The Arranged Marriage

Chapter 2: Depression is an Old Friend

Quinn woke up, her head feeling groggy. She looked at her surroundings and found that she had fallen asleep on the bathroom floor. The blood from her cuts led to small puddles on the ground, all dried up. She quickly grabbed her phone out of her pant pocket to check the time. It was 2am.

Relaxing for a moment, realizing that it wasn’t morning yet and that she didn’t have to deal with Olivia nagging her to get ready for the wedding. Quinn remembered that Olivia told her the schedule for the next few days before then. Olivia wanted to take her dress shopping the following morning.

Seeing that Quinn had time, she got off the floor and wrapped her cuts with bandages. She then proceeded into her room, turning off her bathroom lights. She didn’t care to clean up the blood that had dripped everywhere.

Quinn changed her clothes into gym clothes. Sneaking into the villa’s gym, she began to work out and start practicing her punches on the punching bag.

To Quinn, depression was an old friend. She knew how to cope with it well on her own. With no one else left to turn to in her life, she had to rely on herself to get through in life. Her biggest coping skill was working out and learning self-defense. Every day in college, she would hit the gym early in the mornings, before anyone else had shown up. Once people started coming was when Quinn would take her leave. She didn’t want others to know that she was good at being active in this way.

A few hours had passed before Quinn called it quits before heading back to her private bathroom and taking a long shower.

Once she was out, she looked at the time on her phone once again; 5:53am. Olivia will be coming to get Quinn in less than 3 hours.

Her body began to feel drained again, she dried off her silky, black hair before stumbling into her bed, drifting into a deep sleep.

*** *** ***

“Quinn, dear,” Olivia’s innocent voice was showing this morning. She was the most excited about this wedding. She didn’t care about her daughter or what she would end up like, she just wanted the money that was coming from Jake’s family afterwards.

“I’m waiting to see this dress!” Olivia continued to chirp. The fitters were working hard on getting the gown to fit Quinn’s slim, yet curvy body. Almost all of the dresses that were at the store would have to be altered to even fit Quinn without falling off of her.

Quinn felt her breathing become labored, as they tightened the lace on the back of the current gown, making it like it was a corset. When they finished the fitting, Quinn walked out of the private fitting room and towards her mother, who was lounging on a sofa.

Olivia looked up, noticing that even though her daughter was one of the purest beauties, she never admitted it, nor cared to tell Quinn. She examined the dress. It was a strapless dress that flowed down to a mermaid flail. Critiqued lace designs were throughout the dress, and a silk lace and corset was built into the top.

After looking it over, Olivia went back to looking at her nails before saying, “It would look better if you didn’t make yourself look like a wounded dog with your cuts and scars. What is your new husband going to think if he see’s that on your wedding day?” She motioned with her hand towards the cuts on Quinn’s wrists. To which Quinn lowered her head.

Seeing this, Olivia stood up and walked over to her daughter. She lifted Quinn’s arm, revealing all of the scars that were made on her skin from the previous night. She looked at her in shame and disgust.

“What is this, a pathetic cry for help because you’re getting married? Get over yourself, Quinn! You are a part of a noble family! You should be acting like one, not acting like an attention w***e!” Olivia yelled at her, before taking a couple of deep breaths and calming herself before making herself look like a fool in public. Before turning around to sit back down on the couch, she released Quinn’s wrist.

“Have you ever considered its because of you and dad and Luke? Have you ever thought that maybe you all are the problem, why I was diagnosed with severe depression? Or how about the fact that my own family doesn’t treat me like a human being, and that I got the short end of the f*****g stick all my life?” Quinn began to become frustrated. She didn’t care if it was a scene in public that Olivia was worried about. She wanted to know why her own family never loved her.

Olivia stopped in her tracks. She looked over her shoulder, coldly at Quinn.

“You want to know why?” Olivia hissed between her teeth. “It’s because I couldn’t get an abortion and get rid of you, no! Noble ladies deal with the consequences dealt to us,” she then started walking slowly towards Quinn. “I wanted just one child! I wanted to be able to watch him grow and give him the world. He was the true heir of the Astor family! Then one stupid f*****g night your father got too drunk and- “

Olivia trailed off, remembering that night. Ben had come home after going to the bar with his colleagues. He reeked of the smell of booze and whores. But the ladies he had already spent the night with weren’t enough. That night, Olivia was forced by Ben. That was the last night that they had ever slept together. Ever since then, they had been more miserable together than ever. This was one of the known traits of the Astor family: they cheat and can’t stay away from sleeping around.

Quinn stared at the ground. Her mother’s words wound her more than ever. She had finally found out that she was and always will be the unwanted child.

“I want to cut all ties after the marriage.”