Again, I Loved the End.

Episode 3: The Weight of History

Esme, contrary to what she made her family believe, didn’t go out with friends that night. She hadn’t even made plans. It was just easier to pretend she had somewhere better to be than sit through dinner and whatever else her father thought counted as a conversation. She knew there would be more talks about upholding the family name, possibly more talks about the company and, if she wasn’t lucky, he might even delve into her need to keep on collecting degrees or masters's, instead of potentially working within the company.

When she got back to her apartment, she didn’t turn on the lights. The city outside her window did enough of that, flickering in dull strips of white and blue across the floor. She chucked her bag onto her couch, kicked off her heels, and fell onto the couch in an undignified heap. She let out a sigh. She was tired. She was definitely not going out anytime soon unless she really had to. She didn’t know when or how, but before she knew it, she had fallen asleep. Her dreams were plagued with scenes from the documentary she had watched and what she knew was her brain just filling in the gaps for her by creating likely scenarios of what the day-to-day life of Queen Adora and King Sable looked like.

And that was how she spent the weekend. She spent it on her bed, in her room, having finally changed out of her outing clothes and taken a shower. She was clad in her pajamas and she was buried under her covers with her laptop catching up on some TV series she’s had on her list for quite some time. She spent a bit of time working on some of her assignments that were due soon and some time adding on to her research paper. She was set to graduate soon. As early as three months' time, if she’s able to get all of her coursework done on time. She ordered some food when she got hungry and ignored most of her friend’s texts, and answered with one or two sarcastic comments in the sibling group chat.

Undoubtedly, she checked the trending tab out of habit during a reprieve from typing and saw the documentary was still up there. People were still sharing their opinions and she marveled at that. This story was as old as time in her books. She knew the added information of the pregnancy and also Queen Adora having something to do with her sister’s death was a bit unsettling to an already unsettling story. For years, there has been speculation as to why King Sable would let his Kingdom fall the way that he did. Why he had insisted on marrying his dead wife’s sister (with this one, Esme thought the reason behind it was glaringly obvious, but she realizes that it may not be the same for most people). Or why he would even commit suicide when he could have died with honor, but the documentary had finally shed light on some of the things that people just didn’t understand. He was in love. And as a man who felt he had lost everything, he had lost his ability to care about the world and to care about himself. He saw no point in his life and took matters into his own hands to end his life. Esme thought it was sad, how it ended for all parties involved. Even King Sable’s kingdom. It is known that the man who conquered the kingdom was a tyrant and the people of the kingdom were never happy or treated well. The Kingdom was constantly plagued by wars and people starved to death most of the time. It ceased to be the flourishing kingdom it once was and was now a doomed destination for anyone foolish enough to venture there.

There were a lot of people who seemed sympathetic towards King Sable and Queen Adora. They understood that they were only working within the constraints that had been set against them. There were those who shamed them for what they did. Those who felt like King Sable could have grown to fall in love with Queen Zina if he had just given their relationship a chance. But most of all, it seemed like Queen Adora received the brunt of the hate. People couldn’t comprehend how she could do that to her sister, forgetting conveniently that so many people in this modern era still commit the same mistake that Queen Adora did. She’s always thought human beings were predictable and that people were likely to forget their own wrongdoings when faced with the wrongdoing of someone else. Bonus point if that person is female, rich and influential.

She scrolled through the threads and read them idly. She read the takes about Queen Adora being a snake, King Sable being weak, endless debates about whether love excuses betrayal. Some meme edits too. She actually laughed at one. A photoshopped image of King Sable holding up a sign that read, 'Bad Decisions Were Made.' But then she stumbled on a post she hadn’t seen before. A grainy screenshot of an old, yellowed manuscript, with translated text below it.

“Some accounts claim the gods placed a curse on King Sable and Queen Adora, disgusted by their selfishness and the events that unfolded because of their folly. It is said that the curse does not doom their bloodlines, but rather, the curse dooms the souls of King Sable and Queen Adora to lifetimes of constantly finding each other but never being able to be together if they choose their love above all else.”

What that meant, Esme wasn’t sure. She doesn’t believe in the concept of souls and reincarnation. And she wonders where this obscure text was coming from. What is the source of this so-called curse? She doubts it exists. Possibly someone who wants to add more mystery and intrigue to the entire thing. Esme sees that the post has garnered quite a lot of attention. The common sentiment shared by almost everyone in the comment section of the post was that the two of them deserved it, and they saw it as an appropriate punishment. Esme, if she were to believe in such a thing, would call the curse an overreaction. After all, what most people conveniently forget is the fact that King Sable and Queen Adora were both quite young. Sable was about 23 or 24 and Adora was about 18 or 19 when everything went down. Adora was literally a teenager and Sable was only just past his teen years. Their brains weren’t even fully developed yet at that age.

There were some that were laughing it off as folklore. One user even claimed their great-grandfather used to tell that story. Esme blinked at her phone. She didn’t know why it bothered her. Maybe because she’d heard every version of that story, every rumor, but no one had ever mentioned a curse.

She let the screen go dark and tossed her phone somewhere on her bed. She stayed like that for a while, staring up at the ceiling, listening to the silence in her room. When her stomach growled, she ordered some food and turned back to her paper to continue typing.