12 Kilos
This Feeling
“I know you hate him, I guess that’s due to me, but are you willing to throw away your future in medicine, just because of that hate?”
Garrett felt her thin fingers pulling at and absently trying to braid the hairs of his head as he pulled away. “My disdain for your father has nothing to do with you, he’s a narrow-minded sycophant who refuses to step up and help change things for this place.”
“He’s a doctorman, not a politician, we’ve only lived here a few years, the elder and the council wouldn’t listen to him even if he chose to speak up.”
“No. He can afford to ignore the plight of others, because he’s afforded a certain lifestyle thanks to his skills, so he doesn’t have to be confronted with how others are made to live here. Not speaking up because you have no say, and choosing not to do so, so as not to rock the boat, are two different things.”
There was a silence then, a longer one than usual between them, so Garrett took the time to set down his most recent book and examine the girl he loved so much that it hurt to look at her sometimes.
Elizabeth stood in the doorway of his aunt’s vast cellar/library, staring at a spot of packed earth, “I’ve gotten pretty good at the gardens. Every village needs farmers, and you know animals. We could make it anywhere, I guess.”
“The green lands have plenty of farmers, and ranchers. We would be hired help at best, likely starve to death otherwise.”
Elizabeth was running low on patience, it was the end of another very long day for the both of them, “Well, what do you want then, Garrett? Sometimes I have no idea unless it’s just to complain for the sake of hearing yourself talk.”
“Doctoring is rare, so rare now. It’s not like before…”
Elizabeth really was tired, enough to finally drop the pretense of being the partner who always has a patient smile and a calming voice. None of that was her job anyway and Garrett was all the more thankful for Elizabeth when she decided to put all that good wife nonsense to bed for a few minutes or hours.
“Nothing is like before, Garrett. You spend all your time down here with these books, escaping into them and imagining how much better life used to be, how wild and exciting this world was before it all went to hell. I’m hell, Garrett, so is your aunt, and cool, breezy days when we can smell the ocean. Hell is when the village gets together and cooks and we all join in song, everyone except for you of course.”
Garrett wasn’t exactly ready for this moment, he read about how couples argued, most seemed to in literature anyway, but he didn’t want to do that, he didn’t want to win points or wound Elizabeth, he also didn’t want to ignore her or pretend what she was saying didn’t have the sting of truth to it.
“Yes, their life was better, I don’t try and imagine that we can have that world again, it was obviously unsustainable, but I don’t want to live in a world with public beatings, or shaming laws. I don’t want to live in a village where my aunt is spat at and called a witch or where most women can’t own property or live by themselves without being heckled and demeaned. I don’t want to just participate in a place where brutes like my father hold court over all.”
Elizabeth stops looking at the one particular spot of packed earth as her gaze meets Garrett’s. “Just imagine how much I don’t want to be in that place either. Now please try and imagine how frustrating it is to know that the boy I love, the man I love, won’t swallow his pride so we can find a way out of this place.”