Dignity's Worth

Chapter Eighteen

Chapter Eighteen

Emily Priest was on her usual stroll in the garden by her house, looking for flowers to keep in the vase by her bed. Her father was a very rich man and she knew that. So naturally they had a huge mansion and she'd grown amongst all sorts of luxuries and comforts she could've asked for. But she didn't like all of it that much. In fact Emily spent most of her time thinking about what it would've been like to be a bit like everyone else in town.

Not that she considered herself above everybody else, but the fact was that her father was from a place called the 'High End'. And in Tokentown, High Enders were treated differently than normal citizens. Most people were either afraid of them, or hated them with the bottom of their hearts. And if a certain High Ender had a daughter, then that daughter was called a 'High End slut'.

And Emily's case was no different. Ever since she'd won the beauty pageant the previous year, she was accused of having had relationships with the judges to win the contest. She hadn't done anything of the sort of course, she'd just happened to win that day. And in her personal opinion, she felt that she didn't deserve to win. She didn't like it when people made judgements based on how thin or beautiful a girl was. The other contestants were pretty as well, prettier than her even, and Emily hated being the winner of a contest which she hadn't wanted to participate in in the first place.

So why did she?

Because her father had asked her to. And if your father was a High Ender, you better listen to whatever he said or he'd have you cast out of that community. And it's not like fathers didn't do that because they sympathized with their children. Just a few days ago a guy had removed his son from the house because the son had refused to eat everything on his plate. It was just a morsel or two anyways, the boy was full, he couldn't eat more and he told his father so.

And since then that boy was seen roaming on the streets of the city like a common beggar. From High Ender to beggar just because he refused to eat a little more. And his father didn't have the slightest bit of empathy about the child. That was the worst part of it.

Emily knew that her father was no different. She hated everyone in the High End, except a few of her girl-friends, some who were very much like her and fed up of being treated like princesses. They just wanted a normal life, and so whenever Emily felt like taking a break and forgetting what her status in society was, she used to take a walk in the park amongst the flowers.

It's not that she didn't love her father. She loved him dearly. But he was a very strict man. And he was involved in illegal trade of goods across the city. That she didn't like. But again, almost all of the High End was involved in illegal activities, so she couldn't really blame her dad.

But Emily's biggest lament was that no boy had ever looked at her in an affectionate way. Half of them were scared of her father, and the other half labelled her a slut. There were times when she'd cry alone in her room just because she didn't have anybody's shoulder to cry on. She hated not being loved like she deserved to be loved. The only boy who'd looked at her was a guy named Martin Giovanni who worked for her father, and she knew him all too well to even go talk to him. She knew what kind of a person he actually was, he'd even called her a bitch one day while walking past. She couldn't tell her father because it would've been the most degrading feeling in the world. But what she found really offensive was Martin taking advantage of so many innocent girls every single day. She empathized with each of those girls, although she herself hadn't been a victim of sexual harassment, she felt for those who had been. And it killed her. She was a very good person, too good to be born in a place like the High End.

It wasn't her fault that she was what she was. She couldn't just not be Howard Priest's daughter. Sometimes she did wish to be someone else's girl, maybe a decent and happy couple living somewhere in the middle of the city or on the outskirts. They would've loved her and cherished her as a daughter and she would've loved to have them as her parents. It would've been a very happy family.