A Letter in Post

Dear Mendoza,

I hope you haven't been missing us too much. It was fun visiting you last week and seeing your work. Even if you are going to turn into some old spinster, with all the focus you put into Alchemy, it was a reminder of why I want to study in the first place. Someday I'll surpass you, so make sure to visit us some time too. I wouldn't want to blindside you.

As for Father, I think he's all out of sorts. He says he's really proud of you, and I think he means it, even if you did run from the altar. Yet he's angry. "I'm getting old," he says. "I need to have security in the family line," he says. I think he thinks that I'll be the one to carry on the family name. He's already started finding cotillions an debutantes for me to attend. They're all girls our class, nice enough. But only a few are really interested in Alchemy. I don't have time for someone to slow me down. I want to be famous!

I suppose I wouldn't dislike marrying entirely. but it would have to be a very particular sort of girl. One who studies Alchemy, isn't afraid to get dirty, embraces honesty, and is good embroidering things. She would have to have thick red hair and a sweet face with freckles. She should like goats, and candy apples from the country fair, and have the ability to keep up with me. I haven't seen that in the noble girls of our class so far. They like pretending to be porcelain in satin shifts too much. If no one exactly like that turns up, I might have to flee the altar like you.

I wonder if Father would be angry if I married outside our class.

Otherwise, I think it's entirely too soon for me marry. I'm still of a handsome age. Father says I'm getting old, but I think he's  the one feeling old. I still have six years ahead of study! Maybe even more if I find a good apprenticeship. It'll be up to Ginger to keep this fine bachelor company, and you know how she complains if I even think of falling behind a little in schoolwork.

Please visit soon, and write often. It's boring without you around.

Your brother,
Anatolio

P.s. I would ask you to grant me apprenticeship, but Father says you've been enough of a bad influence already. Sometimes I think if Alchemy wasn't such a lucrative vocation, Father would ban it from my schooling altogether.

Reflection
Behold! A new character! Even though I wanted to flesh out Anatolio a bit more compared to Ginger, I realized he wouldn't be the type to sit down and keep a diary. It's not his speed. So I thought a brother to write a letter to would be appropriate. It's a nice addition- I think the way Mendoza's become a little bit of a black sheep casts light on how eager Lord Cabraron is to have his sons married and with heirs to set his mind at ease about his estate. If one son ran off, who's to say about the other?

Anatolio isn't so adverse to the idea it seems. It was nice to figure out what he notices about Ginger that he thinks is exclusive to her. Naturally, those traits aren't, but I think Toli is enamored with the way they gel together so easily, that he knows her so well, and that she has similar interests to him. The 'embraces honesty' is a funny one- Ginger likes to hide and lie about her state of feelings when she's upset, but Tolio views her as honest because she a lot less duplicitous than the girls he's encountered so far. She tells him nearly everything, so he doesn't really have a reason to think otherwise.