive. I was holding onto every breath that man had exhaled hoping he'd inhale me further into his life. We'd spend days together and call at night. I didn't notice it at the time but in retrospect it was tactical. I spent every moment of my waking days with him and soon my life started to be built around him. Every phone call from a friend I received that spoke about him in any negative way made me push them away and out of my life even further. He was the only one I talked to. He is my world. We were two seeds that had gotten dropped into the same pot and were growing into each other.
In the fall, I fell for him harder than I ever had before. It came to a height when we were walking through a park and watched as the changing leaves fell from the trees. He held my hand in his and he held me so tight as if he was afraid I'd float away and leave him. I would never of course, my life would bend to his will. My head rested against his arm like the red coat he always wore. He'd recount to me stories of his life that would make me laugh and smile. His strikingly blonde hair blew in the wind softly and I noticed every detail of how his icy blue eyes would crinkle when he'd smile at me. He was like a beautiful painting whose artist was unknown. I remember thinking that all I would ever want to be in this life is as significant to him as he is to me. I remember the earth shattering halt my heart felt when he turned to me and dropped down to one knee and proposed. A smirk plastered his face when I said yes. He stood back up and pulled me in by the waist. One hand on my chin and the other on my lower back. The feeling of his warm, soft lips on mine and the feeling of his hair tangled between my fingers. I remember the ecstasy of the moment and the feeling that my friends were wrong, the world was wrong, no one knew Coriolanus like I knew him. He wasn't a cold, calculated, and constantly plotting man, he was just misunderstood. When he pulled away from the kiss, he whispered in my ear that he would live a thousand life times if it meant he got to love me in the next. I remembered everything.
That was the first night we spent together. He snuck me into his house and we giggled in his bedroom when he shut the door. We told each other secrets and moved the furniture so we could dance. My head was placed onto his chest and we swayed to the sound of the music playing from his grandmothers record player. We shared moments of passion in his bed, fell asleep in each others arms, and woke up tangled in bed sheets. I remember thinking he was truly mine.
We married shortly after in the beginning of December. The ceremony was lavish and beautiful. I remember the way his fingers tucked my hair behind my ear. A single tear fell from his eyes and he leaned in and kissed me. He must've been so taken aback from my beauty as I was with his. Only one of my friends attended the wedding but I was too happy that I was marrying the man of my dreams to care. The first weeks of our married life were wondrous. He had risen to power and we had moved into the absolute gargantuan mansion we live in today. He couldn't seem to keep his hands off me and I was the diamond of his eyes. He loved to show me off for the cameras and crowds. Then one day, winter came and roses don't survive.
It started off small. He didn't want to talk or cuddle in bed at night anymore. I assumed he was just tired from working so hard. Then he stopped complimenting my outfits or hair, trading them with passive aggressive comments and ways I could improve myself for him. He no longer wanted to talk at dinner. We stopped speaking at some point. He wouldn't want to hear my voice unless it was to service him. In public, he still was my adoring husband but in private, I felt like I was living with a stranger. At night, I can hear him whispering sweet nothings to the air and humming melodies and I can only hope he's dreaming about me.
These days, I haven't been sleeping, I've been trying to listen in and see if I can make out the words he is saying in his sleep but I haven't been able to make out any other words than lines about trees. While he is having his meetings all day, I am constantly doing new diets, trying new makeup, new hair, decorating the house differently, leaving loving notes on his desk, anything to try and earn a compliment from him. Even if a compliment is too much, I am begging for a word from that man. I love him. I still love him. I don't believe it is possible for me to stop loving him. I can't dare to think of loving any one else. He is so much wiser, and smarter, and more beautiful than I am and I find myself becoming the moon to his earth. I spin around him, pulled in by his orbit except, I'm not his moon. I'm just a star in his sky that is begging to be his sun. I just want a footnote in the story of his life. Even an annotation on a page of his story will be enough for me.
The sound of him placing his heavy book onto the table pulled me out of my trance and my eyes met his blue ones once more. Instantly, I am struck frozen. His eyes had such a way of pulling you in. I looked down at his lips as they pressed a small smirk and his eyes squinted a little while he picked up his fork from the table and looked at me. He examined my appearance and I sat up straighter. The thick tension in the air put me on edge. Finally, his lips parted and he spoke.
"Is that a new hair color?" he asked, keeping his eyes laser focused on me.
"It is... d- do you like it?" He looked me over again and leaned back in his chair contemplating what to say next. Then, shortly, sweetly, and sharply, he muttered the word,
"Tolerable"