[ In truth, Vanessa has not left her room since she first made her way to it — on whose power, she cannot say, save for what residual strength she'd carried from somewhere deep within, all of it leaving her practically at once the moment she'd crossed the threshold of her intended living quarters and glimpsed a bed, small and meager but more than welcome considering her exhaustion. She doesn't know how long she'd slept, drifting through dreamlessness and eventually jerking awake to the sound of a bullet firing. Only then had she emerged from the bedcovers to look in the adjoining wardrobe, though she'd known beyond any doubt what she would find even before laying eyes on the gown, its ivory drape stained with red on the bodice — and she'd slammed the door shut with a small, shuddering breath. She hasn't opened it again since.
Rather than attempt to dress herself in the flimsy paper they'd sent her out in, she settles for using her bedsheets as a makeshift covering, wrapping one of the clean sets around her body and tying it securely at her chest before draping another across her shoulders and pulling it tightly closed. There's no hope of obscuring the mark bisecting the column of her throat, a gray line that doesn't appear to have changed in any manner since she first glimpsed it in her dirty mirror, but in her various attempts to use her device she's seen mention from others facing difficulties as a result of the line shifting to a different shade.
The knock at the door pulls her from where she's studying the mark again, as well as the whole of her reflection. Without pins to secure her hair it's a long, tumbling mass spilling down her shoulders, but there are no dark circles beneath her eyes, nothing to signal any weariness or distress otherwise. She composes her expression as carefully as she's able and crosses the room to open the door for him, inclining her head slightly. ]
Mr. Gray. I apologize for greeting you like this; I'm sure you can understand I'm not feeling entirely myself.
no subject
Rather than attempt to dress herself in the flimsy paper they'd sent her out in, she settles for using her bedsheets as a makeshift covering, wrapping one of the clean sets around her body and tying it securely at her chest before draping another across her shoulders and pulling it tightly closed. There's no hope of obscuring the mark bisecting the column of her throat, a gray line that doesn't appear to have changed in any manner since she first glimpsed it in her dirty mirror, but in her various attempts to use her device she's seen mention from others facing difficulties as a result of the line shifting to a different shade.
The knock at the door pulls her from where she's studying the mark again, as well as the whole of her reflection. Without pins to secure her hair it's a long, tumbling mass spilling down her shoulders, but there are no dark circles beneath her eyes, nothing to signal any weariness or distress otherwise. She composes her expression as carefully as she's able and crosses the room to open the door for him, inclining her head slightly. ]
Mr. Gray. I apologize for greeting you like this; I'm sure you can understand I'm not feeling entirely myself.