A Game of Hearts
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Read between May 16 - June 2, 2024
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I was searching for my real competition. How was it possible that he hadn’t come? A victory today meant little if Tristan Gates was not here to stand defeated.
Abigail McKenna
👀👀👀👀
5%
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“How is it you grow more awful every year?” I took up my quiver and bow, my pulse like a drum in my ears. “That is progress, at least. While you remain precisely the same.”
Abigail McKenna
I almost spit out my sandwich SIR??
Elizabeth (Liza) liked this
7%
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Tristan is awful, but this is low even for him.” Papa paused before speaking. “As much as I would like to place this fault entirely at his door, I do not think he is the one you are truly angry with.” “No?” I turned to face him. “Because I feel like I could hit him over the head with my bow and feel very little remorse. Is that not anger?” He grinned. “That would certainly make any upcoming dinner parties somewhat awkward.”
Abigail McKenna
LOL
Elizabeth (Liza) liked this
8%
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Papa laughed. “Plotting a murder, are you?” “You were the one who encouraged outside thinking.” “Perhaps something within the confines of the law.” I sighed dramatically. “You are no fun at all.”
Elizabeth (Liza) liked this
8%
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“But what a competition. You were brilliant, of course.” Iris’s dramatics made it easy to pull away from the emptying pain of losing. I wanted to escape. “I am never anything less,” I said with a wink. Mama sighed as she and Papa moved past us toward the fair. “My daughters. Humble and unpretentious.”
Abigail McKenna
okay I LOVE this family 😂
18%
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“I would rather have one true friend than a thousand false ones.” She smiled, unruffled. “You wound me. But at least I have my thousand false friends to help me recover.”
Abigail McKenna
PFFT
Elizabeth (Liza) liked this
19%
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After all, what was the point of being a ladies’ society if the food was not infinitely better?
Elizabeth (Liza) liked this
21%
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Most people had no particular wish to know me better, and neither did I want them to. I preferred to keep to myself, because making conversation with anyone I did not know well was torture akin to having hot oil poured on me. And while I never strived for rudeness, I did not know how to be anything but abrupt and frank.
Abigail McKenna
mood 🫣
22%
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All eyes swung to me, an experience I could have avoided completely if I had not insisted on making friends.
Abigail McKenna
ok I love him 🤣
Elizabeth (Liza) liked this
29%
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“And I,” Hawthorne said, stabbing a sausage, “have no excuse. I simply don’t want to.”
Abigail McKenna
🤣 I respect it
48%
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Tristan stood there, hands in his pockets, watching me with a pained expression. His hair was damp with the misty rain, curling around his ears, and a new bandage was wrapped around his head, a strip of pure white. He wore no jacket over his rain-speckled shirtsleeves. My pulse quickened.
Abigail McKenna
not this happening in the RAIN joanna you can't do this to me 🫠
58%
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He was already hoping. I knew better. A love match between Marigold and me? It was absurd. Absolutely absurd.
Abigail McKenna
oh yeah no totally absurd who would imagine such a thing 🤭
65%
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“Prepare yourself,” I warned Tristan. He narrowed his eyes. “I’m not afraid of a society matron.” “Silly, silly man,” I said with a sigh as I led him over.