Sorry, Koffe, but... I just realized that my ending wouldn't work.

Ok, here's the latest installment:

When the others drove us out, we ended up wandering the country side doing odd jobs for a bit of dinner or shelter. I never would have suspected the fact that I would find my mother through all of this. In my mind, I had created a picture of her; all rags with snaggle teeth and matted hair, a person capable of enough deceit to abandon her husband and child. I created this picture shortly after I had been tossed out on the street. Even when I remembered that morning that she left, I could see everything but her face.            I had never hated my father the way I had my mother. I understood why he did it. I could imagine having to live with the scandal and embarrassment of having fallen for a peasant and being abandoned by them. That was why I envied my sister Eulalie so much. I guess that you couldn’t really call her my sister, seeing as how she had a good respectable mother.  A princess no less. But I could never hate my father. No matter how hard I tried, I always felt a sadness for him, a pity that he had been taken advantage of.            Before my mother left, I lived with her. I couldn’t very well live at the palace, with my father’s wife and their child. Some people would think that five was too young to remember, but I remember the morning she left as if it were yesterday.            It had been a misty morning, with the sun kissing the hilltops and a whispered promise of rain. She’d told me we were going to visit Daddy today. I was so excited, having only been in the palace a scant few times. The butler had led us through the huge, carved ivory gates and through the front hallway. We’d waited there, my mother fidgeting slightly, until my father appeared, led by my favorite maid, the one who always gave me a cookie when I came to visit. I hadn’t known her name, but I always called her Brigitte when I was thinking about her. The name sounded royal enough. Someday I would have hoards of my own maids, all named things such as Brigitte and Bell. My father dismissed her with a wave of his hand.            “That will be all, Ella.” I guess that mystery didn’t last long. He turned to my mother and I. After everyone was out of sight, he kissed her gently and wrapped me into a warm hug. My father had always played this game with me. He said that we must be actors, like my favorite minstrels and fire eaters on the streets. No one in the palace was to know that I was his daughter. We were going to trick them all into thinking I was a long-lost niece or something similar. I’d readily played along, happy to be aspiring to Corinth, my favorite street magician and actor.            My mother mumbled something about needing to talk to him alone, and my father summoned Ella to watch me for a few minutes.            “Take care of my niece,” my father told her with a not-so-secret conspiring wink in my direction. I gleefully blinked both eyes back at him.            Ella gave me a cookie, as she always did, and we sat in companionable silence for a short while. My father soon came back into the room, without my mother by his side. In the front hallway, I heard the front door slam and the butler pitifully mumbling after her.            My father’s face was clouded as he took me by the hand.            “Come along Clementine,” he said distantly, leading me to the door, “It’s time to go now.”            “Why?” I protested helplessly, “I haven’t even gotten to visit Eulalie yet!” As if on cue, my sister stuck her perfectly groomed blond head through the doorway.            “What’s all this commotion?” She complained in a delicate way, nose daintily crinkled and eyes expressing polite disdain.            “Eulalie!” I cried across the room, running into her arms and hugging her tightly.

            She looked aghast for a minute at my sudden outburst, then hugged me gracefully, “If it isn’t little Clementine! My how you’ve grown, child.” She gently stroked my dark hair and tilted my chin up so I looked her full in the face. She had ever-so-lovely sky blue eyes that I couldn’t stop looking at.

Sorry if that's too long Admin. I can post it in smaller installments if that would be easier.

Wow, Koffee!!! That's so amazing!! Maybe you could have Eulalie (luv that name!!!!!!!!!) glimpse her mother in a festival (if she's a Gypsy then she could tell fortunes or something), and follow her... Jo & Oliver could come with her...I don't know; that's kind of random. But still!! I love your story!!!

That's great, Koffee! :D Very interesting.

It definitely holds your attention. *applause*

XD

Ok, I think I have a title worked out: The cover would have a picture of a hand plucking a petal from a daisy and the title would be "She Loves Me Not". Because in the story she's going to go on this big adventure to find her mother, but her mother won't come back. I mean, she left the first time. So she's going to end up starting a business or something with Jo and Oliver, and she's going to marry Corinth, that street performer :D I think...so, thoughts on the title?