The Fall - (A Young Adult Dystopian Novel) Read online

  Chapter 5 – A Marriage of Annoyance

  The home of Fern and Copper Grange-Casper is dreary and somber. The walls are smeared with dark brown, and all the furniture is lackluster, with not an inch of color anywhere to be seen. The painting on the wall completes the gloomed house with a figure wailing in despair. In the midst of this darkness, I feel the tempting need to scream and run away.

  Mother and I sit down on a sofa with a fraying grey cover on it. Tea is served, made with fresh goat’s milk and honey. I’ve never had much of an opinion for tea but this was enjoyable.

  “I made the tea,” Lottie announces.

  “It’s very nice.” I smile back at her.

  “I like making tea and I’m a very good cook,” says Lottie. “Wait until you see what I’ve got us for lunch!”

  Lottie is an attractive woman, I suppose. She has long blonde hair and full lips and is very busty. I don’t find myself excited by any of these things. Instead, I think of Brian again as Lottie serves more tea, and I feel myself getting hard. I hope I’m not required to stand up any time soon.

  Lunch consists of a tasty salad with little bits of dried bacon in it. I have to say that Lottie is indeed an impressive cook. She will make a brilliant wife for someone one day, but not me.

  After we have all finished our meal, Copper Grange-Casper begins the conversation. “Our family has a long tradition of carrying babes to full term. In a hundred years we haven’t had one miscarriage or still birth, and we are quite resistant to most diseases.”

  “My husband is one of the most skilled carpenters in the House, and as his son-in-law you will get his skills before anybody else,” says Fern with her eyes fixed on me. She is quite intense. “Those skills might even be passed on to the next generation!”

  “And I can cook,” announces Lottie proudly. “You will always have interesting meals.”

  “The next mayor of the House of Casper deserves the best meals,” Fern adds, giving her daughter a nudge with her elbow.

  I can detect the glint in Lottie’s parent’s eyes. They crave for their daughter to give birth to the next mayor. Lottie has a look on her face, which reveals she isn’t bothered either way. I suspect that she’d rather be anywhere but here. Mother is looking at me, obviously concerned. There is only one answer I can give to this betrothal bid.

  “I am sad to refuse your offer, but I’ve already found someone I want to marry,” I tell them.

  The right thing to do would have been to tell Lottie and her parents that I’m seriously considering her bid, but I don’t want to get their hopes up. It would be too cruel to leave them guessing.

  “Really?” Lottie shouts, delight lighting up her face. “That’s wonderful!”

  “Lottie!” Fern quickly fixes her eyes at Lottie with anger and disgust.

  “All our dreams have been shattered,” Copper wails.

  It’s not exactly the reaction I’ve been expecting. For a brief second I find my pride wounded. What’s wrong with me? Why doesn’t she want to marry me?

  Copper puts hand on his daughter’s shoulder and says, “I thought you said you’d forget about that other man and marry into a decent family?”

  “Ben obviously has someone else and so do I. This discussion is over.” She turns to me, smiles, and kisses me on the cheek. “Sorry about all this rigmarole, but you know what parents are like. No hard feelings?”

  “No,” I say, still a little shocked but happy for her.

  “I’m so sorry about this, Jill. You know what daughters are like.” Then Fern turns to her husband and demands: “Copper, talk some sense into the girl!”

  “This is your fault,” screams Copper. “You put too much pressure on her to marry into a good family!”

  Mother and I leave the Grange-Casper family to it as their argument escalates into swearing, name-calling, and plate throwing.

  After we’ve managed to leave the quarters unhurt, Mother turns to me and says, “So when did you find the time to meet someone and ask them to marry you? You’ve only been back four days, and one of those was spent asleep.”

  I blush. Even thinking about Brian causes all sorts of sensations to course through my body. They are so intense, I imagine Mother can hear the way my heart starts to beat faster.

  “I think I have feelings for Brian,” I admit, looking at my feet.

  “Oh, how nice!” Mother gushes. “Brian is a lovely boy; or should I say man.”

  “He is lovely,” I admit. “I can’t stop thinking about him. When I first saw him again after coming back from my Journey, I couldn’t keep my eyes off him. Before he was just Skye’s annoying older brother but now he’s something more.”

  “Your first love,” sighs Mother wistfully. “I think I should like him as a son-in-law.”

  “Well there’s the thing. I haven’t actually asked him.”

  “He asked you then?”

  “He doesn’t know how I feel.” A sudden panic hits me. “What if he doesn’t like me? What if he doesn’t feel the same way?”

  Mother hugs me and plants a kiss on the top of my head like she used to when I was little and had nightmares. Right then I wish I wasn’t an adult and could rewind time and become a child again. Everything was so much easier. You didn’t have to worry about feelings then.

  Mother looks me sternly in the eyes and says, “This is what you’re going to do. You’re going to find Brian and you’re going to tell him how you feel, preferably before the party.”

  I hesitate. “No, I can’t do that.”

  “Yes you can. And you will.”

  Skye! How can I have forgotten that she’s left already? I don’t blame her really for avoiding the tumult. This news will cause quite a stir. It might even cause Brian to be too preoccupied to deal with my feelings for him.

