Don'ts Of An Arranged Marriage

Prologue

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Can't marry a man you've never met?

Marry a man you've met?

You marry a man anyway.

But is a man worth it?

I don't know. And I intend to find out. Not a believer in love- with the pledge I stare at my parents who were once an icon. A monument of love, their tale the chants and promises for youth throughout the family. But as I see them now, both with pride shoved up their nostrils as they refused to even look at the other's respective selves. I just know, I know that they fought about who feeds the dog in the week to come last night-

I love puppies. They don't judge you. Love is for them.

Puppies are- puppies. You just can't not love them. Their barks are cute. And the cute culture in my country is flourishing. So I manage a cute smile.

But I prefer pet fish though-

They just exist- they don't cuddle and demand attention like dogs. I like fish. I wish I was a fish.

It makes me wonder how they smell when they basically live in water. They get free showers yet they are-

I must've zoned out. I could scrape it from my parent's features.

They frown- Mom delivers babies for a living while Dad makes fortune cookies- his profession is to lie with each note he writes. It wasn't strange to see them frowning or in distress. They are always a mess. Together or individual.

"We can say no to them" mother begins, crossing her legs and arching her ribs straighter " she is young and she doesn't even know the boy"

Dad ponders, scratching his temples with his subtly bearded jaw clamped.

"I know the boy. He is a nice man"

We sit there. Null for a while.

"Is he a boy or a man? Decide first" I ask. Dad humbly slips into a relaxed posture on the couch, his thinking face on.

"He acts like both. But he is a gentleman" he assured.

I hum in response. Mother cleared her throat, her work coat still hung on her frame stiffly. While father had his washed tracks and shirt on. Such a match made in- delusion. But yet they balance, and cancel each others flaw out.

"You write romance Novels shin. You can't marry a man who you aren't in love with"

The heat in my nose prickles. I've to be honest about this- I have to tell her.

'They buy romance from me. I write to make money. I don't know much about love. You both are hardly there for me and I don't have any friends. I do have a brother who I want to throw out from the window of my one-story room at times though'

Slightly a lie.

My family was complete. Though my brother was weird, so was I. And my parents. But we all cherished each other to death. But the hardly there part- they can't help it, they've got work to do. So indisputably, I just wanted to be the whiney isolated girl in my head for the plot.

'I write books to put bread on the table beside the multi-cuisine edibles that our chef prepares for us. I don't believe in what I write mom'

I did tell her inside my eccentric consciousness.

But in reality-

"It will bring pride to our family?"

-as my biological grandmother puts it once she attaches her dentures is able to finally criticize me and my mother.