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“Stop it! We’re supposed to be watching Gothel! Get rid of Mrs. Tiddlepants!”
“Tiddlebottom!”
“What?”
“Her name is Tiddlebottom!”
“Well, frankly I think both names are ludicrous!” Lucinda snapped.
“Is she baking a cake for Rapunzel? Does she remember her?”
“Not quite,” said Lucinda. “But something compels her to make a cake every year on this day. Shhh! Never mind her and listen. I think that stupid girl is about to tell Gothel Flynn is in the closet!”
“Enough with the lights, Rapunzel!” yelled Gothel. “You are not leaving this tower ever!”
“Oh! Look at Gothel showing her true colors!” Ruby said. “There’s the Gothel we know!”
Gothel reclined on the nearest chair dramatically as if yelling had drained her. “She’s really hamming it up!” said Ruby, giggling as she watched Gothel put her hand on her head as if she were going to faint from the exhaustion of it all.
“This is too much!” said Ruby. “Like a badly acted melodrama!”
“Agh! Great! Now I’m the bad guy,” declared Gothel, exasperated with Rapunzel and tired of the pretense.
The odd sisters knew Gothel wanted to put Rapunzel to sleep so she could take Rapunzel’s body back to her country house and wake her sisters. And as much as it delighted the odd sisters to think of the macabre scene of Gothel wrapping that young girl’s hair around her dead sisters, they weren’t about to put another princess in danger. Not while Circe was watching their every move. If they hurt one more silly princess, then Circe would never let them out of the dreamscape. And they would never see their Circe again.
“All I was going to say was I know what I want for my birthday now,” said Rapunzel.
“And what is that?” asked Gothel, annoyed with the entire charade.
“New paint. The paint made from the white shells you once brought me.”
“That is a very long trip, Rapunzel. Almost three days’ time.”
“Long enough to check on your sisters,” said Lucinda. “I think there is something wrong with them. You’d better check.”
“Yes! You’d better check on your sisters, Gothel!” cried Ruby.
“They’re in danger, Gothel! Mrs. Tiddlebottom must be old now without her flower. So frail. Your sisters aren’t safe alone with her,” said Lucinda, binding her words with magic, using them to make Gothel afraid.
“Mrs. Tiddlebottom might go down into the cellar! You’ve never been away this long!” said Martha.
“Go! Go to your sisters!” said the odd sisters at once.
“You’re sure you will be all right on your own?” asked Gothel.
“I know I’m safe as long as I’m here,” said Rapunzel.
“I’ll be back in three days’ time,” said Gothel as she took the basket Rapunzel had put together for her journey.
“I love you very much, dear,” said Gothel.
“I love you more,” said Rapunzel.
And she did. The sisters could tell.
Rapunzel actually loved her mother Gothel.
The odd sisters watched Gothel tentatively go through the secret cave exit, to make her way through the dead woods and to her house in the country. “That’s right, Gothel. Rapunzel will be fine. Your sisters need you.”
