ੈ♡˳ ONE
stained glass

SNOWFLAKES PATTERED AGAINST THE glass of the window pane in silent reverie. the odd splatter of a melted snowflake was lost in the spluttering of the logs being consumed by the molten orange flames in the rustic fireplace.

other than that, the house was drenched in peaceful quietness, insulated by layers of snow. the street outside was deserted, the roads either too dangerous with sleet and littered with the odd cars that hadn't been stored undercover, and were stained frozen with inches of snow that no one bothered to clear.

no one was crazy enough to venture out into the freezing cold snowstorm that had been raging for two days now, although it had started to clear drastically since. those who lived on prosperity lane in the quiet, wealthy outer-suburb were the least likely to head out into the icy coldness. why should they? they had no reason to, after all.

for grace summers, she had been glued mostly to her desk chair in what was once her father's office in the large mansion. ever since she had claimed it as her own, she was sure she spent more time in the confinements of the room that had aged with time, memories, and cigar smoke. sometimes she swore she could still smell the tangy smoke that made her feel sick as a young girl, as if it were trapped in the walls and haunting the room like spirits of the past.

lost deep in thought, grace winced when she felt the needle she had been using to hand-stitch pierce her thumb. no matter how many times she did it, the sharp throb still stung until it mellowed. she was quick to drop the delicate, white lace to the surface of the mahogany desk before it was tainted crimson.

she had no one to blame but herself for not wearing her usual gloves or one of her mother's old thimbles when hand-stitching. with a sigh, she dropped the needle and thread beside the lace and stood from her chair, leaving the warmth of the office to enter the coolness of the rest of the house.

barely using the bottom level of the mansion she had grown up in, it meant that descending the stairs left her feeling like she was standing outside in the snow, the exact opposite of how upstairs felt. grace pulled her grey jacket closer to her as if it would magically expel the temperature drop and headed down into the grand lounge room that barely had as much use as it once had.

the room's charm hadn't changed. the glass windows were stained in delicate patterns that her mother had picked long ago. each item of furniture was an old, rustic wood that had been passed down through too many generations. the theme was much like the rest of the house; reds, browns, and sometimes a hint of navy. a little too old fashioned for grace's taste, but she had little patience and motivation to change it at all.

on the grand bookshelf against the far wall near the window was where she kept the first-aid kit because it was the one spot where most people were entertained if they ever stepped foot in the house. she hardly ever used the kitchen herself, so she had moved it from there and kept it on top of the old novels collecting dust on the bookshelf because then it was easier to find. with careful hands, she picked up the kit and grimaced at the dust as she opened it to fish out a band-aid.

if she had been working on something that wasn't white and wasn't for a collection, she wouldn't have bothered, but one flaw on the gorgeous lace would leave her with hours upon hours of needing to redo the design for the pristine dress she had been working tirelessly on.

once she taped the band-aid securely around her finger and set the first aid kit back up on the shelf, grace heard a thundering roar echo outside. was it storming? the weather reports had said that the snowstorm was lifting and that, although the sky would remain a cloudy grey, a thunderstorm wasn't to be expected. then again, when were the weather reports ever right?

the roar grew louder, and this time it was accompanied by a violent screech like nails on a chalkboard. she pulled a face and shifted her body so that she was facing the stained-glass window. drawing back the heavy navy curtain just a little, she peeked through to the icy wonderland outside.

everything was still. snowflakes still fell like glitter, unaffected by the loud sounds through the usually quiet neighbourhood. grace, however, stood affected by it, because this was out of the ordinary. she was used to the silence of prosperity lane, and occasionally, the only sound that broke through the barrier were the young children two houses down, but they were lovely and sometimes came over to ask her to play with them, so she didn't mind at all.

