[cork] the silver lining | barbara

“Alright,” said Barbara, feeling distinctly put out, though she wasn’t sure if it was because she felt stupid or because Rowen had called her a pygmy puff.

She was grateful that Rowen still seemed to be listening to her, maybe; she was putting the necklace back, at least, though she turned back to Barbara with a toss of her hair and a fierce look that Barbara took, with mild trepidation, to mean that she had no intention of returning to the party. “Well,” she hedged, not sure where else they could go. She didn’t think they could finish the bottle, anyway, could they? More to the point, she wasn’t sure she wanted to: wine made her mother weepy and Barbara had rouge on.

“Wouldn’t that make us… you know,” she said, rather than say any bodily functions alcohol was purported to expedite. They were both too small for the whole bottle, she was very sure – and she didn’t think she ought to, anyway, since her parents were both her and they would be able to tell. She said, gratefully, “Perhaps just another glass.” Rowen repoured, and Barbara gave her glass a doleful look but said politely, “Yes, of course I am. It’s a lovely function.”

Was she having a good time? Only the time she was spending with Rowen had been at all enjoyable, and Rowen had made her anxious within seconds, but Barbara didn’t think there was any point in splitting hairs; she wasn’t sure what she had expected in the first place. These parties were always like this.

Would it make them drunk? Absolutely, and Rowen knew better than to try to drink an entire bottle of wine truthfully. She was not a teenage alcoholic, but she was not clueless either. The little witch did not comment when Barbara decided to have only one more glass. In her twisted sort of way, she respected that Barbara dared to push back against Rowen. Even if it was merely the other witch’s good sense and self-preservation, Rowen could appreciate it. Instead, she poured them both another glass and took her seat.

“Lovely is certainly one way to describe it,” Rowen’s nose was in the air the moment Barbara had commented. It was not that the party was dreadful, not entirely anyway, but nothing was ever quite enough for the young Reinhardt witch. “I suppose the decorations are nice,” Translation: expensive. Rowen took a sip from her wine, and it tickled her nose. “My brother is here somewhere, though; it’s awful.” And while Brennan had never done anything to insult Rowen personally, she felt insulted nonetheless. “He is a disgrace to the family, you know,” So many times, Rowen wished she would have been born Wolfgang’s sister instead of Brennan’s, but she could not change her family tree.

“And my little nephew, have you seen him yet? Spits on everything; it’s disgusting.” Genevieve’s baby, Niklaus, was barely a month old, and Rowen was already judging his lack of decorum. 

Rowen had tilted her head a little at Barbara’s assessment of the party, which didn’t seem fair – would it have been better to say that she found it dull and phony? Surely not, and the Gibsons couldn’t go about insulting the Reinhardts – it wasn’t like they were throwing any parties that weren’t dull and phony (and a wake was not properly a party anyway.) Barbara took a sip of her drink; if she thought too hard about it, she would insult herself.

“Your brother…” she said – she forgot the man’s name; she had always thought him very good-looking; he was older than them, right? – Rowen was going on anyway, and Barbara shifted uncomfortably. This seemed like a family thing that she didn’t want to be involved in. This also seemed juicy. “What’d he do?” she said, furrowing her brow slightly with concern – her own sister had been a disgrace, at least somewhat, and though she was sure Rowen had heard of it sometime, she wasn’t sure she would ever want to discuss it. Even drunk.

That was her business, though, and not Rowen’s, and anyway Florence was dead, and had been for years.

“Your little nephew,” said Barbara slowly, “You mean… the infant?” She felt – for the first time – a desire to defend something to Rowen, so she added rather weakly, “I thought he was sweet.”

When Barbara asked for more information about Brennan, Rowen waved her hand at her. As if it was impolite to ask for such details in this situation, even though it had been Rowen to bring up her brother in the first place. “Oh, you know,” she said because she suddenly didn’t feel like explaining the situation even though she could have gone on about it for days. Her brother hadn’t done anything that terrible, but he didn’t uphold the traditional and high standards of the Reinhardt name, and for that, Rowen had disowned him. Also, he brought an escort to a family party once.

As the conversation shifted from one family member, Rowen would be better off without another; the young witch sipped at her champagne. As the liquid swirled around in the glass, the bubbles rose and tickled her nose, and Rowen made a face. Glaring at the cup for a second as if it too had personally offended her and then set it down on the chiffonier. “Yes, the infant,” She answered quickly, turning around to face Barbara. Rowen’s eyes narrowed as she realized her friend was about to say something contradictory, and her arms folded in front of her.

“There is nothing sweet about it. The little monster can not fend for itself, cries constantly, and is perpetually sticky.” Her cousin had tried to have her hold the child once – it had not gone well. Rowen took a breath and rolled her eyes at Barbara. Babies were not adorable, Rowen had decided. “I’ll never have any,” she confessed, and for the smallest of moments, Rowen dropped the ‘perfect little Pureblood’ act. It was expected of her to marry well and produce heirs, just like it had been of Genevieve, but Rowen had bigger plans. She didn’t want to become some trophy wife who threw lavish Christmas parties and got fat having babies. She wanted to see the world, learn forgotten magics, and be powerful. She had career goals, and none of them included wiping the butts of babes.

“Do you want to be a mother, Barbara?”

