Pinned
This new one, she’s a writer. If she ever writes about me, she might use words like “well-traveled” and “sophisticated.” I’d like her to write about me. She’d make my migratory history sound enviable. Exotic. I am a foreigner, if, like the Americans, you have the need to classify such things. I suppose I’m technically Italian.
I like to think I’m not an ordinary hairpin, but that makes me sound haughty. No matter. In my early years that was a compliment. I am small for my age, as most Baroque hairpins are garish, heavy. I’m uncomplicated and linear, with delicate silver filigree that expands upward, into a cone, topped with a single but magnificent Persian pearl. The fiore all'occhiello is that my pearl is threaded, acting as a cap. If one thinks to try, my pearl may be unscrewed to reveal a hidden vial. Goodness, the secrets I have protected!
I was crafted as a surprise gift to Althia, presented by her husband on their wedding night. I think he loved her. When she opened my empty vial, then looked at him confused, he explained that’s what filled it- his love. Being crafted from such adoration is what’s carried me through the darker times. I’m glad just knowing such a thing transpired. Maybe it will happen again, someday. Maybe to her, the writer.
I remained empty for many years, until Althia took to wearing perfume. Stored it inside my chamber. She’d pull me out, reapply scent, return the pearl, carefully pin me back in her hair, then flirt shamelessly with the bean minder. Poor Fabi never stood a chance! Between Althia’s curves, the perfume, and my own pretty embellishment it was only a matter of when, not whether.
When I turned over to Lucy, Althia’s grand-daughter, I learned she’d inherited the romanticist’s genes. As a girl, Lucy built homes for faeries in lavender fields. She tied the stalks together with grass, making tents. Sometimes she’d fix me on top, like a cupola, to attract faeries of certain stature. It almost worked.
Lucy snuck into her father’s library often, reading relentlessly. If she was admonished for reading forbidden books, we’d slink back and tear out the best words. Desire. Serendipity. Appetence. Lucy balled them between her fingers and hid them inside me for good luck.
When Tommaso started courting her in earnest, she filled me with belladonna. Just before their meetings she’d pull me out and dab the tincture in each eye, dilating to dark tea saucers. “My forest doe,” he’d coo, leaning in for a kiss. Once Lucy deciphered the direct correlation of belladonna to kisses, both increased.
I keep secrets and help women feel beautiful. Help them be beautiful. But, distracted with all the wrong correlations Lucy ignored the early blurriness. By the time the belladonna was retired it was too late. Tommaso decided it wouldn’t be fair to saddle a blind woman with marital obligations and for Lucy’s sake he called off the wedding. Lucy didn’t pin her hair much after that. Eventually we parted ways.
Love. I kept wondering if I would see it again. I wondered why it was so elusive. Whole centuries passed without ado. I looped around Europe, bought and sold, with no one noticing my, ah, functionality. No, there was one exception. I spent a few months with Catharine, who kept me filled with holy water. That crazy hag brandished me like a weapon, flinging holy water onto every kitten she encountered. She feigned offense if cats interrupted her solitude, but I truly believe she went out looking for them.
Like anyone else, over the years I’ve been filled with love, with hate. Good intentions, bad intentions. Fury and boredom. Three decades in Lapland and I was worn only once—once!—their heads perpetually covered in hats. Lisette rescued me. Picked me up on her travels and took me back to France. My years with her were dark and exciting. Lisette, so lovely but impatient. Impulsive. When her younger sister married her moodiness worsened.
She filled me with arsenic and when the opportunity presented she enhanced her sister’s wine. Her sweet dimples and freckles, along with her amiable disposition, expertly camouflaged the quiet rage. No one suspected a thing. In time, I helped her enhance the wine of an unsightly suitor, a cousin, and a goat.
Though I disagreed with her motives, I must say it was thrilling to play accomplice to such things. Sadly, when the legion of troops closed in, she used the arsenic on herself. She hunkered down in her bed, pulled up the covers, took it, pinned me back in her hair and closed her eyes, as if taking a summer nap. That was a close one as I was nearly buried with her corpse! Thankfully, one of the servants had the good sense to pocket me before the coffin was sealed.
Shortly thereafter, my journey to America began. I rode over on a ship with an antiques dealer. I’ve since been to New York, Chicago, Minneapolis, Taos, and now Denver. I managed to land in a crappy thrift shop, some charity store for disadvantaged children.
Then, this morning I met the writer. She plucked me out of a bin and looked me over with intense appreciation. “No. Fucking. Way,” she whispered, unscrewing my pearl. I liked her immediately.
“Fifty Cents! What a find! Let’s put it on eBay for a massive profit.”
Oh no. One of those husbands.
“What? No way!” She twisted me back together.
“What are you going to do with it?”
“It’s remarkable. I’m going to wear it.” She pushed me into the bun at the nape of her neck.
“Gross.” He looked at me, and her, with repulsion. “I hope you don’t get lead poisoning and die.” He turned and exited the store.
“I hope you don’t get lead poisoning and die,” she muttered, patting me into place. She paid the cashier and followed him outside.
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