Thread: Levirate (Google and skittish_butterfly)

Looking back and forth to their faces, her dad and the First Elder looking completely fooled by Jacob's theatrics, Constance felt utter disgust for Rory's brother. No! No no no! Constance stepped toward her father, one gentle hand on his shoulder hoping to elicit some small shred of concern for his daughter even if he'd never really showed it before, at least not in a way she wanted it. You can't, Daddy, you can't believe him. Why did her voice come out like that, as if she was little again, and calling him Daddy? And would it even work? Would he remember she was his little girl, not some piece of property to sell of to the vilest bidder? He doesn't care about Rory, he never did, he hated him. He's lying! Her father had this look of pity on his face, but not a useful pity. More like he pitied her for a lack of faith or something. Please Daddy, don't listen to his lies. She turned to the First Elder, her father a lost cause. He was supposed to have the intellect and reason of a judge as well as being ministering clergy, for he led the Council which settled all disputes and adjudicated the requirements of religious law. Despite her growing panic, Constance knew better than to touch the First Elder. She stepped in front of him, making him look her in the eyes, trying to make him see her as a human being and not some biblical possession. Elder! You can't do this to me. What if Rory is still... The sad little shake of the old man's head stopped her exploration of that line of thought. He... You... You can't just come in here and... Constance couldn't stop the frustrated, defeated groan that came out, the one so familiar from her many years under her father's thumb, and one she could scarcely remember ever making in this apartment, with Rory. She collapsed back onto the big leather sofa, but not to put her feet on the glass coffee table and read while sipping a nice cup of coffee from the end table. She stared up at the men, one after the other, struggling to believe that these neanderthal mentalities were actually alive and well in this modern age. Looking straight up at Jacob now, her voice soft, sad. How could you have sprung from the same woman that gave birth to Rory? What would your mother think of you? Constance closed her eyes for a moment and prayed silently inside with the same intensity she'd been feeling ever since the night she first heard about Rory. She prayed with every scrap of her intense faith, a faith in God and his love for his People still strong, even if her faith in those people was pretty much puppy poop by now. Yet she prayed with fear too, because after listening to her heart's every whispered, fervent request for five years, sending her Rory and a life and education and independence, it was as if He'd given her all of her life's rewards in one brief burst, and now turned a deaf ear to her every plea. Constance opened her eyes after a few seconds, a few seconds all God needed to truly hear and understand a heart's pain. She could see Jacob's staring at her. No, I don't accept this. This is not some stupid wedding ceremony. It's a formality. That's what you said! So let's just get it over with! I demand you let me finish this 'formality'! Staring straight at Jacob, she made sure she knew, Rory was better than you, and smarter than you, and kinder than you... and that's what he would have wanted, so if there's even the tiniest scrap of that repulsive heart of yours that really does care about your brother, you'll do this for me. She slipped from the couch, half crawling the three steps to Jacob. She didn't look up at him with the fury she felt in her blazing green eyes. It was his shoe she wanted. Take the shoe. Spit on him or near him or whatever. Get him out of her life. Just do the ritual she'd sworn to do and be done with it. Surely she had some say in this. Her fingers grasped at his shoe, tugging, untying, all the while intoning, This is what I do to the man who doesn't deserve me! This is what is done to the man who hates his brother and lies about it! On and on, growing closer and closer to tears as her frustration mounted, his leg just so big, not able to lift it to get the shoe off, making her arm feel so slender and weak by comparison. Lift your stupid leg so I can finish the formality you... you.... you asshole! God damn it Jacob, don't do this to me! She didn't even hear or care if the men gasped at her blasphemy. God would understand, wouldn't he? And so should these mortals, who should have no right to decide her life for her.