The palace library sizzled and snapped back into view.

Jesus H! I could consider myself lucky that I hadn’t been shot into Marie’s actual memory of the event. I didn’t really feel like inheriting her pre-scripted PTSD, thank you very much.

I blinked the room into focus. I was on the floor, amidst, of course, a tidal wave of flowers. And Antoinette?

“I’m stuck,” she snapped. “Chloé, for god’s sake!” She yanked at her skirt. It was tied to the floor by a net of vines and lavender flowers. Even the bouquets on the nearby study tables had exploded out of their vases; water and shards of pottery dirtied the library floor.

Somewhere in the mess of it all, Étienne had rushed into the room. Princely concern clear on his face, Étienne extended a hand to me, even though I waved him off.

“I’m okay now.” Am I? I did a quick once-over. Head: on straight. Screws: no longer loose. Phew. “Promise. You should help Antoinette.”

The irony wasn’t lost on me: it was only when I was comfortably back in Marie’s body that I felt like everything was sorted out again.

Thankfully, the flowers had stopped growing. Not before eating up Antoinette’s skirt and half her bodice with their giant blooms, though, turning her into a bedraggled Persephone. Étienne was gentle with her as he helped untangle her locks of red hair from the stalks, plus he handed her a letter opener from a desk to help cut through the thicker vines and unsalvageable fabric.

I pressed my hand to my chest, feeling my heart calm.

Could I tolerate terrifying crap like this for the whole year, until the game revealed who burned down the estate and “Marie” got all her memories back?

Antoinette took Étienne’s hands as he helped her out of the nest of flowers and onto the dirtied library floor. She grimaced at herself, dress still packed with blooms and hanging onto her by threads. Thank god for shifts, I guess. “Thank you ever so much, Chloé. I was looking for an excuse to throw this dress out.”

“You’ve got to have something in the palace to lend her,” I told Étienne.

Eyes brightening, he nodded. "Most definitely. We have plenty of dresses that were to be auctioned off to charity."

Perfect! Antoinette wouldn't want to keep a hand-me-down, even from the prince. With no choice, she'd take a dress, but insist on returning it later because she didn't want charity. Then they'd be forced to interact alone…

"Fine," Antoinette snapped. "Whatever will get me out of this mess."

Her skirt was so heavy with flowers that Étienne and I had to literally hoist it up as we went through the halls. He directed us to a room (on the next floor, agh!) that was stuffed floor to ceiling with racks of clothing.

Étienne and I clumsily set down her skirt. We were both pretending not to pant; he caught my eye and smiled.

"Take anything you want. These racks here were all donations from Duchess Mariette; I think they'll be close to your size."

He stepped outside and shut the door. Antoinette’s cheeks were considerably less pink (I probably wasn't, thanks to hauling that dress up the stairs) as she flicked through the racks.

"I'm so sorry," I said. "My magic, it just–"

"It was an accident. I was watching Étienne try to teach you all afternoon; you clearly couldn’t do something like this on purpose." She brushed petals out of her hair. "Help me find a sundress or something. I'll look ridiculous going home in a ballgown."

Each item of clothing was more gorgeous than the last. Nothing looked like it’d been worn more than once–if they’d been worn at all! Most intriguing were all the patterns and shapes obviously inspired by Japan, Ukraine, Egypt, and more. Were some of these dresses from concept art hidden in the game’s files or in the limited-run art book that went around Japan a decade ago? (And was now being sold at disgustingly inflated prices on eBay? Come on, I thought this game was irrelevant.)

Finally, I found a pretty jewel-blue sundress with an A-line ruffled skirt and modern halter straps. It wasn’t so simple that Antoinette would feel fine trashing it instead of returning it (I hoped)–the bodice was dense with embroidery that hinted at a half-remembered design from Russia–and not so fancy that she’d feel weird heading home. “How about this?”

“Blue isn’t my colour.”

“What? But it matches your eyes.”

“It doesn’t match my jewelry.” She showed me a big emerald ring on her finger that looked like it’d crack your jaw if she slapped you. “Oh, whatever. Not like I can embarrass myself more. Help me get this damned garden off.”

I draped the dress on a nearby table. I made a move to untie the ribbon-threaded corset on the back, but she just handed me the letter opener from the library.

“What do I do with that?”

“Cut me out, obviously. It’s destroyed anyways.”

Argh, talk about otome game shenanigans…

With the help of a floor-length mirror, we figured out it’d be fastest to just cut the dress in half at her stomach. She picked out half-dead roots and flowers as I cut bits of fabric, careful not to nick her or catch on her shift.

“What upset you, anyways?”

I pretended to get stuck so I could think over my answer. “That story of the missing family…I don’t know. It really hit me.”

“I suppose it’s almost like you have a missing family now,” she said as she pulled her mass of red hair over her ridiculously smooth shoulder and out of my way. “My father has connections within the detective department. You should speak with them. I don’t know how much they’ll tolerate a magical bomb of a girl with absolutely no memories to help them, but it can’t hurt to try.”

I tiptoed to the edge of this topic, looking down over the drop. If we talked about this, wouldn’t it be glaringly obvious that I was the missing girl?

On second thought, who cared if she knew? It wouldn’t mess up my plan to save Antoinette. It actually might make it easier if I got the mystery of Chloé-Marie figured out early on, before I had to throw all my effort into things like the invention competition and getting her dates for the many school dances.

But maybe it’d choke up the plot and everything would be thrown way out of order.

“You strike me as bizarrely incurious about your old life,” Antoinette continued. “Though I suppose you can’t get a much better deal than your current one.”

Current?

I didn’t want to get too close to the thought that maybe I really was Marie in this weird, upside-down way. My old life, my family, were gone.

“One doesn’t lose their memories for no reason, after all.”

