Unit 3: Final Draft

Antoine Choueiry

English 1111

Professor Doyle

Unit 3 Final Paper

 

 

The Time of the Ladies

 

Yet we all know that it is this world that attracts the “diamond lady”. Growing up, the diamond lady knows not of what the other children in the “jungle” used to speak. Hers was a life of wealth and luxury; an episode from the lifestyles of the rich and famous. She see’s plainly the envy in the eyes of the others, yet no reason behind this envy. Through the eyes of this lady, the others were the people she would encounter on her daily walks through the park. They were the people who would laugh, run, scream, and play without a care in the world. She watched as they would get together and eat, using nothing but their hands. She could not help but notice the insect crawling into the little boy’s messy sandwich and the darkened color of his hands after playing in the sand, yet she wanted more than anything to join them in their gleeful trance.

The diamond lady knows very well that it is this sort of dreaming that would bring out the side of her world she did not enjoy; the whispers at dinner, the stares at the parties, the angry glares of her father. No matter how much she yearned for a taste of the other world, she knew all too well that she did not belong there. Like the others before her, she must learn to see the reason behind the envious stares. She is to conform to the social norms around her, trying her best to remain unnoticed and unspoken of.

Only then will she feel the only happiness a diamond lady can know. The happiness obtained from the approval of others like her. Coming from this world I know of the occasional feelings of true happiness that it may provide; yet I also know of the feelings of longing, sadness, loneliness, and emptiness that comes along with it. It wasn’t easy having people tell you how to walk and dress, how to speak and how to eat, even though it is something you get used to, growing up in my world. Soon enough, you do let go of the idea of independence, and it is only then that you find any form of peace. It is the few who refuse to have their thoughts drowned by the whispers and stares who the entirety of our world admired deep down. Those with the courage that the majority including myself lacked.

Looking at father, I knew tonight was going to be one of those nights. Screaming and arguing until twenty minutes before dinner when we were sent to our rooms to make ourselves look presentable. “Why can’t you be more like your sister?!” he screamed. It was father and my sister Cecilia fighting yet again. It had become sort of a tradition for the two of them to quarrel a few hours before an event took place. The event was our sixteenth birthday. Cecilia and I were twins, and like many, entirely opposite. We only had a few hours until the guests arrived and yet Cecilia refused to get dressed until father reluctantly gave her a whack on the face.

Looking at my sister now, I still felt the same love and pain for her that I had felt on that night. My visit to the psychiatric hospital she was being kept in had truly brought back memories of all the nights I would watch her cry into her pillow following her disputes with father. Admittedly I know very well that my intervention would have evaded much of those events, yet I did not dare interfere. I was afraid of my father’s deafening screams and did not want his anger redirected towards me. Another reason for this was the joy and satisfaction I felt watching Cecilia go against father’s words. She said and did things I would only dream of doing, yet the outcome was always the same. Father’s screams and Cecilia’s sobs silencing the entire household until mother intervened.

I remember seeing the shame and guilt in my father’s eyes the minute my mother stepped into the room that night. She walked into the room, took my sisters hand, and they were both gone, leaving my dad and I alone. “I’m sorry my darling, you can leave”, he said, placing his hand on his forehead and collapsing onto the bed. I gave him a light kiss on his cheek before leaving the room. I did not enjoy seeing him like this, because I knew just how much he loved both me and Cecilia. My father’s only flaw was the importance he placed in appearance and presentation; and this was a flaw shared by seemingly everybody in my world, apart from Cecilia.

The night of our birthday was more enjoyable than Cecilia had expected. This was of course thanks to Marcus. Marcus was certainly the most handsome boy either of us had ever known. He had long curly hair which came just above his deep brown eyes, and a tall figure which made all the girls swoon as he walked by. Marc came from a family with a history of wealth unlike much of the nouveau riche families who had attended. Cecilia and I are sure that it is for this reason only that father invited them to our events.