a bright light flared first before the screeching grew louder. noticing the culprit now, a black car with a massive dent in the front passenger door squealed down the road as the tyres fought the sleet at speeds too fast for the terrain. grace's look of confusion soon turned to one of horror as she watched someone inside the car raise their hand and lean out the window—

she dropped to the floor in an instant, turning her back to the wall and cowering down into a ball as low as she could. the shattering pierced her eardrums as she squeezed her eyes shut so tightly that she started to see a galaxy of stars behind her eyelids. the sound of shattering glass forced a gasp from her throat as she felt the lightest of pinpricks atop her exposed skin.

something thudded across the floor. her heart skipped a beat with every thud, yet still, she remained deathly still, refusing to even breathe. shock mixed his terror as her body shuddered heavily on the cold, timber floor, but now she could only feel anything but the cold. even the cold shock of what had just happened burned bright hot.

"grace, are you al—?" the voice sounded so far away. perhaps it was. "grace!"

in the dead of night, well, the early hours of morning where the sky was still delightfully dark, hurried footsteps echoed around the large room. at the crunching of glass under shoes, grace only opened her eyes when she felt a light touch on her shoulders, prompting an influx of air back into her lungs.

"you're alright, you're alright," the woman before her frowned upon noticing how glassy grace's gunmetal blue eyes were. the cold surely wasn't helping with the shock.

"eliza," grace breathed out as she forced herself to make eye contact with the other woman who lived in the house with her, "the glass . . ."

"i know," eliza grimaced as she glanced up at the window. the gorgeously stained glass had shattered into a million pieces all over the floor and some landed on grace, coating her jacket and her hair with the sharp reflective pieces of her mother's favourite window. eliza was not looking forward to having to clean that up, as well as figuring out what to do with the massive hole in the wall now that the glass was pretty much ruined forever. "did you get hit by anything? can you feel any glass?" for good measure, eliza tilted grace's head side to side to check her face for any signs of blood or glass.

"no," she shook her head in response, "i think i'm . . . fine," her voice trailed off when she glanced to the right of where eliza was crouched beside her. sitting on the floor was an old brick, and wrapped around it's width was a piece of fine, orange string.

much to eliza's dismay, grace ignored her friend and housekeeper's warnings and crawled over the glass as carefully as she could until she reached the brick. sitting in the middle of the floor in front of the wind tunnel that had formed from the missing wind tunnel, grace covered her hand with the sleeve of her jacket and rolled the brick over. tied to it was a white sheet of paper.

"don't touch anything," eliza walked over to where grace was sat. "come on, out of the wind. i'll call the police."

"i won't touch anything," grace shook her head, cringing when she felt fine pieces of glass dust the back of her neck at the simple action. "but i'm reading this," she gestured to the letter. "clearly it was for me, not the police."

"oh dear," eliza muttered under her breath. she was fifteen years older than grace, but that left her with little authority still. she was thirty-nine now, and had been a friend of the summers family for many years for she had worked for the house since she was twenty. even after grace had told her there was no reason for her to continue with any housework or anything anymore, old habits die hard, and eliza quite enjoyed her job. grace had promised her that she could live in the mansion for as long as she liked, and that she would even continue to pay her if she did not want to work anymore, but eliza had dedicated her life to the family she worked for, and she had been given so much in return that she could not possibly ever gather enough gratitude for.

"just . . . no fingerprints, please," eliza continued skittishly. "this is a crime, you are aware of that, right?"

"uh huh," grace responded absently. awkwardly, with her sleeves covering her hands, she unfolded the sheet of paper as eliza ushered her up from the floor and away from the bare window.

the letter was scrawled in cursive that was vaguely familiar. it was readable, just, which hinted at much more than she knew the police were capable of figuring out.

one word and i'll make sure you lose it all. no cops, nothing.

i'll let the coordinators at the mediterranean know that you stole designs from me because come on, we both know i deserve to win after all this. and they'll believe me over you anyway.

you owe me. remember? or was it too long ago?

all you have to do is take your name off the list and stay in london.

