I am the Queen

It was raining. The gloomy clouds reflected the event that was happening. As the priest read the words on his book with a blank face, the people wept with fake tears.

Just how many people in here truly shed tears from their hearts? Just how many people really felt sad? The priest? His business partners who couldn't wait for him dead? His fake friends who taunted him behind his back. The strangers who didn't even know him and were just there for the food? Or his one-year-old son, who didn't even know his father was dead.

NO one.

That's right. That's how Robert Krisnov lived his life. With no one who would truly miss him nor pray for him in the afterlife.

Not even her. His daughter.

Evangeline stood there with Eric by her side as she watched the dirt-covered Robert Krisnov's coffin. Her mind was screaming, but her body was lifeless. She wanted to yell at the people to fuck off. They were just pretenders. Everything was fake. Even the whole ceremony was fake. They could just throw Robert Krisnov's body in the ocean, and no one would bat an eyelid.

It's sickening.

"Evangeline."

Evangeline blinked. Her eyes then shot at Angel's face. How much time passed that she didn't even notice the people dispersing.

"I think you should have this," Angel said, handing a pocket watch towards her.

Evangeline couldn't think straight as she reached for the pocket watch.

"It belongs to uncle Robert . . . your father," Angel continued, "You were gone, so the hospital called for me to process the papers and collect your father's belongings."

Evangeline didn't reply. Her eyes remained stuck on that pocket watch in her hand.

Angel took in some breath before she said, "Uncle Robert always carried it."

When Evangeline still didn't reply, Angel looked at Eric, whose eyes didn't budge from Evangeline's face.

Her chin crunched, lips pressed together before she turned around. "Though we don't get along . . . I'm . . . I'm sorry. . . ," she whispered the last words before she went her way.

In Evangeline's hand, the pocket watch was dripping with rain. It seemed like it was weeping. When she pushed the side regulator, the watch opened, revealing the vintage clock's intricate details. Pushing the screen, another layer opened. Inside was an old picture of a family of three. The man with his kind expression. The woman with purple wavy hair and her bright smile and the child with big round innocent eyes.

They were a picture of a perfect family.

"Heh," Evangeline sneered. "What good is keeping this photo if you would just leave us."

Eric looked at Evangeline. Her face was unremorseful, and her eyes were full of hate. But her voice was shaking as her lips, the only betrayal of her grief.

  ----

Back in Eric's apartment, Evangeline was inside their room while Eric prepared for their dinner.

Still a bit daze, Evangeline didn't know what to feel. Her shock hadn't subsided yet. It was a given that shock was all she felt. Robert Krisnov abandoned them. The moment he did, he was dead to her.

Without thinking, her hand reached for a drawer. Her fingers searched for something until it touched that familiar box.

Inside the box, a hairpin reflected her eyes. It was just a simple pink clip with no embellishment. The one that little girls used to love.

Hypnotized by it, the memories she thought forgotten resurface.

In front of that store, her little palms were plastered on the large glass, eyes glued on a single object. It was that pink hairpin.

"Eva, let's go."

"Dad. I want that," she said, pointing at the hairclip.

Her father looked at the hairclip and shook his head at the price. "We can't afford it."

She trotted towards her father and clutched his pants, eyes turning red as she pleaded, "Dad, please. Buy it for me. Please, dad."

Her father sighed. His eyes were shifting between the clip and her. No matter how he wanted to stay stern, her pleading looks broke his heart.

"Please, dad," she wept when her father remained in place.

Sighing, her fathers guided her inside the store, and her face brightened.

"Hello, sir. May I ask how much is that clip?" her father said in front of an old man.

The older man's thin brows flexed upward. There was already a price on the clip, but he still answered, "Twenty bucks."

Her father rubbed the back of his head and asked. "You see. I just have ten with me. Is it alright if you can give us a discount? It's for my daughter." He then looked at her, who was looking at him with her big round eyes.

The old man flexed his glasses. "I'm sorry, sir. That clip is the last of its design, and the price is already marked down. Its original price is around fifty."

She didn't know what they were talking about, so she made her way towards the clip. She was mesmerized by its shiny color and how pretty it would look on her hair. She rarely liked something, but she didn't know why that simple hairclip took all her attention.

In the end, she was full of smiles when her father handed her the clip as she ruffled her hair.

"Take good care of it," he said.

She nodded and beamed. But her smile dropped when her father walked ahead, and her eyes landed on his feet.

"Dad, your shoes."

He stopped and looked at his bare feet on the ground. He then laughed with his beard slightly shaking. "Don't mind it. I have another pair in the house."

"But . . . it's your favorite one," she mumbled.

"Come on, Eva. We're going to be late. You don't want your mother to scold us," he said, not hearing her voice.

As her father walked with his bare feet on the concrete ground on that hot summer day, there was only one thing in her mind.

The hairclip she wanted so much that she was willing to cry and beg . . . all of a sudden . . . she wanted to destroy it.

. . .

. . .

"Eve?"

Evangeline blinked. In front of her was Eric's blurry face.

Blur?

"Eh?" Evangeline was confused for a moment before droplets of clear liquid fell from her cheeks and splattered into her thighs.

Touching her cheeks, they were wet.

"Eh?" Was she crying? Why would she cry?

Eric was quick on his feet and sat beside Evangeline on the bed. He rubbed her back and whispered ever so softly.

"It's okay to cry."

Evangeline looked at Eric. She smiled, but her chin wrinkled as her forehead creased. No matter how hard she tried, her expression buckled, and she burst into his arms.

"That bastard! How could he die?! I still have to make him pay! He still has to make it up to me! But now he couldn't! He could no longer make it up to me! He's dead! He's dead!"

At Evangeline's outburst, there was nothing Eric could do but held her tight as she wept in his arms.