Unwittingly

Three

Somewhere with a Monarchy, 1835

Three hours until I got into a carriage and road to the palace. Three hours until I started getting ready for the masquerade ball.

Three hours until I started looking for my true love.

My mother cared about everything besides the true love part, and she was making that very evident with every passing hour. 

"No, no, Aria! In three hours, you'll be trying to win the prince's heart! You must walk with grace and poise. You mustn't slouch, everyone at the palace will be watching your every move!" my mother was a tyrant earlier? Now she was a dictator, ready to manipulate every variable until she got what she wanted. And she wanted me to marry the prince.

"Mother, I'm not a machine! I'm a human being. Do you really think that I'll be able to dance later if you're training me like this right now?"

She sighed, seeing that I was right, "I guess you are correct. But what else am I supposed to do to work out my nerves? My only daughter could become the queen!" 

"Mother," I started, "I'm going to ignore the fact that you just told me that I need to marry the prince, but I'm the one that's going to the palace to find my true love here! Don't you think I might have nerves too? Honestly, mother, through this entire process you've been treating me like an object. For once, I want you to stop and think about how something might affect me. I love you, but sometimes I want you to see me as a human. Now, because the ball starts in five hours and I must leave in three, I am going to wash and hope that the soreness in my poor muscles go away."

My mother sighed again, but didn't stop me when I ran out of the sitting room. Before I went up the stairs, I slipped off my heels and put them off at the bottom of the staircase. My feet were red with blisters, and I winced as I climbed the stairs to the bathroom. 

I sighed when I slipped into the tub, feeling my muscles tense up because of the cold water, but then gradually relax when I got used to it.

I don't know how long I was in the tub. To be completely honest, it was so nice to be away from my mother in her state of mind, I lost track of time.

Until my father started banging on the door, telling me that I needed to get out of the bathroom so I could get ready to go to the palace. It was an one hour journey, so I needed to be in the carriage in half a hour. That was a problem when I needed to dry off and put the very fancy, very heavy dress my mother picked out for me to wear for the first impressions part of the betrothal celebration.

I groaned in response of my father's banging, and he took it as a cue to leave me so I could walk to my room in private.

I dried off and walked to my room, resigning myself to my fate of being in a corset and petticoat for the next two hours. 

Mother had gone out and bought another, more expensive corset that tightened three times more than the regular corset. Basically, my waist would be pencil thin, but my insides would be squished beyond repair.

I lost all of my breath when I tightened the corset, but I shook off the lightheadedness. Slipping on the petticoat, I felt every single shift of my arms, torso, and legs in excruciating pain. My mother said that the pain would be worth it, but I didn't see how currently. It was almost like I was putting on armor for the battle of my life.

A battle in the form of the betrothal celebration.

~o0o~

As of right now, I had been in the carriage for fifteen minutes. My parents had bid me farewell inside of the house because my mother wanted to go and do some gardening to take her mind off of her stress, and my father had an important paper to finish.