— c ♡

"don't call the cops," grace said sharply as eliza held the phone up to her ear.

eliza's eyebrows drew together, "what part of this is a crime didn't make sense to you?" she shook her head, but still put the black phone down, listening to the landline click into place. "grace, honey, if you hadn't ducked- you could've been killed!"

grace understood where she was coming from. eliza was protective, and for good reason. an incident like this didn't exactly help. "can you please just call someone to do something about the window? maybe david?"

sighing, eliza gave in. "fine, alright. yeah, i'll try reach him. are you going back upstairs?"

"for just a moment," grace folded the piece of paper back up and shoved it into her pocket. "i have to call someone."

without another word, grace hurried up the creaking staircase a lot quicker than she ever had before, much like she had when she was a child and her mother used to chase her up the staircase. the giggling was trapped in the walls, too, much like the smoke.

the white lace lay forgotten on the desk as she rushed towards it and sifted through various fabrics in search for her phone. eventually, in her vigorous search, she found her phone by accidentally sweeping it onto the floor. nonetheless, she picked it up and waited too many seconds too long for it to unlock because she currently looked like too much of a mess for face id, and then hit her contacts app.

scrolling for far too long, she finally came across the contact she hadn't pressed on in years. one that she hadn't bothered to change either, it was still childishly titled with emojis after the name.

although it was one forty-two in the morning, she still pressed on the contact and brought the phone up to her ear. grace waited as it rung out once, and so she called back again, and that rung out, too. once more, she pressed on the contact once again and held it up to her ear, walking around her desk until she was standing by her chair.

after what felt like forever, the phone call finally connected. "it's three in the morning," was the first thing she heard from a scratchy voice, followed by a yawn. there was a pause for a moment, no doubt to check to contact name, before the voice sounded again, this time quieter. "gracie?"

"hi, lando," grace fell back into her chair, crossing one leg over the other and spinning until she was facing the large, snowy window behind the desk. "long time no chat."

"gracie . . ." he tested her name again. it still fell off his tongue the same as it always had, even though it had been a little over five years since he had bothered to utter it. "why are you calling so early?"

"well, i was woken up, so i think it's only fair that you woke up, too," she drawled, spinning the chair side to side with the foot she had on the ground. she then muttered, "i can't believe the one time you've answered me was this early in the morning."

that's because i didn't see your contact, he thought, too tired to even function. and so he ignored her comment and yawned once again, this time louder. "i'm gonna hang up."

"i wouldn't if i were you," this time, her tone was darker, and that woke lando up a little more. "i just got paid a visit from an old friend."

". . . who?" lando regretted even asking. he was entertaining this phone call for too long.

"charlize," grace rolled her eyes. her name tasted more bitter than any type of citrus fruit, burning her mouth in a way so unsatisfying and unforgiving. "you know, the one y—"

lando was quick to cut her off, "yep, charlize . . ." another name he hadn't said in a long time. "what'd she want? couldn't this wait until morning or something?" though, he knew he wouldn't of answered if she had called in the morning and her contact name plastered across his screen when he was alert enough to realise who was calling.

"not really," she said dryly. "because the bitch got someone to launch a fucking brick through my window. so," she said, voice calmer now, "i'm gonna call you in the morning, and if you don't pick up, i'll find out where you live and launch a brick through your window. got it?"

lando puffed air into his cheeks in frustration. "got it," was the end of his side of the conversation as he hung up the phone, rolled over, and tried to get back to sleep.

grace rolled her eyes once more. "someone's changed," she mumbled before throwing her phone on top of the desk. "still a fucking brat, though." but with one shake of her head, she shook away the conversation and stood up from the desk, heading back downstairs to the chaos of not that long ago. there was no way she was going to be able to sleep now, and she knew eliza wouldn't be able to either, so she took a detour on the way back downstairs to grab the old chess board from a cabinet long untouched for the two of them to indulge in until the sunlight lit the sky gold.

x

note !

hi :) im really excited for this like i have it all mapped out so i just hope it works !!