Page 64 of His Bride

“I am not calling this baby Interfering Wench,” I say.

He laughs. I laugh. Lydia doesn’t laugh, but that’s only because she doesn’t yet have any control over her sweet little face. She understands though, I can tell.

“I think this baby is spoiled.”

Baby Lydia is three weeks old, can only see bright colors, and cannot yet focus her eyes, and yet my mother is convinced I have ruined her already. I have done my very best to not respond to any of her maternal jibes over the past few weeks. It is becoming increasingly challenging, to say the least.

“Also, what kind of a name is Lydia? It’s very common.” She screws up her face.

“It’s the same kind of name it was yesterday, and the day before that, and the day before that. It’s her name.”

“No need to get huffy!” my mother says, immediately becoming extremely huffy. “You should give her something to eat. She looks hungry. Pureed carrots.”

“She’s too young, Mother.”

“Ridiculous! In my day, babies ate solids when we decided they should eat them.”

“You know, if you don’t like the way I am raising my daughter, you’re free to…”

“Arthur!” My mother trills his name. “Oh, it is so nice to see you again. I’m so sorry my daughter didn’t bear you a son. Such a pity.”

Arthur looks at her. There is a brief pause in which he parses that rudeness. I see him come to a decision. “Get out.”

“Excuse me?”

“You have disrespected my hospitality and your daughter for the last time. Pack your things and return home.”

My mother’s face falls. “Oh, but the baby… she needs her grandmother.”

“Nobody needs a sniping old woman.”

“We’re practically the same age!”

I have to hand it to my mother; that is quite the zinger.

“Old enough to know when to hold our tongues,” he says. “I will call you transport to the airport. Be ready in an hour.”

“Please,” my mother says. “I’m sorry to have offended you, but…”

“Oh, so close,” he replies. “You do know the words for an apology, but not the underlying sentiment, it would seem. Do not worry. I know precisely how to make those incapable of regret very sorry indeed. Now go pack, or you will be going to the airport with no luggage at all.”

My mother bursts into tears and runs from the room. I wish I could tell her that it won’t work, but I am busy feeding my daughter, and it is a relief to let my husband deal with her.

He crosses over to the chair where I am sitting with Lydia in my arms, and looks down at me with an expression of loving brutality.

“I will protect you from any and all threats,” he says. “Even those that come from close by. Nobody will ever hurt you again, do you understand?”

I smile and I nod.

A year has passed. Lydia’s first birthday has come, as has my twentieth. A cake has been smashed into her face, the furniture, and the floor. I have enjoyed the remnants that managed to stay on the plate. Life is good.

But something is wrong.

I know it every time I look at Arthur. I see a sadness in him. Something changed the night he rescued me from the rebels. I know he’s been to war before, so I don’t see why the fighting would have caused him to become quite so hollow behind the eyes.

When he looks at Lydia and me, there is love in his eyes, but when I catch him in private moments, I see a different side to him. I see melancholy.

“Arthur?”

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