Caught (On Hold)

Discoursing

I walk out of my home, silent as a shadow and allow myself the liberty of a cold drink of water before setting off. I turn the faucet outside of our squat, old, "dingy" supply shack and allow the water to run. At first, it's brown (people from here would be amazed at this) but as it sputters to life, it eventually becomes clearer and clearer. Once it's crystal, I turn off the water and bring the cup up to my face, letting the cold, refreshing liquid leak down my throat. Making me feel more energized and awake. 

Now that I'm more awake, I set off. I jog through a few neighborhoods in the poorer part of town, very unlike where I lived, and soon found myself at a small fence, separating me from the forest. My blood began to run faster and my heartbeat increases rapidly. I take a deep breath in, drawing in the sweet smell of pine and fall in the morning. I jump over the small, wooden, fence and find myself in the woods. 

My mother and father hated it when I went here, but they didn't understand the peace and serenity the woods held. You could stand there and listen to the babbling brooks, singing birds, humming insects, rustling leaves, soft squeaks of squirrels, and long off yips all day long and no one could see you, or be mad at you, or tell you to get a husand. You could stand there all day and be you.

I was the daughter of a wealthy couple. Gerald and Elizabeth Paul. The two owners of the biggest grain company in the country. My father had Caught my mother when she was just sixteen, and like most girls, she enjoyed being caught; especially by such a handsome, rich man like Gerald.

Being caught, or catching is when a father believes it's time for his daughter to get a husband. He then sets her somehwere with all of the men; once in the field, the girl must eliminate two of the gentlemen competing, and then, the father picks one from the rest. And by "one from the rest" I of course mean, wealthiest and most demanding of their wife.

I hear a bird whistle that isn't completely "bird" and smile. Elle May was at our Den.

When I arrived at Elle May and I's secret place I sighed. It was a cave we found one day when we were little, we loved it so much, and found so many interesting things in there, we decided to call it our Den. Like a fox den. Although we didn't make any major changes to the place, we did bring in a few things that would help the place and us while we were out here: a stash of blankets, some extra grain snacks, pillows, sleeping bags, and sometimes when we felt up for it, holostories. 

We used to tell our parents we were going to one anothers houses for a slumberdate and then go to the Den instead, we'd curl up in our sleeping bags and listen the coyotes, owls, and other night creatures. Sometimes, we'd watch holostories, and sometimes, we'd just talk.

"Hey, Angeline! Where 'ya been? I've been waitin'!" She exclaimed in her thick, southern accent.

I smiled apologetically, "sorry! I was getting a drink!"

She looked at me quizically, "why don't you drink more often? You get more water than most of us, might as well use it."

"I know," I sigh, "but...It just doesn't seem...fair."

She laughs loudly, sending the birds who were near, fluttering off, squaking a warning to the others. "Fair? Nobody in this generation cares about fairness but you Angeline! Shoot, it's about time before you get yourself Caught! Me too-you know, my father's already been interveiwin' men and your father oughtta start soon and-"

"My father wouldn't have me Caught!" The words escape my mouth before I realize just how untrue they are. He would auction me off for a piglet in a minute, he was extremely desperate.

"Now, Angeline," he had said to me one day, "you need to be Caught! Time's running out! By the moment you discover how much a husband would benefit you, they'll all be gone! You'll either have to stay a single woman until death, helping your mother around or, get married to a much older man, and you do't want that, do you Angeline?"