I had'd noticed when I feel asleep. I awoke to a rock being thrown at my leg. "Hey tree limb, come on down your father is worried about you." A unfamiliar pleasant voice called to me. I looked down and it was him. I sat up and leaned my back against the tree. Why did he come here to find me? Wasn't he the one joying me being mocked. I thought they would be gone by now.
"I'm not coming down."
"Well I'll just climb up to you then." Tori climbed up my tree and sat beside me. "Shouldn't you be down in the village having your pick of the girls?" I asked. "If it were up to my mother I would be but, luckily for you I enjoy a good challenge. Your out burst in there discouraged my mother from wanting this marriage arrangement to continue. I however am still very much interested in taming you. Our arrangement will continue unless there is another who can catch my eye."
"Tame me? Am I some animal for you to possess?" I climbed down from my tree and glared back up at him. He had a shocked expression on his face. "You should listen to your mother, you'd have a better chance finding another girl in the village than taming me." For a slight moment I caught a small glint in his eyes.
When I returned home I received exactly what I had expected. My mother was ranting on about how I almost single handedly ruined my fathers's opportunity to start in the trading business. She reminded me of how we lost everything we owned in the flood and moved here to start over but, this time it wouldn't be with farming. If we were going to start over we might as well aim high. My marriage was simply a business deal to them.
None of the boys in the village were interested in me. I wasn't as beautiful nor graceful as the other girls in the village. The only reason I had this opportunity was because of an agreement made between best friends on the day that I was born. I suppose I look extremely ungrateful to my mother. Still shouldn't I be allowed to feel frustrated and insulted. Maybe what Tori's mother said was true but, I shouldn't have been expected to sit there and be ridiculed by someone I didn't even know. Even though I don't have the luxury to chose my own husband I will fight to maintain my pride.
After my mother was finished with her ranting. She went into her room. "Give her some time to calm down. She was expecting today to turn out the way that it did." My father patted me on the head and went to comfort my mother. My father's words made me feel guilty. Not for what I had said or did but, for the way that my actions effected him. It wasn't his fault that there was a flood, he isn't the reason why I'm lacking in beauty. This marriage could help him. Why can't I just suck it up and do this for my family. They should be celebrating but instead my father is probably being scolded by my mother for spoiling me.
I cleaned up the kitchen and then washed up for bed. I laid there lost in my thoughts contemplating on what I should do. I went back in forth almost all night until I came to a decision. . . . . . . I would at least try to accept this boy no matter how much it pained me but, it would be on my terms.