Who Loves Them? (Who--? Series) (3 page)

Elise shook her head
.  “We’ll be along shortly.”

With a sudden sense of trepidation, Chris knocked on the door and then walked into the study, closing the heavy oak door behind her
.  Her grandfather was sitting in the chair near the fireplace, his walking stick in hand.  His white hair had grown thinner, she noticed, and the wrinkles around his mouth seemed more pronounced.  She felt a sense of dread at seeing how her grandfather had aged.  He had always been so lively, bringing her toys and candy as a child, and later, when she had grown older, indulging her other whims, such as her love of riding horses.  The thought of him not being there any longer was painful.  She hadn’t realized how long it had been until she saw how much he had aged.

She leaned
over to give him a hug.  He seemed thinner, and his normally mellifluous voice had grown a bit raspy.

“It’s good to see you, Christina
.  How is my favorite granddaughter?”

“I’m your
only
granddaughter,” she teased back as usual, but her voice had a touch of a quaver in it.  She knew something was up.  This was not an ordinary visit.

“Sit down, Christina,” he said, and she did so, the sinking feeling in her stomach
growing stronger.  She noticed he had a thin black briefcase sitting next to his feet.  “What do you have in your hand?”

“Oh, it’s just a gift from a friend.”

Her grandfather smiled.  “Aren’t you going to open it?”

Chris hesitated,
and then pulled open the ribbon.  Her grandfather was not like her mother, and didn’t care who she befriended.  As soon as she opened the box, she gasped.  “Oh my goodness.”

She gently pried the
love token from its clasp and held it in front of her.  The token was small, silver, and had the letter C engraved in the middle, with the date and year on either side.  Chris’ heart swelled with affection.

“From a secret lover, I presume?” her grandfather asked.

Chris shook her head.  “No.  Just a very good friend.  It’s beautiful.”

Her grandfather nodded,
and then looked wistfully out the window.  “It’s good to have friends, Christina.  Especially at your age.”

Christina smiled, knowing she was blessed to have such close friends
.  It was just a pity her mother saw them as intrusions.  “Yes, I’m glad I’ve got them.  I don’t know who I would turn to, otherwise.”

Her grandfather smiled
sadly.  He sighed and folded his hands in his lap, leaning forward.  “There’s something I need to tell you, Christina.  It may come as a bit of a shock at first, but I want you to remember that your parents and I have only the best of intentions and want only your happiness.”

Christina put the token away and
nodded mutely. 

“This may seem a little strange to you, being a modern girl, but it really isn’t, when you think about it
.  Just before you were born, my dear friend, Mr. Olivier, who has since passed on, came on some hard times.  I agreed to help him out, and in exchange, he made a deal with me.” He paused as if unsure of how to proceed.

“What deal?” Christina asked nervously
.  “And what does it have to do with me?”

“T
he money I gave him was a dowry--your dowry.  I gave him half then, and I will give his daughter the other half in two years, when you marry his grandson.”

Christina felt like laughing;
surely this was a joke.  No one arranged marriages.  When she looked at her grandfather to share the joke, Christina thought her jaw would hit the floor.  It was obvious from his expression that he was serious.  The room felt like it was spinning in circles around her.  She remembered how her parents had been so insistent about her staying away from boys her age, gently suggesting in firm voices that she focus her attention on other things rather than dating.  That was why they had been so supportive of her spending so much time with Lilly, even if they disapproved of her wayward ways.  She had always assumed they were being overprotective parents, and truthfully, she hadn’t cared much.  She had slipped a few kisses here and there with boys that she and her girlfriends hung out with, and fooled around a little, but having a boyfriend had always been far down on her list of priorities.  But now her parents’ behavior took on an entirely new light--they hadn’t been protecting her, they had been keeping her from dating because she had already been sold!  They were protecting their investment!

Suddenly angry,
Christina stood up abruptly.  “How could you do this?  This is…” She struggled for the right word “…archaic!  We’re in the twentieth century, Grandpa!  You cannot just sell me to your friend’s grandson!  If he needed money so badly, why didn’t you just give it to him?”

