Chapter 1
Romance all of me inside this romance, and then the die is cast. I am cast as a woman, now I am almost 18 and not yet a virgin. I am almost done when he speaks and says he would marry me. I am over the moon as I have something for him, too.
"We are expecting."
"A what?"
"Yes, I am with child."
I am in full bloom, have the ceremony not within the registry but with the good priest, and he totally agrees the match is a good one.
The child we carry within the house as he carries me over the threshold. I am so happy my hair curled, and in fact, it is tumoring down. It had been in pigtails, now no more. I am so happy, do not notice his untangling me and disrobing my head. It had taken me so many precious hours to do my hair.
I will believe him now forever more because I am here in this house in our home. It looked a bit run-down but grand, and there was a piano playing all by itself. I edge near to see the solace to see what would bring me and him joy.
I am no hand-me-down, so he had to marry me in the right ritualistic manner. I am not nothing. I am a somebody now.
Bliss so unspoken, the growling faces do not distract us from ourselves. Daily condescension and the make-believe servile duty. I would if I were to throw them all out in the streets.
I am now in there in the very heart of his house and home. I don't find the right kind of happiness, as if I am grabbing from someone else's table. I am taking them for the things reserved for someone else. Surely not.
One time, I was passing, and he hung up the phone, nothing important, I hoped. Then at another time, he hung up again. I am not totally insensitive, so I asked him what it was.
"Nothing important."
"Would a man lie in his own house?" he asked me, and I knew he would because most people lie through their teeth to take what they like or want.
My pregnancy was beginning to show, and the food was plentiful and varied. I ate the whole time and got most unseemly.
Once I chanced to look aside, and there was a mirror there, and I looked plump and almost fat. I would have to go on a diet as soon as the birth.
When life is about to begin or change, there are always signals of change. No one can make it magic; there are not many magical moments, only the ones to grab for.
Why is he to me everything but I am one line of mistakes he did and has made.
He had locked himself in his office and did not allow me access, and then just had dinner, and then went for coffee and left it. I am in the sixth month of marriage, a something is floating from the steps, trying to fathom what I did wrong.
"What did I do wrong?" I asked one night.
"Nothing, I am doing quality work. I am worn out." he got off the bed and went back to his office and did not touch me again.
He did not love me, just used me for his satisfaction. I, a mere nobody, was of no use to him now because he just wanted me for sex. I was dropped, I had no one, and did not belong in society. So nobody would miss me.
I am unable to be even a housekeeper; nobody feels they have to obey me. I am totally able to do the housekeeping, but the busybody came and took over the stock taking and marking of items, and I was told to look fluffy.
I went into a rage, one of many; the growing panic I felt was sure to become most unseemly. Eventually took to my room and did not leave until dinner, and then crept along as if the whole business was out of reach. I had stopped being sick, and then came the palpitations and the labour pains.
One is a fool, and a fool does nothing but feel something is wrong when everything was okay. I reassured myself constantly as I went in and around the staircase, waiting for him to come out of his paperwork.
He got his papers out and was always working; he was, after all, trying to become the chancellor and did not dislike work. His mittens were almost off nowadays, and he did not want to be disturbed.
But I felt the hostility all around as if the servants, instead of growing out of being unfriendly, were determined to be as rude as rude.
They bumbled over and over coming interrupting our moments and making sure we had one good shag a day.
I did nothing all day; I was bored.
I disliked reading, and the musicals were not to my taste. People did not do any rock and roll like in England. The rest of the world had something; this was a stick-in-the-mud world. The worst off fared even more.
I was practising my steps to the Western music when I was caught out. He flew into a rage and said we had dancing too. Like the seven veils. He was visibly distressed; he did not know what kind of woman I was.
People are here and there making snide remarks, and then they say I am unreasonable within the propriety of manners, and I am mean.
I would show them I would show them. I would give him a boy, and he would never again be unreasonable.
One last moment was the labour pain; it was my day.
"A boy, it is a boy."
I was ever so pleased that this was my boy; he would make everything right for us. He would bring his mother authority. He was now my family. I, as a mother, would never be called names, and I would be rich.
But for some reason, he disliked his son. I could see it in his eyes, some sort of aversion. He sort of saw me in him and said nothing, just closed the door.
He closed the door in front of my face, and I was left in there and here as if the killers were inside me. As if the headaches were there.
"I am a woman here, as if the whole life force within is here."
I did climb that hill and tumbled after as if that was my wit, as if the wit I had was things most difficult to make me less sad.
Found him there the next day, slumped with his coffee and now with the whiskey he had been drinking. Just celebrating. He quipped.
If his drinking were discovered, he would no longer be in parliament.
I had to give him the advice, and he settled the score by hurting me. He said it was none of my business and never shall be.
Let the grown-ups say what they like, we are happy.
I am still not happy. I can never be in such a situation, why I'm I not happy? I should be over the moon. I feel nothing more than irritation with him crying and clinging to me. He has destroyed my life.
