First scene of a novel!

Workin' on a novel (again). No, I have never finished one but there is a first time for everything! This could be the one. There is more to this kid than meets the eye. Here goes.

***

I remember very clearly one evening, when I was very young. I think Undora thought I was asleep, because she was trying to keep her voice down. Her father, however was not.

“You disgrace me, Undora! And you disgrace my name and your fiancé!” The man was short and round, with a bald head that turned nothing less than a sharp cherry-red when he was upset. He was not otherwise very often, at least the times that I saw him.

“Da, you don’t understand!” Undora was angry also, though angry tears accompanied her, making her beautiful brown eyes wet and beautiful in a desperate, proud sort of way. Her once-slender hands, now toughened through years of work, were clenched into fists, as if she were barely restraining herself from hitting him. I would always remember silently praying for her to hit him. I wanted to see the reaction on his face, even at that young age. “I tried to do as you asked, but I was doing it for you and not for me. I found someone –“ She choked, and I couldn’t tell whether it was from emotion or from stumbling over her words – “Someone better, and – “

“Someone better?” he roared at her, the thick hair on his neck nearly bristling. “Better than Tronas! Do you know how hard I worked to find that match for you?! Where is your ‘someone better’ now? Hmm? Is he dead?”

“Stop it…”

“Did he die nobly Undora? Or was he as fed up with you as I am? He found another woman, is that it? A better woman?”

“What do you want me to do?” she shrieked, letting tears fall and weakening. No, mother. Fight back. You’re stronger than that. “You wouldn’t let me speak with anyone for five years! Why do you come to me now! I’m happy where I am.”

“Happy where you – “ He laughed derisively. To this day I don’t think I’ve heard an uglier sound. My chubby little hands clenched too, mimicking Undora’s. “Look at this place. My daughter living in a sty. It’s despicable…” Undora opened her mouth to protest, making a squelched sound of objection, before the little round man continued. “I found another match for you. It’s not as good as the first one but if you give up the bastard you can regain some of the respect – “

“Get out of my house.” Undora was shaking, she was so upset, and her voice was tight and strained. I wanted to run to her and embrace her for being so wonderful but I didn’t dare for fear of both of their wraths. “I never want to see you again. Get out.”

Her father stood there, mouth agape and outraged. He stepped toward her, and I foresaw the sound smack he delivered to her. She turned her face, now red with the blow. “You are dead to me,” the older man hissed, and he turned on his heel and left the house, slamming the door behind him.

Undora slid to the floor, hiding her face in her hands and sobbing as I had never seen her do before. She was always so strong, and it frightened me she could break. I was nearly too terrified to go around the corner of my hiding place and comfort her, but I felt it was my solemn duty to do so. I was vaguely aware she had done this for me, though I didn’t know why I should need protecting. Downcast, and probably looking like a whipped puppy, I crawled into my mother’s lap and rested my head against her chest, where I felt her heart beating, alive and vibrant and well. She stiffened. I could tell she didn’t want me to see her cry. But she kissed my head anyway and held me. Neither of us said a word for a very long time. It was gathering dark when finally she kissed my cheek. “Thank you, sweetheart,” she whispered quietly, then got to her feet, carrying me with her. I squirmed. She must have forgotten I was too old to be carried, but I didn’t have the heart to tell her.

Finally, as she was tucking me into the small bed we both shared, I said, “I’m proud of you, Mama. For standing up to him. I liked to see you win.”

Undora looked down at me with those large, doe-brown eyes, still red-rimmed. For a moment I thought she would be pleased to hear what I’d said, that somehow I’d made her feel better. Instead, she whispered quietly into the dark, “What made you think I won?”

Before I could answer she had left. I should have felt content, in my warm bed and with that terrifying rotund man gone. I should have been glad I could still Undora’s tears. But a vague sense of something terribly, deeply wrong had settled on me, something that I could not shake, nor dismiss as childish fears. It ran deeper than the fear of the dark, or the fear of the Night Demon come to steal the souls of the guilty. For, though I wasn’t fully aware of it, no thing of the dark was more terrifying than myself, and I wasn’t yet guilty of anything worse than a white lie to Undora when I’d gone to the river during a rainstorm. No, there was something far worse that unsettled me that night. Before the week was out I would wish I had a bed to think upon at all.