by Bree Cariad
“As such, when a girl turns eighteen, she’s available for a courting here in our town.”
While he spoke, Kathy had been unable to make a sound. It all sounded so strange. A part of her thought it was a good strange as dating, the couple times she had done it, had sucked. But most of her was kind of horrified.
“But I’m only a senior in high school,” she whispered when he paused for a few seconds. “Surely this kind of thing won’t happen for at least a year.” Or two… or maybe even five. They could wait until college was done, right?
“Marriage couldn’t happen for at least a year,” he said gently. “But the courting could happen at any point. In fact, there are already four men in town who have asked for permission to spend time with you.”
Her eyes widened and she stared at him. “No.” She meant to yell it but it came out as a whimper.
Carilyn held her hand tighter. “It isn’t as bad as it sounds,” she assured her daughter who turned and stared at her uncomprehendingly. “It isn’t like two hundred years ago in that you met with someone, were engaged two weeks later and married a few weeks after that. The courting is a full year of—” She paused as if looking for the right words. “—call it conscious dating. Spending time with the same man daily, getting to know him as he gets to know you. There would be no dating guy after guy after guy looking for the right one. Instead, the two of you work for a year to see if you form a bond. If you don’t, the courting is disbanded and you move on. Plus, as I understand it, your father has to approve of the council’s choice before they can officially announce your courting.”
“In fact,” her father added, “once the council asks for my permission and makes its decision, then the choice is yours, Kathy. You do get a say here.” Relief flooded through her. Well, at least she wouldn’t be forced into dating someone she couldn’t stand. Knowing that she had a choice made her feel marginally better about it.
Kathy’s mouth opened several times, but gathering her thoughts enough to make intelligent words took some time. Thankfully her parents waited until she could. “But we just moved here. Surely they would wait until I could get to know some of the men.”
Gerald shook his head. “Unfortunately not. For one thing, most of the girls might know of the men who court them, but they don’t usually know them personally. A decade’s difference in age keeps them apart. For another, I know you are mature enough to handle this. This isn’t some kind of death sentence, honey. I would never okay some jerk taking out my daughter. You know that.”
“A decade?” she asked in shock. “They’re ten years older than me?” Eww. That was so old.
His lips twitching in what looked like amusement, her father nodded. “The men can’t enter the courting system until they prove they can support a family. Until they reach their mid-to-late twenties, that truly isn’t possible.”
“But we aren’t just talking about a guy taking me out.” Kathy felt like she and her parents were having two different conversations. How could they be okay with this?
“In a way we are. At first, your dates will be simple, at the house with us present while you get to know one another. Over time, you would start going out together.” There was a pause and he squeezed her other hand. “As things progress, he would become just as much responsible for your discipline as I am.”
“Oh no. No strange guy’s gonna spank me.” Kathy tried to stand up, her intent to run out of the room, but both of her parents tightened their grips on her hands keeping her seated.
“That’s something that will happen in time, but not at first,” Gerald agreed. “But when you start working toward making a home with someone, you’ll have to accept his discipline, Kathy. Just like your mother accepts mine.”
She shook her head, unable to speak. This could not be happening. Her parents expected her to get into some pseudo-engagement with some guy she didn’t know? Had Hyacinth turned their brains to mush?
“Kathy, why don’t you go upstairs and take a bath?” her mother suggested, wrapping an arm around her shoulders. “You’re shaking. Take some time to think about it. Gerry and I will start painting. Come join us when you’re ready.”
Nodding stiffly, as soon as her father stood up releasing her hand, she broke away from her mother’s grip and fled. As she crashed onto her bed, she had no idea how she made it up the stairs. This had to be a joke. They couldn’t honestly expect her to marry some guy she didn’t know. As tears dripped down her face, she sobbed quietly into the pillow. Hyacinth was the worst thing to happen to her.