My life wasn’t big or complicated or successful, but it was still mine. I had friends who I laughed with and created with. I was getting super good at writing and maybe one day, I could publish a real book and finally let my family see the craft I was working so hard on for so many years (and then I’d keep writing and keep improving, and get really embarrassed that they’d read it at all). I had classes to finish, a stage to walk for my degree. I had a future, even though it was a blurry, confusing mess most of the time, and getting blurrier with every day I spent in Love Blooming.

Ugh, damn it. I was so lost in my gloomy thoughts that I wasn’t even enjoying helping Antoinette take off her dress!

“Done,” I said. At her sharp gesture, I took the cue to lift up her flower-filled skirt and the two of us heaved it over her head. For a second, I spotted a glimpse of her in the shadowy, flower-scented mass of fabric, and it felt bizarrely intimate. Her annoyed huff skimmed past my cheek. It was like I could sense the shape of her in the way the air bent against my skin. Then after another rustle of fabric, she was gone, and that weird second was over.

Antoinette kicked the dress away. She stepped out of her shoes with a shudder–they were tattered and torn and bristling with leaves. “You can probably find a use for those flowers. Unless your magic screwed up the potion components.”

As she dressed, I got to work tugging out the flowers–the ones that weren’t big as Halloween pumpkins, that is. “Why did you offer me help?”

“Why wouldn’t I?”

“Antoinette, uh…you’re not very nice.”

“I’m not nice?” Did she sound genuinely surprised? Girl, you’re the villainess, and it’s a lot less cute when you’re real. She asked, “What would you call that offer, if not nice?”

“...Considerate, I guess. They’re different things.”

“I’m as nice as I have to be. It certainly hasn’t scared you away.”

That’s because I know you can be someone else underneath all the prickliness. “I’m more surprised that you didn’t chase me off, actually. You made it pretty clear that you didn’t trust me.”

She snorted, adjusting her big emerald ring and opening boxes to find new shoes. “If you were sent as a scheme to get close to me and siphon information, you were an awful choice. For one, I’m not exactly known for my charity friendships. And for another, there’s so much information about me in gossip rags that anyone could manipulate to get close to me. Yet you don’t seem to know me at all.”

E-...excuse me?

Me? Hanna? Not know Antoinette Delphine?

I didn’t win the Love Blooming fic-athon just to be told that by Antoinette herself!!!

She added, “You didn’t know my mother was dead. You invite me to trivia nights with total nobodies, and you stare at me and the prince like you expect us to break into song together. You’re too bizarre to be a threat. But I’m curious about you.” Sliding into her new shoes, Antoinette spun her skirt in front of the floor-length mirror. “Because no one else would ever dare tell me I’m not nice to my face.”

~*~

Because of my flowery fiasco, we ended up finishing the lesson around sunset. Étienne offered to let us sleep over at the palace–it was the weekend tomorrow and he had appointments here, so he wasn’t going back to La Belle Lavande. I excitedly agreed for both Antoinette and me.

While we were being led to the guest wing after a wonderful dinner (without the king and queen, notably), Antoinette whispered, smirking, “Are you hoping Étienne will throw pebbles at my window tonight?”

The servant brought us up one last flight of stairs to a triangular landing. As he pointed out which door belonged to each of us, I recognised him. He was one of the grooms who took Étienne’s horse. 

He was a nondescript 40-something-year old man. Gaunt and lined in the very precise way that shojo art tends to make faces look older. I didn’t know much, but I was pretty sure being a groom and being a butler or whatever were two different job titles. Game was probably running out of graphics.

Antoinette noted this, too. “You're one of the stable grooms, are you not?”

“I am, Mademoiselle Delphine.”

“I saw you earlier, after the prince was riding. He gave you instructions and you disobeyed them.”

Oh no.

“I need not remind you that his animals and their safety matter deeply to him, and yet you insisted. On what else do you ignore his wishes?”

The servant didn’t react; I bet most of their training was about learning how to not grimace. “I was following instructions from His Majesty.”

“Ugh. Servants always find excuses.”

I had a feeling it was more about servants finding ways to not get fired.

I pinched Antoinette's sleeve and tugged. “Thank you for showing us to our rooms. Good night!”

Maybe I pulled too hard: Antoinette stumbled a little in her donated shoes, leading the butler/groom to catch her arm and set her right.

She swished past me to the furthest door, let the butler open it for her, and then flicked her hand to dismiss him.

I dramatically opened my own door. “Guess I gotta do everything myself around here,” I joked weakly. “Well, see you t–”

As she tucked back a lock of red hair, I noticed something on her hand.

Or the lack of something.

“Your ring,” I said. “The green one. Did you forget it in the wardrobe room?”

Antoinette examined her hand as if she hadn’t realised. She blinked slowly, a little bit of that faraway look creeping back into her gaze, just like in the art studio. I was instantly on high alert. “Oh, I’m sure that servant will find it for me soon.”

“What do you…” Shit. She must have slipped it in his pocket or something when she ‘tripped.’

I turned on a heel and made to go after the servant. Antoinette neatly stepped in front of me. “Don’t bother, Chloé.”

“He’ll get fired!”

“He’ll only get fired if we say anything. Otherwise, he’ll simply get a scare.”

“That isn’t fair. You already told him what he did wrong.”

“You’re so naive. People need consequences to learn.”

I blinked at her, stunned. Consequences? Images raced through my mind–the CG of Antoinette furiously screaming as they arrested her, Antoinette all humbled and dirty in prison, Antoinette tossed aside in fic after fic, Antoinette in that goddamn creepy revenge comic.

And then I thought of all the things Antoinette did to Marie in canon.

I suddenly cared a lot less about the carefully blank look on her face.

“You were right, after all. Maybe I’m not nice.” Antoinette turned away. “Good night.”