I decided to go with something I wrote this semester for uni, but with some changes because I wasn’t totally happy with the previous outcome. This still feels like a work in progress, like it’s missing something but, for now, here’s my story…
Beauty and a Beast
When will you settle down? When will we hear the pitter-patter of tiny feet? People had pried into his life for years, smiling and joking in what they thought was an endearing way. He was too busy, building his empire, making more money than his father before him. Love had never entered into his head. They’d all been for fun…but it had finally happened.
To fall in love sounded like a weakness, and having her didn’t feel like one. He knew she enjoyed to read, so he gave her his library, which before then had been lonely and dusty on the second floor of the apartment. He knew she enjoyed the singing of the birds, so he nailed them to the trees so they could never fly away. He knew she loved to look her best, so he filled her wardrobe with the most expensive, beautiful clothes, all made to measure.
His mother started sending him emails with potential names for a baby he would never have. A baby required time. It would make her attention stray. No, there would be no baby. His sister would drag her out shopping for a wedding he had not yet proposed. But he would. And she would say yes.
When the weather was nice, she liked to work out in the garden. He would watch her, stretching and balancing. Afterwards, she would walk slowly around the perimeter, the sweat glistening on her forehead, her long brown ponytail swishing. Her head would bend as she rounded a tree, obscuring her eyes as she walked around the red spotted grass.
‘My love,’ he said to her one night after dinner. ‘Are you happy here?’
She looked at him, contemplated him. ‘I’m here,’ she said.
That wasn’t what he had asked. He tried again.
‘My love,’ he said the following night. ‘Do you want to be here?’
Her answer came faster than last night’s. ‘I’m yours.’
That wasn’t what he had asked. Again. Fury grew inside him. ‘What does that mean? I’m here. I’m yours. Why can’t you answer the question?’
She looked at him, offering him a small smile. ‘Have you noticed the trees?’ she said.
He looked into the darkness but couldn’t see what she meant. The trees were where they had always been. They shivered, leafless twigs smacking together.
‘The trees,’ she said, ‘don’t sing anymore.’
She picked up her book from the table and left the room. He returned his gaze to the garden, where the moon and splattering of stars did not shine brightly enough to pierce the darkness. The trees don’t sing anymore. He’d picked the most beautiful birds, the birds with the purest voices. He’d spent hours attaching them to the branches. He sighed.
Tomorrow he’d give her back the singing trees.