Their lunch was the most quiet meal Cerise thought she'd had in a long time. She couldn't decide if she was grateful or upset. Indifferent would be ideal, but she knew she wasn't that.
It was too clocking hot to think about what she was or wasn't. Before the sat, she saw her father's eyes travel to the other table, two deeply Anaxi diners seated at it. They both knew, regretfully, exactly who was seated at it. Cerise wondered, suddenly, what her father made of Judge Roumanille; they had to be at least passingly familiar. If not from work, than from the scattered handful of times Cerise had launched herself at the man's daughter. Each one of them deserved, she thought stubbornly; each and every one. She had never thought about it before, and she didn't like thinking about it now.
Cerise thought of the warning her father had given her back at Ms. Ebele's, about the heat, and making sure to have enough water. She had hardly touched it then, and regretted her own stubbornness now. She hadn't precisely disbelieved him; she had been here seven days already now. But the morning had taken so much out of her she felt dizzy, and no matter how she was dressed it wasn't light enough to keep a thin sheen of sweat from coating every inch of her skin. She felt, quite frankly, absolutely vile. Inside and out.
At least Sish seemed to be back to her own cheerful self again, happily engaged in some light destruction of property. Cerise kept only half an eye on it; she hadn't the energy, just now, to do anything to stop the miraan from whatever she wanted to be doing. Perhaps Sish knew this, and took pity on her mistress. The plant was left largely intact, with only a few leaves destroyed here and there.
She hadn't the energy, either, to stop herself from the concerned frown that flickered across her face watching her father's hands shake. She shouldn't feel so, she reminded herself, but it was a kind of dull, hollow sentiment. She shouldn't, and she did, and that was all there was for it. Her own hands weren't so steady anyway, muscles strangely exhausted by how tightly she'd held her fists for so long. She wasn't conservative about water as they ate their eggs and whatever else. By the time her father rose to pay, she thought she might feel a little better. Physically, at any rate, which was the only part of her she could do anything about.
Her father rose, and shortly after so too did Cerise's eyebrows. Judge Roumanille called out to him, and her father looked like he'd been punched in the gut. Not a positive relationship then, to address her idle curiosity from earlier. He smiled, but it was that kind of thin, professional look she'd seen on his face often enough. Directed at her, even, if she was proving particularly difficult to manage. She didn't snort when he said "pleasant surprise", thought it was an effort.
Cerise inclined her head from her seat, not bothering to get up. She smiled, and it was even thinner than her father's expression had been; she was not nearly so professional a liar. If the Judge was irritated by it, she couldn't tell and she certainly didn't care. Both men disappeared inside, and Cerise was left alone with her thoughts and Sish, in a quiet broken mostly by the sounds of the city and the buzzing of insects.
One large, particularly loathsome insect made her way over to the table where Cerise sat. Cerise looked up, feeling more exhausted already. There had been some measure of hope in her breast that with their respective fathers due back at any moment, Antoinette would leave her alone. She should have known better than to hope. That was the theme of the day, after all.
"Vauquelin," she purred, leaning forward to rest her hand on the table, "how lovely to see you here. And how unexpected! You look... Well, that outfit is certainly very you, isn't it?" Cerise rolled her eyes. Antoinette had never quite grown into her face, but she certainly carried herself like she had. Cerise could grudgingly admit that of the two of them, Antoinette likely seemed the better daughter. She was dressed neatly and in the Anaxi style, even in this heat. Cerise noted with some cruel amusement that sweat had pooled where one expected it might; she looked somewhat more wilted than she usually did.
"Yes, it is truly shocking, to see me in the city to which we came for the same purpose, when you have seen me nearly every day. Lovely to see you, great catching up, so on and so forth. Go away, Roumanille." Cerise looked away, disinterested. She didn't want to fight with Antoinette, even if the very brush of her field made every hair on the back of her neck stand on end in disgust. She had never wanted her father to come back quite so much in her whole life—at least, not since she started school.
Roumanille the younger did not, alas, go away. She had come over for a purpose, Cerise could see it on that soft Anaxi face. Not just some passing needling in the guise of keeping good relations with the Vauquelin family; Antoinette was on a mission. Cerise felt the chutney sour in her stomach.
"Now, there's no need to be that way! You'd think we weren't dear friends, the way you go on." Cerise snorted. This was a new tactic; she thought both of their fathers being inside had something to do with it. "I just haven't had a chance to catch up with you. You've been so occupied, since the Arts Fair."
The Arts Fair—so that was what she wanted. She should have known. There was no way Roumanille would miss her chance to be repulsive when Cerise had practically handed her the opportunity with a signed note. Wrapped up with a bow. This was not the day for it. Any other day, maybe. Literally any other time, she could have brushed off the persistent buzzing of Antoinette Roumanille in her ears. She did, in fact, do just that. They had been going to school together for a long, long time.
"Don't," Cerise warned; it was a mistake. Those washed-out blue eyes lit up. Cerise grit her teeth and came to a stand. She had a solid three inches on Antoinette; she thought it best to remind her of it now. Antoinette, damn her to every hellish Ever that existed, wasn't deterred. Likely feeling secure in the fact that both of their fathers were just inside, and would return at any moment.
"Don't? Don't what, Vauquelin? I just wanted to ask you—is everything I heard about that night true? To hear Langley tell it, you threw yourself at McAllister and that halfbreed both. And poor Raquelle, half out of her mind with fright." That cultivated Brunnhold drawl poured into Cerise's ears and ran down all her spine, like vinegar over skin raw and peeling already from the sun. Anger sprang up then, pure and clean. Her hands clenched, and her teeth ground together.
She saw the shadow in the doorway out of the corner of her eye. Her father, returning at last. She thought Antoinette would leave off then, and Cerise was disappointed. The clear, quiet sneer that came next was unexpected, then. Antoinette looked at her, a mask of disdain, and she spoke. "Does your father know that you're looking to pollute the family line, Vauquelin? Maybe I should tell—"
Cerise didn't hear the rest. She didn't need to. It didn't matter what was coming out of Antoinette's mouth. All of it was disgusting, and it always had been. That some of it was, in a way, true didn't make that much of a difference.
Damn it all, anyway. This city, this day, this whole clocking last couple of months. Damn her father and his letters and his tailors and his questions. Diana and her tear-stained face, looking at her in the reflection of the mirror. The way Ellie had looked at her, when the plate broke. The plate on the shelf, cracks all lined with gold. Em, hers again—and that sick feeling in the back of her mind where she was waiting to ruin it all over again. Cerise thought too of that black image of Naulus on the mantle, watching over everything. At least Cerise Vauquelin knew exactly how to feel about the things coming out of Antoinette Roumanille's mouth. Rage, simple and perfect.
Cerise curled her fist, her thumb tucked out of the way and all her knuckles aligned. There was no thought, just a brilliant burst of anger and action—the most pure and clean feeling she'd had all day, ending in the satisfying crack of Antoinette's jaw at the end of her fist.