One day, as I took the first step out of my home, I was pleased by the weather outside. It was neither sunny nor rainy, the white clouds had covered up the sun rays trying to reach our city. Add to that a refreshing breeze blowing in the background, it was the perfect weather for a walk.
I didn't have any expectations anymore, I was just going there to follow my routine.
I had recently stopped tying my hair in a ponytail as well, leaving them hanging in the breeze. It was a refreshing feeling.
However, the world might have changed, but 33rd Street was bound to remain the same, still as noiseless and despondent as any other day.
That day though, I was bound to receive the shock of my life. The Uncle Albert that I knew of as a block of ice that refused to melt was out of his shop and talking to a beautiful woman at that.
She was dressed in all black, wore a huge round hat, and attached to it was a transparent veil that couldn't hide her almost perfect and symmetrical facial features.
His face, for the first time in my life, had a trace of emotion, and it was bitterness. By the time I reached their proximity, their conversation seemed to have ended. Seemingly preoccupied with something, Uncle Albert didn't acknowledge my presence and went inside his shop. The lady with whom he was talking, on the other hand, turned towards me curiously.
She was surprised to see me skipping over a pothole, seemingly with an intent to meet the man she was just talking to.
With an amused expression, she removed the thin black glove she was wearing, reached her hand out to me, and said, "Nice to meet you, young lass, are you familiar with that blockhead over there?"
Her hand was dangling in front of my face and I had no clue what to do with it. Was I supposed to kiss it or shake it? Her graceful manner was giving me a sense of pressure.
In the end, I flusteredly leaned forward and kissed it, to which she held her other hand to her lips and giggled. I wasn't able to answer her first question before she followed with her second with a chuckle, "Little lady, are you trying to woo me?"
My face turned a little red but I was only embarrassed and not disgraced. The lady wasn't trying to be demeaning or anything. From what I could gather back then, she was genuinely finding this amusing.
First, I nervously apologized for not shaking her hand, to which she said, "No problem" while wearing her glove. Then, I asked, "Um, do you mean Uncle Albert?" while pointing at the lonely pawn shop in the corner of the empty and broken street.
The lady's eyes lit up in abrupt surprise that I could glean from her transparent veil when I asked her that.
"So, you DO know that blockhead? How has he been living? Does he talk? Did he tell you about his family?"
I was flustered again by her stream of questions but I wanted to know the answer to those as well. Therefore, I replied after some consideration,
"Um, Uncle Albert mostly spends his time reading books, I haven't seen him talk in quite some time. I don't know where he lives so I can't say anything about that…" The lady kept nodding her head as she listened. While she was processing the information, I asked the question that I wanted to know the most,
"So, um Miss, by family, do you mean the Sullivan family?"
Suddenly, the mild surprise on her face turned into shock,
"So, he DID tell you of his family?"
I quickly recalled my father's warning to not casually toss around the name or the surname of the Mayor. I was afraid of her misunderstanding my connection with Uncle Albert and therefore, promptly explained, "Ah, no, it was something I had guessed since he looked quite similar to Mayor who had the same surname and so–"
"So, you know about my father as well? Lass, you seem to know quite a lot."
It seemed that in my attempt to clear my position and explain myself, I had dug a deeper hole for myself by over-sharing everything that I had known and speculated.
The lady was genuinely surprised now. There was no way she was going to let me off with small talk anymore.
Moreover, I could've been making random conspiracy theories about the Mayor's family and his connection with Uncle Albert for months but that I would stumble upon such a massive secret was something beyond my expectations.
After all, the mayor was known to be a solitary and mythical creature that sprung up out of nowhere. His age alone made it impossible for anyone to trace origins. If the news that the Mayor had a daughter and possibly a family somewhere else was revealed, it was bound to cause great uproar within Elitist Street, where the upper echelons of the city, such as the big Merchant families, trade union leaders, and the official lived.