Isabella used to like parties. Not the big ones but the small ones where the people you're close to gather around the a table where your cake was there for you to blow.

You'd think that after you blew the candles, your wish would come alive. As much as it was fun to create fun wishes filled with delightful cakes and treats, you knew you'd grew out of it eventually.

It was only a matter of time.

"I hate parties." She muttered as she walked around while people she didn't even knew that existed came to life by greeting her a 'Happy Birthday.' She smiled and thanked them, of course. But the excitement she had when she was child during birthdays vanished in thin air. All she could see were invited strangers on her property who could potentially be a threat to her or the people she held close.

She couldn't believe Dmitri would lower his guard that much for her birthday. A party like this is a pond filled with possible troubles.

Suddenly, someone grabbed her arm, causing her to almost grab the gun she hid inside of her dress.

"Izzy!" The woman said with red all over her. Red dress, red hair, red lips, red bracelet, red necklace. Red. All red.

Isabella forced herself not to cringe at the name. That name reminded her of someone she was not fond of.

Still, the lady smiled at the red woman. "Hi. How are you?"

The red woman grinned and hugged her tightly. "Augh, you're so pretty, cous. Anyways, this is some amazing thing you've done here. You sure you wanted this party and nobody forced you or whatever?" She joked, nudging her playfully.

Isabella laughed forcefully. "My, uh, friend wanted this party." It was actually Dmitri. "I only agreed to it." She replied.

The red woman laughed haugtily. There was a slight scowl on her face as she looks at Isabella with a hint of bitterness in her eyes.

"Damn, must be nice, Izzy."

Stop calling me Izzy.

Isabella instead tilted her head in mock confusion. "Must be nice to what?"

The red woman chuckled wickedly before slapping her arm playfully. "Oh, don't play pretend with me. I'm not drunk enough to play that."

Isabella didn't even try to force a smile this time. She frowns and looks at her in confusion. "What do you mean?" She said seriously, her eyes narrowing slightly.

The red woman, who's supposed to be her 'cousin', sighed in disbelief. "Y'know... Women in this family are more like decorations. Why d'you think they run away so often? Dames like us ain't worth a penny, unlike men in the family."  She sips her wine as her expression darkened with each word she said. "Gals like us are almost always locked up like we're in jail so I'm surprised you're allowed to have a party like this. It's like paradise, to be honest."

Isabella snorted and rolled her eyes at that. "Is it?"

"Fuck yeah it is!"

She looks at the surrounding that's littered all around them. Beautifully designed chairs and tables meant for people who held power and authority. The breeze was lightly swaying the trees near the lake. The morning sun was cascading down the water, creating a beautiful soft glow.

It felt freeing. To have a party, to celebrate another year where you turned older. To just have fun.

"It is kind of nice to think of this as paradise, isn't it? I mean a peaceful home near the lake where nobody could bother you. A party meant for people to have fun. Just family dancing around here and there. It almost feels like you're just normal, isn't it?" Isabella said, looking at Dmitri and Rafael arguing to Ezri trying to eat the sweets before the meal.

The red woman sighed and closed her eyes in contentment. "It is."

"But the thing about this paradise is that it's meant to deceive you."

How Dmitri tries so hard for every single surprises he creates for her birthday. It was meant to heal what was broken, to try and make her the way she was used to be. Dmitri is trying so hard to create a fun and memorable day for her but it was only a delusion meant to cover what was actually the pain and the sorrow left by the people she called her family.

She shouldn't be hurting but it left a hole that leaked memories filled to the brim with just them. Memories that were supposed to be happy but now turned into grief.

It felt like the family she once knew died the moment Dante said that he was tired of her.

Her cousin turned to look at her. A confused smile plastered on her lips. "What?"

"Mhmm, it's meant to make you believe that it is when it's actually not what it is." Isabella laughed softly. It wasn't even the bitter laugh or the kind of the pained laugh that she was expecting. It was the tired kind of laugh that sounded more strangled, like she wanted to cry but had decided to laugh away the pain. "I guess you could say that this is prison disguised as paradise. Beautiful and peaceful, almost normal and underneath all that are just caged walls, thousands of guards telling you what to do. A paradise where you can't escape. Kind of like a zoo. Animals have a good place to stay, good food, nice people to take care of them. A good home. But we can't ignore the fact that they're still locked up, am I right? Prison disguised as paradise."

The red woman didn't speak. She only flinched at her response. She sensed that she made some kind of mistake. An error with her words.

Isabella supposed that it wasn't her fault. She only said the truth and it was Isabella's fault for popping her idea of paradise.

People have some sort of prison in their life, people have some sort of story that they want to erase, an emotion that they would rather forget.

Isabella continued. "We could never be free from this family and from what this family could do that taints us. That's just how it ends."

The cousin gripped her wine glass and her eyes darkened. "Does it scare you?"

Isabella was taken aback by the question. "What?"

"The fact that you're in a paradise you can't escape from?"

Isabella laughed at that. Scared? Why should she be? Why should they be scared? She should be angry. She should be angry that she was locked up without her realizing it. "No, because, before I realized that this was actually prison, I got used to the feeling that this was paradise. I lived in a fairytale for so long, it seems that it was too late to hate it anymore."

The red woman snorted. "You're too kind."

Isabella snorted, glancing at her with a small grin. "No, I'm too stupid."

The red woman looked at her for a moment, her mouth opening and closing, obviously trying to find an answer, an encouragement, to her words but she decided against it. She only shook her head in response.

"I'm going to get more wine." She muttered before walking off, leaving Isabella all alone in a sea filled with strangers.

Isabella took a shuddering breath out. She didn't mean to talk like that. It just came out as that. But she spoke the truth. She didn't mean to.

Well, at least she spoke to someone who wasn't Ezri, Rafael and Dmitri. They should be proud of her for holding a conversation for that long.

Isabella was about to walk to where Ezri was when someone caught her eye.

In the distance, where a tree was almost at the water of the lake stood a man who she knew too well and had never seen in so long.

A man she didn't want to see and yet there he stood with his eyes plastered on hers, with so much emotions swirling inside those gaze that she almost didn't want to look away.

Her heart ached as her mind told her who it was, providing her with memories she would rather forget than remember.

"Nicolai?"

_______

Okay, story time:

Y'know, I sometimes read my books and then I read some comments and then I would suddenly turn into a proud potato and think to myself 'Wow, I did that' ( ꈍᴗꈍ) and then it would immediately turn into 'Wow, I did that???' ಠ_ʖಠ

And then I would get so confused and ask to myself: 'How the heck did I create a story?' and then 'How the heck did I create a story AND THEN post it?'

And it's a cycle sometimes ◉‿◉

Anyways, uhhh, surprise?? It's Nicolai!! ✧◝(⁰▿⁰)◜✧

How would he react now that Isabella's got Ezri now ಠ∀ಠ

Anyways, I hope you enjoyed. I'm sorry it was short.