Carry On

Chapter 1: Duty Calls

"Katrina, we've talked about this before. You are almost twenty one years old. You know the deal." I roll my eyes, muttering under my breath.

"It's tradition, Katty. Over five generations of our family." I hate that nickname. My dad started it years ago when I was a young girl and despite expressing how much I hated it, it somehow made its way into my whole family's vocabulary.

"I know that, Gram, but I don't know what you want me to do. Husbands don't just fall out of the sky." She smiles, but I can see right through it.

"What about all those nice boys you dated before? What about Daniel?" I breath in sharply nearly choking on my water. I have to take a second to compose myself. 

"Mom, help me out here."

"You drove them off, Katrina. I don't know what you want me to say." Crossing my arms, I sink back into Gram's hard kitchen chairs.

"They weren't right. I wasn't in love with them. Or him."

"What does love matter? I was married to your grandfather, rest his soul, for over thirty years. I grew to love him."

"And I your father for a good ten years."

"And look what happened to that. He's with his mistress who's barely two years older than me."

"Katrina!" Mom shrinks back, taking the hit like I had physically slapped her. Gram's eyes are menacing as she glares at me.

"Look, I'm not like you. I'm not going to just settle for any random person. I want love and I want it to last. And I'm going to take as long as I need to to find it. Maybe you both need to see things from my point of view. Look at the world around you. Times are different now. And I don't need a man to be complete. I tried that once for you. Not again." The chair screeches back against the tile as I stand, taking my keys from the table and leaving my mom and grandmother's house.

Inside my car, I rest my head on the steering wheel. I pull out my phone and dial Kaidynn's number by memory.

"What did they do now?"

"Just meet me at Shelly's."

"I know the drill." I drive around Bay Grove as I do every other day, summer break in small town California isn't very exciting.

I smile at Sue, the elderly woman who works the counter, before finding Kaidynn at our usual table. She has two bubble teas set in front of her, following me with her eyes all the way until I sit down across from her. I take a sip.

"So?"

"The old hags are at it again." Kaidynn pops a smile around her straw.

"They still on the whole marriage thing?" I lace my fingers in front of me the way Gram does.

"'Katrina, you're almost twenty one. When are you going to walk down the aisle?' 'Katty, when are you going to meet that special boy?' 'Katrina, I'm not getting any younger. I want a grand baby.' 'Katrina, Katrina, Katrina.' If I hear my own name one more time. I might just lock myself in my house and never come out."

"Kat," I glare at her. "Sorry. But you know they are only doing it because they love you."

"And if I end up strangling them it's only because I love the rest of humanity." She snickers.

"Be nice. You knew this was going to happen especially after-." I cut her off. 

"I couldn't control the family I was born into." She rolls her eyes.

"Then why don't you just give them what they want?" 

"What?" Never has Kaidynn taken their side on this debate. She thinks its just as crazy as me. Who wants to settle down in the prime of their life?