  I pace for about ten minutes around the corner from Brian’s quarters, trying to give myself the courage to knock on his door. I know I can do this. I’m not a coward. I’m brave. Why are my hands trembling and why is my stomach doing somersaults then?

  Just as I’m about to set off I hear a low wailing and find Milo running towards me. Tears are streaming down his face.

  “What happened?” I ask. He hugs my legs and cries.

  “My book!” he wails. “Someone burned my book!”

  I try to concentrate on his words, but my mind is fixated solely on Brian.

  “Calm down and tell me what happened.”

  He wipes his runny nose on his sleeves and begins. “Megan said she saw a pigeon in the library and we went to look for it and when we came back the book was in the bin and someone had set it on fire!”

  He pulls a black, burnt page out of his pocket and shoves it into my hand. I notice redness on his tiny hand. He’s burned himself trying to get it.

  “You need to get yourself to Doctor Kahn-Casper. That injury looks quite painful.”

  “But you got me that book!” he protests, the tears flowing once again. “I liked that book and someone burned it! It’s not fair!”

  I can’t imagine why anyone from the House would burn a children’s book. It doesn’t make any sense. Such petty acts of vandalism against our own kind are completely unheard of. We have little enough as it is and people respect that. I’ll have to tell my father of it later and see what he has to say.

  “I bet that Diana did it,” says Milo.

  “Why would Diana do such a thing?” Diana is the only other child, bar Milo and Megan, under the age of ten in the House. She is a little troublemaker and has often annoyed the other residents with her mischief. Still, this doesn’t seem like the type of thing for her to do.

  Milo looks down at his shoes, guilty. “I might have told her she could read my book, but then I wouldn’t let her so I pushed her on the floor.”

  I really don’t have time for this. I need to confront Brian while I still have the courage to do it.

  “The next time I go out, I’ll find you an even better book,” I promise him. “I bet you were bored of reading this one anyway. How many times did you read it?”

  “A couple,” Milo confesses. He appears to think very seriously for a moment and then says, “Okay, I suppose you can get me a better one. I’ll tell Megan!”

  He skips away, once again content. I’m glad I’ve sorted things out with him, and remind myself to tell Father about the incident. He can sort Diana out by having a word with her parents. I have other things to do.

  I knock quietly on Brian’s door. His front wall is made out of long metal sheets painted white, and the door appears to be taken from some old vehicle; maybe one of them long ones, with seats for many passengers? After I knock a few more times, I realize that he mustn’t be in. He’s probably out working somewhere.

  “Did you know about this?” Brian screams.

  He is stalking up behind me, his face thunderous. He holds in his hands some type of letter, and is directing an angry look at me. I don’t like it.

  “What?” I mumble, though I have a feeling I know.

  “Skye’s gone!” says Brian, shoving the letter in my hands quite roughly. “All she left was this stupid note!”

  I open the letter and read it. It says, “I hate parties and you’d only all try and talk me out of it anyway and thanks for everything you’ve been a great family but I have to go now and...these aren’t tearstains on the paper. Bye.”

  I thought that maybe she’d at least tell her parents she was going to leave before the party. This was a cruel way to tell them she had gone.

  “Did you know she was going to do this?” Brian demands.

  “No,” I say. But my lie is so unconvincing that Brian knows immediately.

  “If she gets herself killed I blame you!”

  “I saw her leaving but you
know what she’s like. There’s nobody who could stop her,” I explain. Brian is looking at me like I’ve betrayed him.

  “I would’ve stopped her. I could have stopped her.”

  “Really?”

  Brian sighs, leans against his door. He puts his hands to his head, then brings his fist down and bangs it against the wall. I’ve never seen him look so infuriated. It’s as if he’s already consigned his sister to death.

  “I know Skye really well,” I say. “She may seem a bit flaky, but she’s stubborn, determined and very independent. Brian, you know her more than anybody else in the world. Do you think she can do this?”

  Our eyes lock and a shiver runs down my spine. He’s crying.

  “I honestly don’t know,” Brian says.

  I have this overwhelming urge to lean in and kiss him on the lips. But it would be wrong. He’s vulnerable right now, and I’m still not sure whether he likes me or not. My feelings for him gush through my body like some kind of drug.

  “I so wanted her to come to the wedding,” says Brian. “Well, if there ever is a wedding. Her parents think I’m not good enough.”

  My eyes widen. “Married? You’re getting married?”

  “She’s a wonderful woman and I love her very much, but like I said it’s been difficult,” Brian explains. His face takes on an almost glow. I can tell he’s in love. “But there’s been a few teething problems.”

  I feel like I’d been punched in the face. My heart beats so fast I imagine I’m going to die. But I don’t die. I just stand there, my cheeks going redder and redder, as Brian stares at me with pity.

  Brian continues. He never even notices my misery. “Lottie’s parents wanted her to marry you. Not that you aren’t worthy to marry her, it’s just that…”

  “You love her,” I say.

  He smiles. “Yes, I love her.”

  I’m silent. I can tell him that I’m not marrying Lottie and she’s free to wed him, or I can keep my mouth shut. I can’t do that; not to Lottie and not to Brian. My own selfishness at thinking of keeping this information secret astounds me. So I tell him. He cheers, hugs me, and heads off to find his true love.

  My life is over.