Marcus and his family were different than the rest. They did not care for the gossips nor did they care for the mindless talks of men revolving solely around their status. Expectedly, Marcus and Cecilia shared a more intimate relationship than that of friends. I would always find them speaking of the “other world” when we were supposed to be studying, and holding hands underneath the table during dinner. I had only once joined in on their wild plans when they had convinced me that it was ok to miss the book talk to watch a movie; admitting that this is the wildest thing I had done in my youth is something I find to be truly shameful. I sometimes hear Cecilia laughing at me, telling me it’s ok to be part of the other world as long as father didn’t find out.

1920 was a good year for father as business had been going well. This was obvious as the parties father held had become more frequent and lavish. The entire family was beginning to enjoy these parties giving more time for Cecilia and Marcus to be together. They still left the parties to go on their little adventures and this had seemingly given Cecilia enough satisfaction to go along with father’s demands. It is only after listening to Cecilia’s story that I now understand the true reason behind her contentment; yet mother had known all along.

It doesn’t surprise me that mother had kept Cecilia’s secret from us. That was just who she was. She was the most caring and understanding woman I had ever known. In a world so shallow and empty she still knew how to be the perfect mother to Cecilia and I, as well as the perfect wife to father. At dinner all the guests hurried to find a seat beside her. She understood how to entertain our mindless guests with knowledgeable and intellectual discussions that left the men wishing they had such a wife, and the women whispering amongst each other. Even after everything my sister had done, I sometimes feel as though mother preferred her to me.

“I still love your sister dearly, as I expect you to!” she would say to me when we discussed Cecilia. I have always understood the love she feels for Marcus, and I prayed that she would find happiness with him. My dearest Cecilia. Such a clever and sweet girl. She did not mean to harm Mrs. Amery and we both know it. She is just an innocent child born into the wrong family.” This is when mother began to cry. “Were they in a different place, at a different time, they would have been fine. Your sister deserves happiness. She deserves a relationship like that of you and Anthony. She would have made your father proud I’m sure of it.”

Speaking to Cecilia of mother would also leave her in tears. She knew all too well the endless love my mother would always feel for her. Looking at Cecilia I still saw the 19 year old girl who would argue with father over the pettiest of things. As she continued to tell me her story I couldn’t help but slightly alter what she was saying in my mind, considering her words to be those of my rebellious 19 year old sister. Where she spoke of father’s screaming, I thought of her rebellious actions which required this of him. When she spoke of her love for Marcus, I imagined the love of two rebellious children. A love that they both should have known would be torn apart by the world. This was something I resented myself for. I knew that deep down I felt superior to Cecilia only because our world had embraced me more than it did her. I was now living the life father had imagined for me. I married a man from a respected and wealthy family, and kept a flawless reputation. A reputation that had reserved a place for me between the women of the world I have now grown accustomed to.

My worst fear was to ever look and speak to my sister as though I was truly one of the women at the parties, whispering things about her and glaring at her with skepticism. This was always the way people looked at her her whole life. Nobody except my mother and Marcus had ever truly taken her seriously. I was writing a story of my sister and yet I could not help but write her story through my words and ideas. She deserved to have her story be expressed by accurate emotions and actual events. I guess that I simply did not want to believe that my sister had truly been in love and had that taken away from her. I did not want to believe that she had gone through life beaten and yelled at for being different and wanting to live in a world different than the one father had planned for her. Instead I wanted to write about a girl who had somehow found a way to live happily with the person she loved and in a world she lived happily in. I knew that if I did not break this habit I would soon be writing a fiction-based novel. I needed to refrain from avoiding the truth of the matter, and needed to accept the life I had chosen to live. I understood that it wasn’t the outcome of Cecilia’s actions that I was trying to evade, as it was the outcome of mine.

Finally realizing this I knew that I needed to edit my story and allow Cecilia’s thoughts and emotions to be accurately portrayed. This was the story of the person I had grown up with for most of my life as well as admired. I knew that Cecilia was eager to tell her story as I saw the satisfaction in her eyes grow as the story progressed. I knew that through this story I was expressing Cecilia’s thoughts on every aspect of her life without having anybody scold me for it. The visits were much of a relief to the both of us. In a way it had given me a sense of accomplishment for depicting the actions of a character that had the courage to defy the character of my father as well as the norms which I had never dared to challenge. For Cecilia on the other hand, she was simply doing what she had always done by questioning the norms and ways of our life yet without any consequences. This was her way of defending her actions and emotions, and I was going to do my best to help her do so.