Christian Fontenot sighed
.  “My friend, Mr.  Olivier, was a proud man, God rest his soul.  He would never have accepted a hand-out, not even from me.  Not even for his precious daughter.  And I didn’t sell you, Christina.  You know that you would be expected to marry, and marry well.  Your mother’s dubious…past…made that prospect difficult at best.  Any suitor of yours would have had to have your father’s approval, and mine as well, God grant that I live so long.  We’ve simply skipped a few steps and chosen the man for you.”

“But…” Christina stammered
, “…what if he’s awful?  What if he’s cruel, or selfish?”

“I wouldn’t let you marry an abusive man, Christina
.  Give me a bit of credit.  I am your grandfather, and I love you.  I would never see you harmed.  I cannot promise that your personalities will be a perfect fit, but marriage isn’t about romance and flowers, it’s about a partnership, and with dedication, that can be had easily if both partners respect one another.  Gordon is a good and respectable man, and he will make sure you are happy and cared for.”

Christina flinched at the mention of his name
.  “And am I going to meet Gordon
today
?”

Christian shook his head
.  “Gordon hasn’t been told yet.  We thought it was better…let the boy sow his wild oats, so to speak, without knowing he has a fiancée.  He will be told in due time.”

Christina laughed, inwardly fuming at the double standard that allowed her
fiancé
to play around in the interim, while she was expected to “keep herself tidy” for her future husband.  It was ridiculous.  She had half a mind to run down to the swimming hole and let Matthew, her best friend’s brother, get to second base just out of pure rebellion.  She was angry enough to actually speak her mind. “So I have been carefully kept pure as the driven snow while he is out ‘sowing his wild oats’ with everything in a skirt?” When her grandfather didn’t respond, she knew she was pushing his limits, so she tried a different tact. “So what if Gordon falls in love with someone else?  What will happen to your precious family?”

Christian chuckled
.  “Then he will have to give her up and do his duty.  But I doubt that will be a problem.  He’s young, only four years older than you.  He’s away at the university right now.  Boys at the university don’t fall in love, Christina.”

She sighed, defeated
.  “So when is this wedding to take place?”

“The engagement will be announced after your
twenty-first birthday, once the social season starts.  The wedding will be the following spring.”

Christina sunk back into the chair
.  “This is really happening.  I’m going to be married in two years.  What about school?  I wanted to go to the university and study….” She suddenly saw all of her dreams being snuffed out right before her eyes.

Her grandfather cut her off
.  “You will get married, have children, and keep house for your husband.  It may seem old-fashioned to you, but our families have been doing things this way for decades, and there is no need for it to change.  You may read and study all you like in your private time, keep an entire library if you wish, but your primary focus must be your husband.  I am telling you about the arrangement now because I know it is a shock, and I want you to have time to think about it and prepare.  This is your life, Christina,” he finished gently.  “I want you to be as happy as you can be.  But nothing will change what has been decided.”

Chris shook her head
.  “No.  No, I’m sorry, but this is not going to happen.  Did you ever stop to think about how I might feel?  Sure, I wasn’t born yesterday, but seriously…you can’t just sell me off.  I have plans!  You can’t just take them away from me.  You’re a good, kind person.”

Her grandfather sighed
.  “It’s not like that, Christina.  It was a business deal that helped save our family, and it helped reunite two families.  I knew that you would be unhappy about this.”

Chris chewed on her bottom lip and felt tears well in her eyes
.  “Make my family proud?  I thought graduating from the university with honors would make my family proud.  Don’t you care that I want my own life?  That I want to make my own decisions?  Do you even believe in love?”

“Chris…” her grandfather tried to clasp her hand
, but she pulled it away. 

“No
.  You don’t.”

Her grandfather
sighed and ran a tired hand through his thinning hair.  “There’s nothing I can do.  Unless you can turn back time and damn us all to poverty, you must accept your fate.”