Chapter 4
To say she did not even want to talk to her father was a misstatement. She didn’t even want to see him. All Sunday evening, she stayed in her room, taking a half hour to soak like her mother suggested and spending the rest of the time tugging on loose threads on her bedspread. When Carilyn knocked on her door, letting her know dinner was ready, she felt a stab of guilt knowing she had left her mother to make dinner by herself, but not enough to want to go down and face her father.
“I’m not hungry.”
After a pause, the door opened and Carilyn entered the room, walking over to sit across from her on the bed. “I know you’re upset, Kathy. But this will all make sense in time. The girls here who grew up with it are lucky in that it is the norm to them. Just remember your dad would never saddle you with a dork.”
The last word almost made Kathy smile, but not quite. She couldn’t put up with a man who would never take her wishes and desires into account. Kathy wanted to go to college. And maybe someday have a career outside the home. This whole situation was scary and it felt like some of her dreams were about to go up in smoke.
“Besides, you know your father’s rule. Unless you’re sick, you need to come downstairs.”
“I don’t wanna see him.”
“I know. But sometimes we have to do what we don’t want. Now, wash your face and come down.” Carilyn reached out, cupping Kathy’s face in both her hands. “Gerry loves you, honey. He just wants the best for you. Plus, he’s looking like someone ran over his puppy at the moment because he knows you’re angry at him. Please come down and put him out of his misery? And if not him? At least put me out of mine. Right now he’s trying to help to try to get his mind off things. He actually suggested putting shelving in the corners of my kitchen. It’s driving me mad.”
Snorting out a laugh she couldn’t help, Kathy nodded. “Okay.” As soon as she washed her face and took a comb to her hair, she made her way downstairs. As the table wasn’t set, she gathered plates, glasses, and cutlery and quickly set their places, purposefully not looking at her father who was measuring the corner next to the fridge.
They sat down and after prayer, passed around the food. Surprised at the barbequed pork chops as that was one of her favorites, Kathy finally looked up at her father who offered her a small smile. “I’m sorry it was such a big surprise,” he said calmly. “But I do need you to know I believe it’s in your best interest to live a Hyacinth life.”
She turned back to her food, unable to respond. Thankfully he seemed to understand as he didn’t call her on it. The pork chops did not taste as good as they normally would as she knew they were apology food. And it wasn’t even an apology, really. He wasn’t saying, “I won’t make you court some guy.” He was saying, “I’m doing this for your own good.”
Just like he did when he disciplined her. Sitting up straight, she stared at her food in surprise. The discipline, as much as she hated it, actually was a good thing. She felt better afterward… well, except for the smarting rear. And she always knew he forgave her for whatever she had done when he did it. “Daddy?” she said when there was a lull in the conversation. He looked up in surprise. She rarely called him Daddy except after he spanked her. “What if I don’t like any of them?”
“If I don’t feel that any of those young men are good enough for you, they won’t be courting you,” he said firmly. “And if I find one that is, in that year he won’t just be proving himself
to you. He will also have to prove to me that he’s worthy of you.” Reaching over, he squeezed her arm. “And that is no easy feat.”
She wasn’t exactly mollified as it seemed that her liking a guy wasn’t a prerequisite to courting him, but she decided that if nothing else, she could give it a try. Just because she was meeting guys who wanted to court her didn’t mean anything. Guys at her old high school had wanted to date her and only a couple had gotten past her father. “Okay,” she whispered, cutting off another piece of meat and stuffing it in her mouth.
A large smile spread across his face. “It’ll be great, honey. I promise.”
That remained to be seen. But for right now, she wouldn’t hate her father. If he chose a jerk, though, all bets were off.
“Oh,” she said, remembering. “A girl I met. Cami. She’s going around to places for volunteer opportunities this week and wondered if I could come along.”
“Who are her parents?” Gerald asked, eating with gusto now that she was talking to him again.
“I don’t know. I’m not even sure what her last name is. She’s the one I was talking to at the picnic.”
