#seletionocnet

Mentions of: @domschreave and @sera-chamberlaine

It comes in waves, I close my eyes, hold my breath and let it bury me.

Smiling at every aestheticly pleasing object in my vision and adrenalin and serotonin floating my bloodstream, I skip trough the halls. Making pirouettes along the way, strolling on pointe and restraining myself from jumping into the air. My pace getting slower as I reach my room, carefully turning the knob and opening the door before entering. My maids greet me with pleasant smiles, while excitingly waiting to hear every single detail about my short interview with the prince today. I sigh and try to keep my fading smile plastered onto my face. “So how did it go, Lady Ruby?”, Aurelia asks with an excited giggle following her question. “Is he as handsome as everyone says he is?”, Radia squeaks.

“Just let me sit down first, I am still a bit dizzy”, I comment a bit overwhelmed and let myself glide onto the floor, smoothing out any creases in my bright yellow day dress. “Do you want some water, Lady Ruby?”, the petite brunette, Luna, asks with a worried expression clouding her face. I just simply nod as a response, trying to calm myself down while exhaling deeply. Don’t throw up Rubes, you don’t want to ruin that lovely carpet. Luna hands me a little shiny glass cup of ice cold water, little drops running down the side of the coquille, wetting my slighlty shaking fingers. With a lot of effort I manage to bring it to my lips, letting the water glide down my aching throat, wetting my mouth and cooling my lungs. I sit up straight and take another deep breath before taking an other small slip of the cold wet. Radia takes the fragile jar out of my shaking grip while stroking my back. “It’s okay, Lady Ruby. Everything will be fine”, I shake my head while feeling my blood pressure growing and growing, even though serotonin left my body a long time ago. Anxiety keeps creeping up my body, numbing every inch of it, taking control. “Shall I get you some medication?”, Radia speaks up again, having no idea what to do with my fragile and messed up mind. I slowly shake my head and get out a simple demand with my shaking and scratchy voice: “I just need some time alone.” “But Miss, we can’t just (…)”, Aurelia starts of her complain while worryingly eyeing me. “It’s fine Aurelia, I just need some time for myself. And I am pretty sure you’ve got something better to do then watching me wheep”, I try to laugh to lighten the mood which only comes out as a scratchy cough. “Are you sure with that?”, Luna asks suspicious, bitting her nails while studying my expression. “Yes, I am very sure”, I state, not backing down. Luna nods and is the first one to quietly leave the room, Radia and Aurelia following her lead with a longing glaze at my fragile silhouette.

After the door falls shut, the first sob is escaping my rough throat, making an inhuman sound an ripping through the walls. Salty tears start streaming down my face, dissolving my makeup and creating an ongoing waterfall along my neck. Wet dark spots appear on my delecate dress, ruining it’s stunningly fabric. How could I’ve been so stupid (…), so stupid to believe I could make it. Why did I even try? Why didn’t I just stay home? I sob again at the thought of home and regret ever betraying father. I should have listened to him! I will be eliminated in a few hours and got no where to go. Mum won’t take me back without a promising husband, so where will I live? Gosh, I would never survive on my own and if I get kicked out now, my career will be over as fast as I can say Guacamole. An other sob rips trough the air, making the walls shiver while tears are now wetting the floor beneath me. I rest my head onto the cold floor while small needy sounds are escaping my mouth.

With a soft noise my door cracks open, I slowly look up and see a dark beauty who I can identify as Lady Seraphine, standing in the doorway. “Why are you crying like that?”, confidence radiating of her flawless skin. With a confused expression I only manage to bring out a little “Huuhh?” sound. “You’re on the floor, crying like a little child. Why?”, she asks in a demanding voice, closing the door. “I fucked up”, I manager to say with a sniffled sound. She sighs and makes here way towards me, siting down on the edge of my large princess bed. “What did you do?” I take one last breath before starting to ramble with in a whiny voice: “Like for the first half I didn’t even talk and then he asked me what I did for fun”, I start sobbing again, trying to remember every thing that went wrong during the interview, “and bare in my mind I rarely do anything for fun and then I said something and he thought it was boring and then I asked him if he could love someone like me who doesn’t even know themselves.” I sniffed a bit before I add: “I am such an idiot.” Sera stares at me with a confused and anoyed look, still sitting on the bed above me. “W-wait hold up girl, about who are we talking here?”, she groans, “you got to make yourself more clear.” I slighlty nod while stating that I am complaining about my interview with Price Dominic. “Ah right the interview, I’m sure you didn’t screw that up”, she states, confident in here words. But how can she know? “ I am pretty sure that I am the first one to be eliminated. He probably thinks that I am way to weird for him”, I state, burying myself in self-loathing. “Oh come on, you can’t be that bad. I bet some out there were weirder than you.” “Are you sure?”, I ask still sniffeling a bit. “You have to drop the insecurity girl, it won’t bring you anywhere.” She is right, but I’ll never as confident as her. I mean, how could I with that lack of social skills. “But how do I do that Sera?”, I ask like a little girl trying to learn to tie her shoelaces into a proper knot. “Of course I am sure”, she proudly comments before commanding: “First of all get up from that floor and wipe your tears away, don’t cry over a boy.” I do what she says and take a seat next to her on my light pink duvet, whipping away the salty tears still leaking from my watery eyes. “Good, second don’t worry too much about what you say. If you show you don’t care and have trust in your words you already come over much more confident”, she states trying to encourage me to be myself. Can I even be me, without knowing who my true self is? The same doubt came up at the end of my interview, ruining it for once and forever.

