Love All, Trust a Few
Posted: 09 Dec 2024, 11:13
Though to the general public, Miss Nellie Jones was but a form of a celebrity who played magnificent creatures up on stage and acted the willing star to the people who loitered for a word with a talented actress, Jones’ reputation among the professional sect had… not exactly glimmered in recent years. From her turning up late to rehearsals, to suddenly leaving a theatre in order to go on holiday with a rich patron, it was never quite a surprise to hear that Miss Jones had left a troupe in the middle of a working season. As was the case with the Royal Victoria Theatre, it was something of a tradition for the troupe to put on a performance of A Midsummer’s Night Dream, in which Nellie had partook before as the fresh faced Helene or even Hermia. Alas, perhaps due to her age or the rumour of her drunkenness, Nellie had been casted as the older Hippolyta, Queen of the Amazons. The casting made sense, to many people, and for some time Nellie had thought about simply playing along… but, having been overlooked for some young rising star instead, Nellie had erupted by the second day of rehearsals.
Claiming that they did not deserve her talent or her fame, Nellie barked her declaration of leaving the theatre for greater, better things before descending into her dressing room in order to pack up her things: a row of costume jewellery, a chestnut box of stage make-up, facial oils and vials of perfume given by lovers alongside handfuls of stolen accessories and trinkets that she had been staring at like a crow after something shiny.
Though she had not a plan in place, Nellie had marched her way away from that cloistered street of glittering theatres toward the apartments of her paramour instead, and with a heavy fist she knocked against his door in the same way he had when she had come to her rooms to apologise for their most recent split.
By all accounts, Nellie was after comfort and somewhere safe to linger — that, and she felt it quite important that he put his hand toward writing a letter to neighbouring theatres, for Nellie had never learned how to write and was all but illiterate in terms of actually signing anything other than her name, which was but a swirling mess on his own merit. Wrapping her body in the coat she had plucked from a fellow actress’ stand at the door, Nellie stared into the wood before making herself heard, howling up toward the street as a banshee would — for exhaustion, frustration and anger riled her almost colourless, her face a speck paler than it normally was. “Rafa, Rafael!"
Claiming that they did not deserve her talent or her fame, Nellie barked her declaration of leaving the theatre for greater, better things before descending into her dressing room in order to pack up her things: a row of costume jewellery, a chestnut box of stage make-up, facial oils and vials of perfume given by lovers alongside handfuls of stolen accessories and trinkets that she had been staring at like a crow after something shiny.
Though she had not a plan in place, Nellie had marched her way away from that cloistered street of glittering theatres toward the apartments of her paramour instead, and with a heavy fist she knocked against his door in the same way he had when she had come to her rooms to apologise for their most recent split.
By all accounts, Nellie was after comfort and somewhere safe to linger — that, and she felt it quite important that he put his hand toward writing a letter to neighbouring theatres, for Nellie had never learned how to write and was all but illiterate in terms of actually signing anything other than her name, which was but a swirling mess on his own merit. Wrapping her body in the coat she had plucked from a fellow actress’ stand at the door, Nellie stared into the wood before making herself heard, howling up toward the street as a banshee would — for exhaustion, frustration and anger riled her almost colourless, her face a speck paler than it normally was. “Rafa, Rafael!"