After chewing and swallowing, he took a moment to drink some water before he replied. “I would like to know who her parents are before we let her take you somewhere.” Nodding, as that was a normal-enough response from her protective father, she wondered how she could find out.
“Have you had a chance to look over the events list for this summer?” he asked.
“No! I’d forgotten actually. After dinner, I’ll go grab it.”
With the tension out of the air, the rest of the evening was kind of enjoyable. She did all the dishes to make up for not helping her mother make dinner, giggling as her mother shooed her dad out of the kitchen when he tried to go back to measuring. As soon as the kitchen was clean again, she ran upstairs and got the events list and brought it back downstairs. As she stepped off the last step, the phone rang and her father walked out of the room to answer it.
“Anything good?” Carilyn asked as Kathy sat down.
Looking down at the list of classes, trips, and events that were planned for the summer, Kathy was actually kind of impressed. “Wow. They have something for every day during the week all summer long.” Before she could continue, her father walked back into the room, holding out the phone.
“It’s a Cami,” he explained, chuckling when she jumped up, grabbed it, and ran upstairs.
“Hi!” she said once she closed her door behind her.
“Hi, Kathy. Sorry about calling so late. Are you able to go volunteer shopping with me this week?”
“I asked, but my dad wants to know more about your family before he agrees.”
“Drat. Though, I’m not surprised. If it weren’t that Dad knows all the other families in town, he would do the same thing. So, do you have some time to chat?”
“Definitely,” she said lying down on her bed with her feet tapping on the pillows and her head on her hands on the foot of the bed. “So, I just found out about this whole courting thing…”
“What about it?” The confusion in Cami’s tone made Kathy shake her head.
“Do you realize that in other places couples just date all sorts of people without the intent of getting married?”
“That’s kind of pointless. What’s the use?”
The two of them talked about courting and Hyacinth for over two hours until a knock came at her door. “Hold a second, Cami.—Yeah?”
The door opened and her father stuck his head in, shaking his head as he saw she was still on the phone. “Come down for prayers.”
Glancing up, Kathy was surprised to see it was already nine. “Be right down.” As soon as he shut the door, she went back to the call. “Sorry, Cami. I gotta go. Family prayer.” As she said the last two words, she paused, half expecting some sort of rude comment which was the kind of thing she got from girls in her last town.
“Me too. I’m sure Dad’s waiting with a look that says ‘you’re late, young lady’,” she said with a giggle. “Talk to you later, Kathy.”
As Kathy joined her parents after hanging the phone up, she said, “Cami’s going to have her father contact you so you can get to know him better.”
“Perfect. Who is he?” he inquired as the three of them knelt down.
Startled, she felt a blush tinge her cheeks. “I forgot to ask.” His roar of laughter filled the whole room.
The next few days were extremely busy. Carilyn and Kathy worked hard painting the entire downstairs so that Gerald could rest when he got back from work. By Wednesday, all of the rooms any guests would see had two coats of paint. “We’d better stop there,” Carilyn suggested as they finished the second coat in the living room. “Give the house a couple days to air out the paint smell before your—” She paused and placed her hand over her mouth. Kathy reached over and put her hand on her arm, afraid her mother was having some sort of reaction to the paint fumes. “Before your gentleman callers arrive,” she finally squeaked, bursting into laughter.
Rolling her eyes, Kathy shook her paintbrush at her, spattering her mother with paint. “Ha ha, very funny.”
Snickering and hiccupping, Carilyn nodded. “Sorry,” she gasped out. “Suddenly the phrase came to me and I couldn’t not say it.”
“Uh-huh.” Kathy tried to appear stern, but her lips were twitching. Her mother’s laughter was so infectious it was hard to keep a straight face.
She would have liked to ignore the fact that three men were coming to meet her in a few days to check her out like a prized cow, but that was all that came to mind. Cami had acted like it was the most normal thing in the world when they talked on the phone on Sunday.
