I would never say I know her very well, but a few years of working with a person cannot help but give you some view of her character. And she was always the chatty one besides—a good listener as well—but still in so many cases the one who drug the conversation back to her. It is not that I begrudge her attention, but one can only listen so long.

Some people are still enchanted by her story of midnight and pumpkins and glass slippers, but I've heard it too many times.

I guess I never understood it. That ball was before my time, but we've all seen the prince, heard the stories. Handsome and charming, no one would deny that. But actually marry him? We all heard the stories. He was shallow and flippant. He was a little more than a government figurehead anyway.

But Cinderella was always a romantic that way. Still is and probably will never change. Though to me I don't get how a person so in love with romance will waste away the rest of her days pining for a man who no longer cares. A few years of marriage and she finally decides the prince is mature enough for fatherhood. Kid is born, heir to the throne, so on and so forth, a few more years later they are divorced. Everyone heard about it.

And so she is here, working in a shoe shop, of all the poetic irony. I know the prince is the prince, royal and powerful, but I think if a prince was to divorce me I would fight a little more. Not for the prince, but for something out of it. Not to be materialistic, but money, enough to support me for the rest of my life, that's something. I mean, he's a prince! He could afford it. Cinderella fought, but just for her prince, just to remain a princess. Poor thing. She's the type that should be a princess, the type that needs to be adored. It was like she could not swallow leaving the palace, going from "Princess Cinderella" to just plain Cinderella again. Of course I imagine it would be hard, not be fun, but maybe I'm old enough to know there's more to life than a title.

She is older now, of course, and there's nothing wrong with that. She is still attractive and probably will always be so. I envy that about her. But she is stuck in the past, wanting to still be that sprig of a servant girl whisked off to the palace after a few nights of dancing. She does not want to grow up, be a woman. She doesn't look like that young girl, but she pretends. The rest of us like the shoe shop. She doesn't, and the day is spent with her stories of how happy she was, how much he hurt her. Poor thing.

The young prince stays with her most of the time. A boy should be with his mother, even if he is heir to the throne. A few more kids with the new princess did not change that. But sometimes he is her pawn, her connection to that old life. And sometime she is his. She has brought him in a few times. He is a spoiled little brat. I blame her.

But she is his mother, and she wants him to like her. That's why being a princess was good for her. People like princesses, and Cinderella needs to be liked. Craves it, requires it, breathes it.

Maybe that's why she stayed in that house with her stepfamily. That was a question I always had. Everyone knew she had the inheritance, a little bit of money to start a life of her own. But she would do anything and everything for someone's approval. They never cared for her.

I know I should not judge, but I observe what I observe. She comes in every day and bends over backwards for everyone then sings her own song about that life years gone.

Everyone knows her story, the first part of it, anyway. And it's a good story. But it ended where it ended and she never finished it to a real happy ending like I think a story ought to have. But what do I know of the world? I'm young and poor and never had anything close to a prince in months.

All I know is that I never want to be like her.