Cheah Hui Qin

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The Sacrifice

Written by: Cheah Hui Qin

Churchill, England.

1700.

Marianne was having a hard time trying to fix Mr. Popper’s necktie. She tilted it to the right and no sooner that she found out that the tie was looking askew then she immediately tilted it again to the other side. Still, it was then aslant. This had been going on for more twenty minutes that she could not stifle a heave of sigh. As she did so, she could sense a tumultuous turbulence.

“Stop it, you mutter!” the man with overweening arrogance and pride curtly backed off in a brusque manner. His brows wrenched into a tight know as he spoke in an overly-ostentatious tone, “Blockhead, what’s with that inauspicious scorn? Are you trying to ruin my red letter day with that baleful derision of yours? Or perhaps, you really hope that I remain to serve on probation after a decade of doing so? You know that I am going to be tenured today, and if you are not cool with me at my turf and think I shall annul my pedestal with such hoity-toity sneer, you could pack up and leave!”

“Please regain your composure, Mr. Popper. I didn’t mean to spoil your very day, though, there is something wrong somewhere with this tie…”

“Instead of complaining about my tie, I think it’s better for you to confess that you are such a witless woman, and in fact you are the thickest woman I have ever met in my life! Stop being high-and-mighty! Decline, or I shall nullify you and get you divorced!” Mr. Popper spoke contemptuously with two hands akimbo.

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After putting on a gesture, signing ‘back off’, Mr. Popper dashed through the nettles and into the faraway boulevard. Marianne watched as he fixed his hat and stuffed the newspaper back into his hat. As she stood silently behind the door, a sweet memory of hers on their wedding day brought her back to the fountain of true love…

“Christopher Popper, will you have Marianne Gisell to be your wedded wife, to live together in the covenant of faith, hope and love according to the intention of God for your lives together in Jesus Christ? Will you listen to her inmost thoughts, be considerate and tender in your care of her and stand by her faithfully in sickness and in health, and preferring her above all others, accept full responsibility for her every necessity for as long as you both shall live?”

“I could do more than that. I will get her the brightest star of each night and love her with all my heart, to this I vow.”

That was the time Marianne felt herself being cherished and she supposed that she was blessed to be endowed with such a loving monsieur.

Mr. Popper was once a refined man, where manners were a canter. Though fond of many acquaintances, she desired an intimacy only with him as he possessed her esteem. His manners, were true and they were tinctured with a sense of humour. When he spoke, the flowers effloresced. He was generous even to profusion and was never affected to be thought a prodigy of parsimony and prudence.

Nonetheless, everything will change. It did.

He turned out to be a lad who welts, screams and shouts. He was proud of his malevolence and took as much pain to hide his indifference like any other hypocrite would do. He had never brought stars for her.

Marianne was not living merrily, after all, but she thought that she was blessed, and she would do anything, in fact whatever, to please her man with all her heart. She was brought up and nurtured in the patriarchal society, in which her mother had never been mutinous although being charged with contempt by her depraved father forever and a day. She was taught as a woman, to sacrifice for her man and never touch his esteems.

“I shall do and commit in everything to charm Mr. Popper. He is the man of my life, and I shall sacrifice for the betterment of his, not mine, for he is a gifted piece and my brightest star of each day.”

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