“Of course, I’ve known Damian my entire life,” she said at one point. “His mother and my grandmother were good friends. When he went away to college and came home, I figured it was no good wishing as I was only thirteen and had so long to wait to reach marriageable age.” She giggled. “I had no idea he would wait. I mean, it’s not like he’s declared himself or anything, but he has never entered the courting pool and he comes to dinner here twice a month. I can hardly wait until I turn eighteen and can be officially courted. It must be strange, though, coming into town not knowing of the rules and suddenly hearing about it. I would probably mouth off to Dad if he had done that to me. And gotten a spanking for it,” she added dryly.
That all the girls had the same rules she did made Kathy feel warmth toward the community. It was wonderful to have that be the norm. For once, she didn’t feel weird for having a father who was the head of the house.
For some reason, Kathy had assumed all the gentleman callers, as her mother referred to them, would come on the same night. As it turned out, she would get one each night. “Like the ghosts from A Christmas Carol,” she mumbled when Gerald informed her Friday morning before he went to work. Unfortunately, her words combined with her glower and the fact she interrupted him merited her ten swats with his belt. Her constant reminder all day every time she tried to sit down made it even more difficult to be excited for the evening’s festivities.
Added to it, her mother had insisted they made rather time-intensive meals for each night. “Something to showcase your cooking talents,” she explained, ignoring Kathy’s grimace.
It was difficult to do something she both wanted to do and loathed to do at the same time. If she knew the guy and wanted to date him, she would want to make the most wonderful meal on the planet, and knowing that one of these guys could end up courting her pushed her to do so. The smaller part of her, the part that loathed making these guys good food, wanted to add jalapeños to everything. Thankfully her mother had put a kibosh on that when she mentioned getting some when they were at the store. Kathy had the feeling her father wouldn’t have stopped at ten if she had managed to do it.
Spaghetti and meatballs was on the docket for Friday night’s dinner and Kathy felt good about that as she had made it a lot. Only… “For dessert, you can make an a
ngel food cake,” her mother informed her. Given that desserts were not her forte and the fact that Kathy seriously regretted signing up for baking as a class next year, she spent most of the morning going over and over the direction for the cake before finally starting.
Carilyn kept out of her way, letting her cook as she popped in the kitchen every once in a while in the guise of needing something to eat or drink. As she walked in just as Kathy had taken her cake out of the oven, she walked over and looked at the pan Kathy rather roughly sat on the counter. The cake was flat. It hadn’t risen at all. And there was a rather distasteful stench coming from it. Placing an arm around her daughter’s shoulders, she squeezed. “We’ll get one from the store. Come on, start on the spaghetti sauce and everything’ll be fine.”
The sauce allowed Kathy to work out her frustrations by cutting up the vegetables and frying the meatballs. By the time she added the tomatoes, she felt marginally better. When her mother arrived home with an angel food cake, she shrugged. “I have no idea what happened.”
“Angel food cakes aren’t easy,” her mother responded with a smile. “Why don’t you cut up the strawberries for the sauce?”
Everything was ready by the time her father arrived home and he had barely had the chance to greet them when the doorbell rang. Both Kathy and her mother turned toward the door but didn’t move. Gerald chuckled. “That will be Michael. Calm down.”
Calm down? Kathy was about to meet a guy that could possibly be someone she would have to date for a year without her okay and possibly marry. How was she supposed to calm down? Her mother patted her shoulder as he walked to the door. Suddenly all those regency romances Kathy used to sneak on the sly seemed preposterous and the girls really silly. Arranged marriage. How had her life come to this?
Michael seemed like a nice enough guy. A local farmer, he had his own land and even had a couple large contracts to sell his produce. The man was prestigiously proud of his cucumbers. He even brought her a bottle of pickles made from them. What were you supposed to say when a guy brought you pickles? Thankfully, he didn’t expect anything except for the tiny “Thank you” she offered when he handed them to her.