Penolope


Penolope stood in her room, intently judging her own artwork. It was hard to focus on the huge painting in progress in front of her when noise from the large Gala in the ballroom was continuesly floating up the stairs. She was used to hearing Galas from her bedroom. She had stopped being allowed into the prestigious events when she was about eight years old, around the same time she could vocalize her own opinions and not just be a cute little girl that was dragged around and used to show everyone at the events that not only were the Dutch's powerful and smart, they really cared for their adorable family member.


Penelope added a slash of black to her abstract painting as she remembered the last Gala she had been invited too. It had been an event celebrating something to do with her uncle and an oil rig, she couldn't fully remember as she had been so young. However, she could remember her grandmother's livid expression when she informed some fancy old dude that her great grandmother had been boasting about destroying a few company's that got in the way of her uncles business. She had never been to any business events or celebrations since. No Christmas balls, Galas to impress fancy investors in town, or even celebrations of her various family members achievements. Of course Priscilla was at every one. Usually gave a speech or two as well.


Penolope was suddenly overwhelmed by the feeling that she should leave. Tonight felt like the perfect night to finally put her plans of running away into work. She had found ways to 'borrow" money from her family throughout the years ( stealing wasn't stealing if they got the money through morraly wrong means) and she should have enough money to survive on her own for a few years. Something had always kept her from leaving. No. Not something. She knew it was the hope that one day her family, and especially her sister, might somehow miraculously love her that kept her from leaving.


Penolope flicked her wrist to splatter the canvas with blood red paint. She was unable to tune out the noise from this particular event. The ballroom below held a celebration for her mother's promising lead in an important upcoming election. " ugh," she groaned at the thought of her family and all the stuffy politicians in the ballroom joking and celebrating about her mother's almost guaranteed win in the election. She didn't know much about her mother's plans, but she knew her mother and her family. Her family would profit greatly from her mother's new position, and hundreds, if not thousands of people would suffer as a result.


She splashed a whole can of dark purple paint on the canvas. Chatter from the party only seemed to be getting louder. wait a minute, Penolope thought. Those voices aren't coming from downstairs.


She quickly moved to the left side of her room, kneeling on her king sized bed to place an ear to the wall. The room on the other side of the wall was her aunt ediths room, and she could pick out her aunts voice, along with Priscilla and her great grandmother.


" I still don't understand," her aunt said, " how does Miriam becoming prime minister of a country we don't even live in bring us any money?" She continued, begining to yell. " the only thing I can think of that miriam could do that would make anyone any significant money is illegal, so if you're setting my sister up to get arrested or assinated-- "


Priscilla cut in, speaking in a queit tone that was a lot harder to hear through the wall. " aunt edith, I think it would be in your best interest that you didn't continue that sentence," she said coolly. " I assure you that my mother has been smart and carful with her campaign, and you're correct, her simply being the prime minister won't make us any money. It's the deals and industry opportunities her being in that position will allow that will be highly profitable."


She said will, Penolope noted. She pressed her ear to the wall harder and continued eavesdropping, jumping a bit when she heard her great grandmother, she forgot she was in there too.


" one deal in particular will be incredibly lucrative," the tone her grandmother spoke in made invisible rattle snakes slither down penolopes neck and back. She sat up on her bed, pulling her ear from the wall. That tone was never good. Sometimes it ment there would be money made, but it was never good. She took a few breaths before pushing her ear back to the wall. She had clearly missed her grandmother's explanation of this mysterious lucrative deal, because it was her aunt who spoke now on the other side of the wall. " That explains why there were about ten or eleven inuit people rioting near the house and at her campaigns. what happened to those people near our house anyway."


" I have my means of making people disappear", grandmother said in the same tone that released the rattle snakes. " let's just say, you don't want to dig up a certain place in the forest across the road."


Penolope felt like her heart was stuck still in her chest, and her neurons stopped firing. She was obviously just confused, she must have missed some crucial information when she lifted her ear from the wall and didn't hear her grandmother speak. They couldn't mean--


She was stopped from trying to convince herself the situation wasn't what it obviously was when her aunt spoke again. "But you couldn't have killed and buried all of them could you," her aunt didn't sound concerned or surprised, just mildly curious.


" not all of them,no, that would be a lot for even me to cover up", she paused, seemingly for dramatic effect, which usually Penolope would laugh at, but the only sound she made sounded like a drowning raccoon started choking on peanut butter as her great grandmother slowly continued. " We just got rid of the one that mattered the most, showed them their was no point in their fighting. Not only did we take their hope, we took their ability to want hope. Therefore, safely eliminating the threat." Penolope already felt sick, but she felt vomit rise in her throat when her aunt started laughing. Not a coping mechanism laugh, a real laugh, like there was nothing funnier than murder. Penolope knew it wasn't a joke. Her grandmother was more than capable of pulling something like that off, especially if she had the right motivation.


Penolope yanked her head away from the wall as tears started flowing down her face. She was suddenly way to aware of the fact that she wasn't supposed to hear that conversation. She wished she hadn't, there was nothing she could do, and who knows what her grandmother would do if she knew that Penolope had heard firsthand that she was responsible for murder. Penolope stood from her cushy bed, still in her paint covered shirt and overalls as she ran done the stairs, unsure of where she was going or what she was doing. All she knew was that she couldn't bare to stay and risk that she would hear about more killings. or worse. Hear her sister start laughing too.