During one of my visits, father decided to come along. I had given him and Cecilia a few minutes of privacy to talk, and yet surprisingly enough the encounter ended in screams and sobs. Four years since he had last seen his daughter and yet he still found room for snide remarks and criticism. Listening into their conversation I heard the typical things my father used to tell her before she ended up here. At this point she had given up her fight and simply listened to what he had to say. She decided to think of mother and her calming words, reminding Cecilia that she was a lady, and “a lady is to swallow her words to avoid any conflict. That is the truest strength”, she would hear mother say, as she brushed Cecilia’s hair. I had always listened to mother. I was not necessarily convinced by her arguments, yet I never wished to challenge her like I did father. She had always listened to me and supported me, and so I tried to show the side of me father was not as powerful to bring out. I gave mother that power over me so that she would always know that in my world she was superior to him.

It was during one of the dinner parties that I had decided to leave with Marcus. We secretly left as we had always done. Making sure we did so unseen. It had been quite a while now that I was certain of my love for him. He asked me if I would spend the rest of my life with him. Any other year and this would have been the beginning of my happily ever after, yet with my luck it certainly wasn’t. His family was having some trouble with money but I was the only one who knew about this. If father was to find out he never would have allowed me to see him again. It was because of this that we had decided to keep our romance a secret until his family was able to gain back their wealth. It seemed like a good idea, and one that would have worked if it weren’t for father. It was that same night that we snuck up to the room and slept together. I may as well be losing my mind in this place, but I would not take back that night for anything. It was the first night that I had begun to feel real and pure happiness. I had finally dared to dream of a life outside this world and beyond the reach of father, but this was short-lived.

Before carrying on I need to let you know that it was never my intention to hurt Mrs. Amery or Marcus. I would have never done such a thing, and you my sister know this better than anyone. Marcus and I were lying in bed until father walked in. I could see it in his eyes just how furious he was. He walked back out and re-entered, this time with a gun in his hands, pointing in Marcus’s direction, but before I could get up and stop him it was too late. I heard the ringing of the gun shot in my ears and so all I could do was run towards father in a hopeless attempt to knock him over. Evidently I was not the only one who had heard the gunshot, because as I was heading towards the doorway I saw Mrs. Avery laying on the ground, not dead, but probably passed out from the pain of the gunshot in her arm. All I remember after that was seeing your terrified face as I fell to the ground.

I remember waking up with no pain, or fear. Just a feeling of eternal numbness slowly taking over my mind and body. I knew Marcus was gone, and I knew he wasn’t coming back. I know that you did not quite believe that I had shot them both. It was rather evident from the way you would stare as they questioned me, waiting for me to reveal the real story of what happened, but it was the last thing I wanted to do. I did not want father to have to leave you and mother, nor did I care what happened to me. As far as I was concerned I had the only life I could have possibly lived, but in losing Marcus, I lost myself.

Looking at Cecilia I could not help but tear as I saw the utter lack of emotion in her eyes. She was not mentally ill or sick. My sister had died; along with Marcus and the life she once dreamed of. If there was any room for the idea of Cecilia not reporting father out of any love for father, there was none now. My sister had long been drained of any such emotion. It isn’t easy having to write an account of a story when you share such similar knowledge of the events you are writing about. My aim was to write the story of my sister Cecilia and the effect the world I lived in had on her. I remember speaking of the guilt my father felt when he would argue with my sister. This was the greatest dilemma I faced in attempting to tell her story. I already had a clear outline of it in my mind before I even began writing. I predicted her emotions and motives simply because I had been there through it all. I expected this to be a considerably easy story to write, and yet looking at my sister now I understand that one has the most to learn from those closest to him.