hiatus

Her heart beats in the tender trepidation those who are younger often do when presenting a portion of themselves to an elder’s eye. And there was no eye more discerning than her dear Papa’s. No day more important than this, wherein nothing short of perfection would be permitted. For it is not fear that flutters her pulse so, but the most ardent hope and wish that she might give the man who has given her everything...something of soul and substance in return back to his baring.

Her eyes alight at the first sign of his clear delight and pride, but it is his embrace which releases a bright laugh of surprise, love, and teen indignity from her lips, “Papa! I’m too OLD!” and yet still her arms tighten about him in spite of her protests, whispering softly into the fabric of his starched neck cuff, “Никогда другой, как ты. Я люблю тебя, папа.“

She slips to her feet once released and brushes her hair back in an effort to obscure the misty quality that has sheened and slipped into the corner of her eyes, clearing her throat quiety, “There’s something else in there. Just a little thing.”

And there, tucked into the pages of her heartfelt gift, a slim piece of independent paper slips loose. An application for a United Nations Advanced Youth Internship.

“I was accepted. I got in.”

She goes up on tip toe though well she is past the age of needing to kiss his cheek (though however tall she grows, she knows she shall never attain his height), handing him a clean white wrapped slim box tied with ribbon as she does so. "Happy Birthday, Papa." Within, pristine tissue paper parts with a crinkle, to expose the leatherbound book she has handsewn herself and written on its pages her own translation of a copy of The Prince in several languages including the original Italian.

The very sight of her sets a smile on his face so wide that it aches and he would have scooped her up in his arms if it weren’t for the box she handed to him. He eagerly unwrapped it, fingers running across the leather cover before opening it and beginning to read. It was a gift truly from the heart, of shared experience, of advice he had passed on, of advice that he had lived his life by. It fills his heart up to bursting that he can’t help but throw his arms around her and hoist her up, giving her a big and hearty kiss, squeezing her as tight as he can. “Thank you, princess.” She was, without a doubt, the best thing he has had the honour of giving this world. More than all his years of service, he was foremost proud of her. His little princess, his pride and joy. 

@presidentviktorpetrov replied to your post:                    (is suddenly awash in new followers and is quite...                   

The President has ordered it!    

~

No fair! We agreed you can’t pull Presidential rank!

(is suddenly awash in new followers and is quite confused until she sees why and stamps her foot preciously) Papa! You cannot SHARE a birthday!

Princess Ekaterina! Delighted, delighted!

She wanted to chase in solitude the faint thrill of possibility she had felt before, the elusive excitement at a prospect she was coming close to defining, at least emotionally.

Briony Tallis, Atonement. (via savingquotes)

Pavane in F-sharp minor, Op. 50, Gabriel Fauré

(via royal vale teacup | Flickr - Photo Sharing!)

Saoirse Ronan

Happy Birthday Lars Mikkelsen!

petition for house of cards spin-off focused solely on viktor petrov 

If you want to be happy, be.

Leo Tolstoy | Anna Karenina (via forsimplicityssake)

“ACK!” She darts to the side, slipping out of retaliation range, trailing cookie pieces like pebbles in a child’s fable behind her. “You always have time to eat!  It’s one of your more well known consistencies.  The kitchen staff literally has to double up on stock whenever you come to town!” She twists away from the next punishing pinch that might fly in her direction, protected by the countertop certifiably between their frames.

“Besides, I know you aren’t starving yourself of sweets.  Katerina’s younger sister is in my year. Word is she snuck back into the house after curfew in quite a state after being dropped off in an old school relic of a car with very familiar plates.” 

She had practically twisted Maryia’s arm to extract these details.

“What have you to say for yourself, lazy liar?” She prodded pubescently.

He reaches over to pinch her arm, as she knows very well that he doesn’t like that nickname, though he’s gotten used to it by now. “When you go to university you’ll find out exactly how busy you’ll be and how you have no time to eat. Even less time for sweets!” Which wasn’t even going to how he might possibly have not been so good with budgeting…

“Not even a full week out of university, NIKKI, and already you’ve raided the summer house pantry?  Good thing I learned early on to ferret away the sweets before you came to visit.”

Any tsking is taken up by the hard crunch and crumbling of the cookie in her hand.

Karen Knorr, “The Corridor” from Musée Carnavelet