Barbara didn’t know, but she doubted that she would be able to cajole any further information out of Rowen if Rowen didn’t want to be cajoled. She nodded seriously and fussed with her skirt over her knees, anxious for the conversation to move on from family disgrace.

Of course, once it had, she was anxious for the conversation to move on from that too.

Calling an infant a little monster seemed rather strong to Barbara, though Rowen’s glare and folded arms were putting her off of venturing another disagreement. Still – though Barbara privately considered herself to have a moral high ground over Rowen most of the time, rarely did she have one she suspected that even Rowen couldn’t dispute – only the most hateful, wretched, vindictive person could think so little of a baby just for being a baby. Barbara would have laughed at the sheer ridiculousness if she hadn’t been so uncomfortable that just the slightest giggle would put her in hysterics.

“You know, you were a baby once,” she said. She was about to add that she was sure Rowen had been perpetually sticky as well, but thought better of it at once, and pressed her lips together hard enough that they hurt. Maybe Rowen didn’t want children now, but Barbara couldn’t help her thrill of holier-than-thou, righteous conviction that Rowen was going to have to come around sometime.

Rowen asked: do you want to be a mother?

Unlike Rowen, Barbara didn’t dislike babies – certainly she’d never taken umbrage to their stickiness or their helplessness – but it seemed like a large jump from liking babies to having her own. “I don’t know,” she said. “It might be nice” There was something very noble in rearing a new generation, she thought, but as the daughter of a mother, she couldn’t help thinking that it seemed a lonely and thankless task. That was what made it noble, obviously, but Barbara was not noble.

She said, more decisively, “But I don’t know.”

“What does that matter?” Rowen snapped back at Barbara as she pointed at a very obvious flaw in her dislike of babies. Everyone had been a baby once, and Rowen was fully aware of that, but she didn’t think her past made any difference on her present. And while she wasn’t unaware enough to say that her time as an infant was out of her control, Rowen still felt like Niklaus was far worse than she ever could have been. However, Rowen was the only person in her life that was unaware of how stubborn and selfish she still was. The teenager may have outgrown being sticky and using single syllables to communicate, but she was still a bit of a baby.

On the other side of the spectrum, Rowen knew she never wanted to be a mother. And while she hadn’t assumed Barbara would share her opinion on the matter, she had expected a little bit more reasoning behind the Ravenclaws answer. “It might be tragic,” Rowen corrected as she moved away from Barbara and tucked the barely half-finished bottle of champagne behind an antique mirror that was leaning against the wall.

“We should return to the party; we wouldn’t want to deny future suitors the chance to see us before our hips expand, and we are expected to bear their hideous children.” While most of the world had forgotten the antiquated practice of arranged marriages long ago, Reinhardt witches weren't so lucky. Rowen pretended to hate children because they were sticky and unwieldy, but the truth was that she refused to crumble under the pressure of one day being forced to marry someone as unattractive as Horus Heyward the Third, or worse.

Barbara thought, rather wistfully, about saying whatever to Rowen. Just once in her life. She thought it would be marvellous – after all, for all that Rowen dismissed her and Billie and their opinions or ideas as fanciful and foolish, Rowen, too, was a fifteen-year-old girl, and just as fanciful and foolish, and – Barbara was sure – would have made a particularly noxious baby, given how spoiled she already was.

Of course, she didn’t even dare to outwardly disagree again – all she said was, “I s’pose it doesn’t,” – but by now, she was starting wish she had just stayed downstairs with the rest of the party, and borne that rude girl’s comments about her dress. A stranger could be ignored. Rowen was her friend, and thus could not be.

Tragic, actually, did seem likely; they were Pureblood witches, and their daughters (Barbara suspected) would be Pureblood witches too, and these days it was difficult to be a Pureblood witch. They wouldn’t have anything to give to their daughters but dying traditions and dying names – Rowen, of course, would disagree with her if she said it, but Barbara was past lying to herself – and then what? Their daughters would leave them for boys. It seemed, at times, like an immense tragedy to be a witch at all.

We should return to the party, said Rowen, shaking Barbara out of this spiral. “Don’t be so cynical,” she replied, rather uncomfortably, but there was truth to what Rowen was saying, wasn’t there? Nobody came to these parties without ulterior motives.

They probably should return to the party, anyway; Barbara glanced at the mirror where her friend had hidden the evidence of their little crime, to be sure it was out of view, and said, “Well, then, after you, Miss Reinhardt.”


OUT

Rowen narrowed her eyes at Barbara when she told her not to be cynical and then frowned. "Cynicism is good armor," She returned, giving the other witch a flippant look before heading toward the door. Maybe it was wrong of her to assume that everyone in their lives was out for themselves, but Rowen knew firsthand how true it was. The young witch only thought of herself because that was how she was raised, and she assumed everyone else was the same. (Maybe not the same because obviously Rowen thought she was better.)

As much as she would protest and fight it, Rowen was fully aware that one day her parents and her cousin Wolfgang would agree on a suitor for her, and she'd be expected to marry that wizard. It wouldn't matter if she were busy with her own pursuits or if she absolutely hated the man; it would still be expected. And she would have a decision to make -- do what she was told or disrespect her family's traditions. Rowen hoped that day would not arrive for a very long time, but she knew that it would be an interesting day when it did.

Stepping in front of Barbara as they reached the door, Rowen checked her reflection in one of the many mirrors about the room, fluffing her dress and smoothing a curl before opening the door. "Off we go,"

/end