“But I don’t know how to properly socialise so how will I appear more confident if I am not capable of holding proper conversations”, I bring up my doubts from earlier, clearly stating my weaknesses. I definitely shouldn’t be that open towards a complete stranger. Only god knows what she will do with these information, maybe even feeding it to the press, trying to ruin my calm and collected representation. But I have a feeling that she is clearly different, maybe even as misunderstood and mistreated as me. We would share the same dispair. “I think you need to get out of your shell more, be bold, go to people and talk to them. Be more… like me.” Be bold, I repeat in my head, be bold.

“I don’t think it’s possible to be just like you… But I’d like to get out of my comfort zone and challenge myself. But how exactly do I do that?” “By really just going for it, doing things you wouldn’t do normally. What is something you won’t do usually?” Gosh that’s such a hard question. Nearly everything I have experienced in the last 48 hours and which I am experiencing right now, is at least a bit unfamiliar to me. “Applying to the selection was already one of it”, I laugh a bit at that very obvious answer, “but I normally do everything my parents ask me to do, so…. Maybe I wouldn’t eat chocolate or throw knifes normally?” I should definitely try one of these the next few days, okay, maybe not the last one. “I get that.. but that is exactly what you need to do then. Eat all the chocolate that you want, talk to people, throw knives at them”, she states with a small sad smile gracing her lips. After realising what she said she coughs a bit while adding a “sorry not at them of course”, who h makes me giggle. “I should definitely try that. But do chocolate and pizza actually taste that good as everyone says they do?” “You’ll have to find out for yourself, honey.” “But what if it tastes so good I can’t stop eating?”, I moan a bit due to her sketchy and teasing answer. “Then you keep eating, so what?”, she shrugs her shoulders and stares at me with an innocent expression gracing her beautifull painted features. “But thenI’ll ruin my body”, I whine while pouty lips are distorting my face, making me look like an immature six year old schoolgirl. “I thought we, as dancers, had some sort of discipline?”, Sera wonders while raising an eyebrow. She is right, we do have a lot of discipline, but I actually planned on throwing it all out of the window during the course of the selection. “We do. Maybe I can control myself with the chocolate”, I sigh while realising that no tears are running down my face. My pulse has finally calmed down a bit and Dom’s face isn’t clouding my messy head anymore. “You better do, it would be a waste of your body.”

I massage my soar hands, finally feeling the blood running trough my veins again, banishing the numbness which took over my fragile body way to long. “You are right. Maybe just a tiny bit of chocolate. I can manage that”, I agree with her while nodding, still making out the dizziness located in my chaotic head. “See”, she states while getting up again, smoothing out her dress and looking towards the door, “you’re all good.” “Thank you Sera”, I state gratefully while taking her small figure into my embrace, giving her a loving hug. I inhale slowly, being glad that I still know the rough basics of showing emotion through simple, everyday actions. I deeply sigh as I realise that I don’t even know when I last hugged someone. It could have been years ago. “No problem, but you have to do it on your own now girl”, she gladly accepts the hug. Slowly I take a step back, trying not to let the sadness take over again, and state while nodding: “I promise Sera. I am a big girl.” A genuine smile is gracing my lips, happiness and warmth is floating my body, a tingly feeling is spreading through my veins. She rolls her eyes again and smiles lightly before mentioning: “I got something for you, as a farewell gift.” A farewell gift? Is she already leaving? No, that can’t be. She hasn’t had her interview yet and I doubt that Prince Dom would eliminate a beauty like her right away. She hands me a little flask and calmy remarks: “Give it to Dominic, when he is annoying you, or when you’re married.” With narrowed eyes I inspect the shiny little flask and wonder what liquid is filling up this coquille. I nod slightly, while tugging it under my pillow: “Thank you sera, I will give it to him if the time comes.” “Good”, she states while looking in the mirror and touching up her dark brown silky hair, “I got to go now, remember my words okay? Be bold girl, you got it.“

Be bold.

“I will live your advice Sera. Thanks for that”, I affirm her plea and present her a last genuine smile. I fumble with my hands, still feeling the warmth returning to my limbs. She winks at me before heading to the dark brown wooden door, walking out with a “I’ll miss you Rubes.”

I stare at the closed door for a couple of seconds thinking about her last words, wondering if they confirmed my assumptions, before I shrug it off and stand up with weak knees and make my way to my grand white desk. With gleaming eyes, I stare at my complexion and my slightly ruined make up. I could make a panda competition with this look. With an easy flick of my wrist, I grab a makeup wipe and gently rub off the remaining face paint clogging my pores. After moisturizing my now clean face, I try to imitate a few steps my maids taught me this morning while Zuzu was warming up her voice. First I shall use primer, than put on some matching foundation with a brush, after that I should apply concealer, powder and a little bit of eyeshadow and add blush for some rosy cheeks. The finishing touches consist of a simple eyeliner without a wringe, or whatever they call it, a bit of nude lipstick and then I am done. I proudly view my finished makeup and am definitely very pleased with the results. It’s definitely not the best, but I am still learning, it’s definitely better than the make up I used to apply at competitions and much better than the mess my face was before. With one last sip of water, I make my way to the closet and choose one of the already finished evening gowns and let it glide over my smooth skin. A blood red gown is now gracing my complexion, creating contrast against my dark skin, while making my red cheeks stand out as well. I twirl around and admire my dress floating in the hair, while discerning my figure from different angles. My hair is still in a pretty updo from earlier this evening, revealing my prominent collarbones and round shoulders. I nod towards my complexion in the mirror, a proud and confident smile appearing on my lips, now I can be bold.