Havrian City, Sector 18, Apartment Building
With the morning rays bathing the whole building, inside one of the moderately furnished apartment rooms, a woman sat rubbing her forehead with her hand, clinching a medical report she had just received the previous night.
Due to exhaustion from her duties as a kindergarten teacher, she hadn't been able to fully read it, but in the morning, she did.
It was a diagnosis report confirming that she had stage two metastatic cancer, where initially it was just a tumor that had not spread across her body.
However, due to neglecting some symptoms she had been experiencing, she finally sought a diagnosis only to find that it had spread to other parts of her body, including her lungs.
"Should I be relieved for this freedom?" Staring at the letter with hollow eyes, exhausted from maintaining her daily work as a teacher, she found this report rather than being traumatic, a relief from a life filled with constant pain and struggle.
Normally, anyone would find this situation tragic or even despairing, but for her, having lost her parents at an early age and living with an aunt who treated her as nothing more than a money-making machine, the medical report felt like a pathway to freedom.
She was not strong enough to take her own life. So she tried to hold herself together, and finally, with this report, she felt relieved that it would soon be over, without any struggle at all.
Tring tring
However, it appeared things would again take a turn against her as the phone rang, making her turn before picking it up.
Knowing who was on the call, she said in a very obedient and trembling voice, "Hello, yes Aunt?"
:: Hello? Agatha, why didn't you send the money for my yoga classes yet? ::
'!'
There was a flicker of surprise in Agatha's eyes, not because she had forgotten the class fees, but because her aunt's voice was much softer and more lenient than the rude tone she normally projected at her.
It was simple and melodious, as if she were trying to present herself as a kind woman in front of others, yet unable to hide her desire for money.
"I will send it today after I get my salary, Aunt," Agatha replied, as today was the day she would receive her paycheck— a day she might have enjoyed if not for all the EMIs her aunt had taken, leaving Agatha barely surviving in this one-bedroom flat.
:: Tch, you are so useless. ::
"Yes, I know." Agatha just replied, rubbing her forehead, as she couldn't even let her tears fall; she felt soon enough she would be freed from this struggle that life was throwing at her.
It was a pain only someone like her could understand, where someone could even see their death as relief.
:: Whatever, do you know where I am right now? ::
"....No?" Agatha focused on her aunt's voice, which seemed much more delighted, asking something that didn't make sense.
Yet Agatha didn't raise her voice, not because she was obedient, but simply because she was too exhausted from this life where she had struggled all her life without anything of her own.
And finally, at the age of twenty-seven, she was going to die soon.
:: In front of your future husband! Congratulations! ::
"Wh-who?"
Agatha slowly processed what her aunt had just said. Yet her raised voice was enough to pull her attention to the call. Blinking, she tried to understand what she meant.
:: Tch, you always act dumb. I said, I'm here with the man who will marry you. Good man, well-settled; he's even saying hello to you from here. Say something, smile a little, Agatha. ::
There was a subtle shift in tone, as her aunt's voice turned more graceful, even playful, yet that false sweetness did little to hide the forced tremor behind it.
"...Aunt..." Agatha spoke, but then closed her eyes before slowly exhaling, gripping the phone tighter as she said, "I... I can't marry him. I was going to tell you—" she stopped as her throat dried; the words felt too heavy.
"The diagnosis... It's cancer. Stage two... it has spread to my lungs. I won't live long..."
:: Huh?— :: Her aunt's tone suddenly lowered before she seemed to step aside, her voice becoming muffled slightly, as if covering the speaker with her hand, ":: Wait, just give me a moment, dear. She's shy. Let me speak privately. ::"
There was a sound, possibly of her moving away from the man, followed by a clearer voice, one that dropped all sugar and now returned to its sharp self.
:: Are you crazy? What kind of nonsense are you spouting over the call? That man doesn't know a thing! You want to ruin this now? Now?! You know how hard it is to get someone to agree to marry a woman like you?! ::
"Aunt... I can't lie. I can't deceive someone like this, just to—"
:: Shut it! Do you think anyone cares about your fake little ethics? What have they done for you until now? You're going to die anyway, right? So what's the harm? At least this way you won't rot alone in that apartment like a stray dog! ::
Agatha felt her chest tighten.
"I don't want this... I just want peace for what little time I have..." she whispered, her voice cracking.
:: Peace? You had peace when I fed you with my own hands after your good-for-nothing parents left you on my doorstep like garbage. Peace when I took your school fees on loan. Peace when I built your whole life while you kept crying for your dead mother. Peace doesn't come free. You owe me. And now I'm asking for a small thing. Just marry him. Or don't. Just bear his child. I will raise it after you die and become his guardian; this man is rich! That's enough. That's the only way you can be useful now. ::
Agatha bit her lips, trembling, her vision blurred with unfallen tears, but she didn't let them drop. Her hands, cold and sweaty, slowly slipped off the edge of the table.
She opened her mouth, trembling, almost to deny—
Yet, she just wanted to let go of this life somehow.
"...When do I meet him?"
She asked, voice low, almost invisible, like something breaking quietly.
She decided to marry the man she had never even seen.