Undesirable

Chapter 5

Dozens of boats glide across the water's surface, their sails and flags fluttering in the light breeze. The docks are usually quiet this early in the morning, but as it's the last Friday of the month, a thousand shipments of fish are being sent out all across the Tiers. Huge ships, bigger than any boats that the village fishermen sail, wait in the docks to be loaded up with their cargo. A few years ago, my father would have been amongst them, elbow deep in work. He used to love his job, he was one of the only few who did, and he was good at it too. That was until they reduced him to the shell of the human he is today.

Luckily for me, people are too busy to pay me much attention. Normally, everyone would be bombarding you with questions on your walk home. They'd beg you to tell them all the details about how it went, if you thought you did well, or how likely it is that he's going to propose to you. Some ask out of concern, but the majority just want to know the latest gossip. I'm happy I can avoid it today. Everyone is too distracted.

I make the usual journey up to my house, and see Ana sitting on the hay roof. When we were growing up, we spent every evening sat up there, watching the sun go down as we talked about our days. She is several hours early today, and the sun hasn't even made it to its highest point in the sky yet, but I can still pretend like it's the old times. Except from she is married now, but I won't dwell on that.

She stares out to sea, off in her own little dream world, so taken away by her thoughts that she doesn't even see me pull myself onto the roof to sit next to her, "Hey, what are you doing up here?" I ask, breaking her from her daydream.

"Just looking at the view," She replies, gracing me with a pleased smile. The sea spans out too far for us to see the end of the Tier, but I have heard whispers from fishermen, who work on the boats, that there is a steep drop waiting for anyone who dares venture too close to the edge. They say, if you were to ever jump off, you'd be more likely to die of suffocation than actually hitting the ground of the Lower. Neither sounds that pleasant to me.

"How did your meeting go?" She asks me.

I let out a long sigh, "As well as they always do." She doesn't need me to explain what that means.

"That bad?" She says, gaining her a nudge in the rips from my elbow. "What happened?"

"We weren't a good fit for each other," I reply with the best excuse I have. It sounds pathetic for me to admit, even though I don't like him and found him extremely patronising, I will still say yes if he asks me to marry him. Not that I think he will propose after that disastrous meeting, but I can always hold onto a bit of hope - no matter how far fetched it is.

"I think you'd have to be insane to be a good fit for Marcus Alexander," Ana states, laughing, making a very valid point.

"There is always a silver lining," I sigh in bittersweet relief.

Ana has to deal with Marcus Alexander on a regular basis, he is her father-in-law's favourite fisherman. He personally delivers their order of fish to their house every week and even stays the evening to have a meal with the family. Ana has complained about him to me a few times now, describing his painfully boring conversations and anecdotes, but I never expected him to be as bad as he was. It is common knowledge that, if people's lives weren't in danger by rejecting a proposal, he would never have gotten married the first time.

"How did your evening with the witch go?" I ask her, changing the subject. Ana planned on going to visit Messena shortly after she helped me with my meeting last night, and even though I don't trust the witchy voodoo magic she claims to wield, I would be lying if I said I'm not slightly intrigued by what occurred.

"Witch Doctor," She quickly corrects me, with a stern glare. "It went well. She has given me a few things to try out?"

I didn't realise she was going to have to do anything after she met Messena, I thought that one meeting would be enough to 'cure' her. Surely, for the witch to use her magic on my sister, she needed to be in close proximity for it to work. If not, couldn't she just use her gifts on anyone, whenever she wanted?