It was an early spring morning when Eloise awoke in her flat in Midtown. From her bedroom window you could look over the river Thames running southbound, along with what used to be Old Town Chelsea. Ever since the rising demand of the sweeping Aesthetic Movement, pursuits in architecture was one of the first considerations; and with novel tastes for France’s ‘man conquering nature’ theme, renovations were already underway to embody its architectural counterpart in the New Parisian style, featuring taller windows and jutted out terraces, an extension that nearly made a foot-long platform. These ‘enlightened renovations’ were carried over into other territories as well, which, being always governed by Aesthetes, were established as a new domain. And its name eventually caught on. It was called, Aesthesia. All in all, it was the revival of a middle age spirit. A kind of neo-renaissance awakening brought to the height of modern fashion.

Leading some of these architectural projects during the time was Jean Blanchard, Eloise’s grandfather. A thin but strong man with a full head of grey hair, he was one of the chief architects for designing and supervising the layout of Pinnacle, a residential complex in Midtown. Previously, he had won acclaim in Paris for designing his large scale ‘tree houses.’ Though their praise was more in due to their purpose than their visual appeal. For these towers came with a crisscross pattern that revealed a luscious green up and down the entire structure – thousands of juniper trees. And with large technological fans built within the exterior came the result of what was an ingenious expedition for removing greenhouse gasses from the atmosphere. Needless to say, despite the scattered criticism, they were much more endeared by the public than the initial Eiffel tower was.

But when the job was done at Pinnacle, the local opinion (which is what mattered most) was complete admiration for the elegance of the new edifice. In fact, one of the primary owners was so impressed that he offered Jean any one of his flats for half off, should he ever consider moving in. He ended the conversation on this note: It would be a shame to my courtesy and an injustice to London should I not entice the creator of this magnanimous complex to live here. I hope you will consider it.

Jean did consider. And since he was so pleased with the building himself, he couldn’t find it in him to refuse such an offer. Plus, it was hard not to see the practicality of having a residence in London, being as it was a new mecca for his line of work. So, by the end of the year, when Jean had found a pause from his projects in Paris, he and Eloise returned to London and settled themselves into one of the penthouse suites there at Pinnacle. And over time, that two thousand square foot habitation became more than a second home. It became a place that served as their little rendez-vous of cultural surplus: such that their holidays were spent gathering paintings to decorate what they called their peu d’exces.

But when Jean passed away Eloise decided to move the rest of her belongings to London and take up permanent residence there.

In the end, Eloise would find it easy to say that her grandfather had given her everything in life. And while the claim had some merit, to say this was to only get at half the truth. Indeed, she had much to thank her parents for – which not least of all was each and every morning she woke up energized.

Since her parents were both Aesthetes, while Eloise was in the womb she was privileged to all the genetic modifications available at the time. And though the engineers confessed that her DNA was already quite perfect, there was one stark hang-up: her sleep SNPs (single nucleic polymorphisms). According to them, her AANAT, PER2 and 3, CLOCK, COMT and various other SNPs less directly related to the sleep equation, indicated that she was determined to suffer from a delayed sleep phase onset (DSPO), hyposomnia and a hyper REM disorder. Thus, her main alterations were done so as to optimize her sleep.

Now, due as a result to this intervention, she could sleep for five hours and not have any of the residual cognitive deficits that would otherwise zombify her. She didn’t even have to set an alarm to wake up. For the modifications regulated a circadian rhythm that announced its fulfillment at the crack of dawn. In the final analysis, every primary sleep coding gene was corrected for – leaving hardly anything left of her natural genetic makeup that could potentially interfere with a perfect sleep schedule.

And this was why Eloise was so perturbed…

For on this particular night, all of that engineering seemed to fail her. The hour was a little after midnight when she came to terms with her restlessness, deciding to finally get out of bed and walk. Placing her foot on the floor, a dim light gently outlined the silhouettes of intrusive objects. So that when her second step determined a decisive path, a giant regency mirror, a high-back chair situated in a corner and, directly above, a miniature chandelier, were the first of these illuminated.

With every step, new objects were revealed while old ones dulled out behind her. And if one looked from the outside in, they would see these ornate spaces from long faced windows – they would see her too – complimenting their decadence with a grace of her own. She was a slender figure with porcelain skin and chocolatey brown hair. There was age in her eyes, a poise that bespoke a breadth and depth beyond her years. But in contrast, there was energy in her movement and youth in her face; such that her age was utterly riddled by appearance.

As she moved effortlessly through each room, her silky gown played to her curves. Flashes and glints rolled through the material sensually. From head to toe she was flawless.

Passing through the kitchen and then the reading room, she shortened her steps as she approached Arran’s door.

***

The sun was now rising, and Eloise could tell by the receding darkness on the walls. She thought that it must be around 06:00. Leaving Arran to sleep, she walked back to her room with the intention of getting changed. But when she reached the threshold, she had to fight the urge to sit on her bed, knowing that that was her body’s way of beckoning her to sleep. Instead, she reached in her little cabinet next to the fireplace and pulled out a bottle of gin. Pouring herself a glass she walked over to her study room, sat in a lounge chair, and started to write in her journal.

Eloise’s Journal

Well it’s been some time, Journal. Some things to note:

I’ve loved caring for Arran. And I’m pleased with how I look now. Most of the baby fat from the pregnancy is gone and I’m starting to see the shape of my abdomen again. Just in time for summer. I plan on taking Arran to Brighton then. That will be his first time seeing the beach.

Today, I woke up at night (technically morning) a little after zero hundred hours. And to say I woke up is generous; I don’t think I slept at all. Instead, I spent the rest of my sleeping hours feeding Arran and watching him in his crib. He’s truly fascinating. And it may be my bias as a mother, but I really do feel something special about him. When we were at Green Park yesterday, I was exploring his mind to see what he was experiencing. There was nothing particularly notable, just a lot of emotive impressions moved by external stimuli. But then he suddenly turned to me as if he knew that I was there – as if he could sense that I was in his mind. He held my gaze for a while and then got distracted by a squirrel racing by. I don’t know…As I said before, I’m a biased mother, and most mothers unfailingly report the same thing, not realizing that, of course, while you obsessively search your child’s mind, you’re going to witness some spontaneous looks from them multiple times a day. I don’t want to be one of those mums. I will admit that I’m optimistic, but I’m not a significance junkie, which isn’t something I could say for the rest of those mothers. But still, optimism could be enough to seed error; so let’s just keep this between us, journal.

I honestly don’t think that I’m mistaken when I say that Arran really did catch my telepathic signature. Let’s just for a minute assume that that’s true. But then, wow…to do that this early, that would really be something. I wasn’t able to do that until I was five – and I’m among the top percentile in fluency (for most other Aesthetes it’s not until they’re nearly ten that they can pick up when someone else is walking in their mind). I think this is also partly why I haven’t gotten any sleep: I’m so anxious about these damn predictions. And if I’m right about his higher affinity for frequency, that would more than likely mean that he’s an Aesthete (on the basis that Innocents are terrible at fluency). Ah! this day needs to be over. I just need to know.

I’ll end my entry on this note, a new conviction in fact: Everyone needs a flower in their life.

And Arran is mine.