A Daughter's Duty

Prologue

     "Margaret, please," Alfred pleaded, keeping his voice hushed as to not wake up the sleeping baby in her crib, "don't do this." He looked down to the child, her pink cheeks twitching with dreamy smiles as she slept, her thick eyelashes fluttering. The room was peaceful, with a hazy morning light creeping through the blinds. Soon, the whole household would be awake, setting about their daily chores and getting the grand house ready for its day.

     "Alfred, don't beg, it truly makes it harder to leave, and a great deal more embarrassing for you," his wife said, putting on her gloves and adjusting her sleek golden hair in its updo as she spoke. Alfred tried his hardest to ignore the way her voice was dripping with disdain when she said "you." "My things are already packed, the coach is downstairs, and I've had the home in town prepared for my arrival for days already. What's done is done, don't make it harder than it needs to be." 

     Purposefully avoiding the intense gaze of her saddened husband, Margaret looks around and sighs. "It's a ridiculous thing to expect me to live my life here. There's a whole word beyond this estate that I just need to be a part of. While I don't expect you to understand, I do hope that you can save me the theatrics." She straightened up her elaborate dress with her small gloved hands, "we are different people, that need to live different lives."

     Every word she spoke felt like a knife through Alfred's chest. "Well, what about her," he said, gesturing to the sleeping infant, "she's your daughter!" With this, he began to choke up, "you can't just leave her."

You can't just leave me.

     "She's your daughter too, she'll be fine. She's better off without a mother like me in her life anyways Alfred, you must be able to see that. I'm not fit to be anyone's mother, I would be doing the girl a disservice." 

     She made for the door of the nursery and Alfred began to feel his whole world crumbling down. "I need to be a part of the world, Alfred. I can't breathe when I'm here." She came back and gave her husband a kiss on the cheek, "goodbye." And with that, Mrs. Margaret Gardiner, a wife, and mother, just left. 

     Alfred wasn't sure of how long he stood standing there, but eventually, his daughter began to stir. He scooped her up into his broad arms and supplied her with gentles "sh sh sh's" as she started to wail.

     "Don't you fret, my dear. We're not going anywhere, we'll have our own world right here." The girl calmed down and opened her deep brown eyes up to her father's. 

     It was in that tender moment that Alfred decided Margaret's desire for the outside world would never touch their daughter, for he didn't know how he could bear another woman walking away from him for the outside world.