Arranged heartache

Arranged heartache was written for the Vocal+Assist Facebook group, which I encourage you all reading this to join! Let's get into this tragic romantic Hallmark movie spin-off community challenge.

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“Damn you!” Isabelle shrieked as she felt the tree branch protrude into the slender lace wedding shoe draped around her trembling ankle. Its delicate beauty was custom-made after treacherous hours were spent by the local shoemaker for the special occasion she was attempting a mad dash away.

Phillip was a nice man, she attempted to coerce herself into believing that very morning. Only a few hours earlier, the maids were all frantically racing around the bedroom chambers. Panic was evident amongst all their weary faces as Isabelle curled up into a ball on her bed once again.

Even the subtle pecks and furry face rubs from her darling feline companion Georgie could not subdue the pain Isabelle felt inside. It was as if she were slowly burning from behind her chest, the smoke clouding her vision and coughing up a vicious storm of tears and wallowing cries. A lifetime prepared for marriage, yet nothing could have gotten her ready for the thought of knowing love and having it disappear - forcefully placed out of reach once those heavy metal wedding rings cling together her soul with another’s, but not his.

❄

We met in 1902, Henry and I. The son of our ground’s farmer, he was a poor fellow who made up for it in every possible way through the sweet personality which was instantly adored.

It began innocently at first, helping to tame the mad horse I was determined to train when it dashed much too far away from the maid watching over myself that day. Ironically, it was always leading me towards his wooden log place shared with his father.

Whenever the melancholy seemed to show face, Henry escaped far into the woods where the backyard lake was hidden away. A delightfully hidden treasure this escape provided, watching bald eagles spread their wings angelically ‘round the edge of its crystal shore as we explored the waves and grassy land beneath its soar. She fell in love with him that immediately after that day.

That fairytale does not receive approval by her family in their mid-century home, even graced with royal presence back in the day. England does not allow ill-bred suitors to marry daughters of prestigious background, no matter what emotion or fate is displayed.

And that fate was destiny, Isabelle told herself that very morning before getting married, just as Henry surprised her with a morning picnic by the lake.

“Our last time before these treacherous waters sweeps you away - or that is what I will tell anyone who asks why I am alone after this day as I cannot bear to live without you as my bride, nevermind think to replace.”

A respectful man, they sealed their goodbyes with a friendly wave after a kiss was placed along the crevices of her opened palm taunting him, which is never to be explored by a man’s lips unless you wanted scandal amidst.

“A dowry must be in place,” her father used to drill into the very deep depths of her brain as a young child who simply wanted to escape into the treehouse with Henry. Money would never buy love, yet it will always provide security - a synonym for joy back in those days.

Which leads us to Phillip, the man Isabelle was so desperately trying to get as many countries between them while dashing through the rolling hills of the family estate. He was arranged to be her husband and father to their children at the ripe age of 13 and has known no life other than being prepared to become his.

No matter how hard she attempted to escape, though, fate would never let it be that way. Soon after the guards were among her surroundings, coercing her back into the church yard. No matter what she pleaded and cried, her sorrow was met with cold-stoned eyes from men who gave no remorse to her marrying one of the wealthiest sons around Europe on Christmas Day. This event was “a prayer St. Nicholas answered for us all to celebrate.”

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“What the hell is this!” Isabelle cried while pushing Phillip on his bare side. Assertiveness like this was not usually possessed in the bed while child making, but was insisted by fear of what was displayed across his lower body.

Once a week the couple met to “perform their marital duties”, as her mother explained it, anyways. Isabelle scrubbed her body the rest of the week in ice-cold baths immediately after the act - something her scandalously secret coven friend explained one chilly November morning after this all began. A child would not be bred until she was ready to face life without Henry and grieve the heartache it surely would cause.

“It looks as though you were bludgeoned so badly your skin is bubbling about!” Isabelle whined as she slowly backed away, frightened by the display on her husband’s lower stomach.

Instantly Phillip dashed out of bed like a lightning bolt with the sheet draped around the infection, and into the dark room where his chamber pot was laid. After examining his own body thoroughly, a call was made to the infirmary and the local doctor must have made haste as he arrived only 20 minutes later that evening. Smallpox was the diagnosis, running rampant across the city of London, apparently.

A fortnight went by with little progress made, but hope still remained as the last bit of life was sucked from his remains. Lacking spirit in the eyes of the doctor or his nurses and maids, Isabelle ran outside to drown out the look on his passing face, as stone as a river on December mornings.

With no family left in this place, the widow was in no state to remain. After a treacherous six months of farewells prayed to Phillip and the life he promised her all while stolen away from Brighton Place, the time had come to return back home again. A dreadful time being the holidays again to make her staff part ways, but what better gift to give than her presence to the one she gifted her heart to and then abandoned.

❄

“Get your ass out of the way!” Henry roared as he hung from the side of the tractor, steam pouring over his figure and into the cab he was plowing soybeans from within.

Slowly grazing through the field with suitcases in tow, Isabelle had no desire to stray from the plot she was surely destroying bit by bit with her protruding heels. No matter, she thought, she would spend the rest of her life plowing next to this angry man making it up to him every day.

Henry noticed those lace white shoes, the same ones running through these fields only 11 months ago, ripping out his heart along with the seeds he had just sowed. Without another word, he ran outside and instantly grabbed this woman by her sides and hauled her over his backside, dashing towards the chilly lake as they giggled and laughed all the way.

Mistletoe was left hanging around the sandy shore that day, or that will be their excuse for the lipstick all over Phillip’s face. Rushing inside to meet with her family, they caught up around the fireplace slowly roasting the pine Christmas tree they all sat around joyfully.

‘The giver of every good and perfect gift’, as jolly old St. Nicholas once said. This is what Isabelle would be to mend Henry’s heartache as fate brought them together on that same day she abandoned ship, a year prior to this.

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