She nodded, her hands clenching and unclenching in her lap
.  For a moment, she hated them all – her mother, her father, her grandfather.  She knew she would do her duty to her family.  It was who she was.  She vaguely heard the study door open, and her grandfather get up and speak to first her father, and then her mother, as they entered.  She vaguely noticed as she stood up, apologized for her shock to her grandfather, and hugged her ecstatic mother.  She vaguely saw the frown on her father’s face and registered some displeasure there.  She drifted out of the study and up the stairs, where she sunk onto her bed and cried.

How could her grandfather be so cruel
?  True, she had never been overly fond of him, but that was because they had never really gotten to know each other.  Now she knew why.  He knew it would be more difficult to give her the news that she was already married if they were close.  She sat up and beat her fists upon the walls.  What did he expect of her?  That she behaves like a prim and proper woman like the women in his time?  They lived completely different lives.  The women of her day weren’t like the women of his.  Surely he knew this!  He was a smart, intelligent man!  She frowned.  No, this was not going to happen, no matter how much he, and her family, protested that it would.  She was not some old chew toy ready to be given away to a new owner.

W
hy was her mother so happy about the situation?  She was her only daughter!  Surely she didn’t want to give her away so soon.  Christina began to cry.  Had she always known?  Of course she had….it was silly to think her mother ever had her best interests in mind.  She rolled over and screamed into her pillow and fell into a restless sleep, punctuated by dreams of her in a white dress, standing in a giant church with a priest marrying her to a faceless man.

****

Mardi Gras that year, was of course, uneventful, Chris was usually lively with excitement, yet this year all her hopes and dreams faded away.  Fat Tuesday was more of a sombre occasion that Chris would have liked, despite the fact that the Kings Cake party was quite lively and exciting.  Chris wore a purple and pink taffeta dress and tried to stay away from her mother as much as she could.

On the streets were: 
men and boys, women and girls, white and black, yellow and brown, grotesque, quizzical, diabolic, horrible, strange masks, and disguises.  They appeared with heads of beasts and birds, beasts and birds with human heads; demi-beasts, demi-fishes, snakes' heads and bodies with arms of apes; man-bats from the moon; mermaids; satyrs, beggars, monks, robbers.  They paraded and marched on foot, on horseback, in wagons, carts, coaches, cars, and in rich confusion, up and down the streets, wildly shouting, singing, laughing, drumming, fiddling, and all throwing flour while they broadcasted screams in high pitch voices as they went their reckless ways.

Despite
the rich excitement, Chris felt like she was a bird trapped in a cage.  She smiled and spoke only when she was spoken to, and danced only when she was asked.  She hardly ate anything, and tried to avoid her mother as much as she could.  She felt like crying the whole entire time, and yet the day seemed to go on without anybody taking any notice.  Nobody asked how she was feeling, since she hid her feelings so well.  How was she supposed to be excited when she was soon to be married to a man she didn’t even know?  She sighed.  She only had a few years left of freedom…she had better make the most of it while she still could.

Suddenly, her hands were full of drinks
.  She ate hardly anything, so the alcohol went straight to her head.  She wondered whether she should eat some of the cake, but every time she hovered near it, her mother swatted her away.

****

She didn’t notice she was drunk until she began having trouble standing up.  All of a sudden the world started to lean over, and she had to focus to balance.  She vaguely heard her mother tell her to lie down, but she ignored her and continued drinking.  She couldn’t remember speaking to anyone, but she remembered laughing a lot, mainly to stop herself from crying.  After a while she found herself slouched on the lounge, an empty wine glass in her hand.  She stayed there for a while, watching everyone laughing and celebrating.  No one seemed to notice her, which made her feel even more depressed.  Was this how her life was going to be?  Cast into the shadows and no one to care about what she was doing or how she was acting, or whether she spoke to anyone at all?  She sighed.  She’d better get up and wash her face and return to the party.