╔══════════════╗

Troubling Choices

╚══════════════╝

Florence sat beside Gilbert on a bench near the schoolhouse, now calmed down as she explained an entirely different story as to why she was crying. She managed to spare some details: her story suggested that she was just really missing her parents today . . . But it wasn't completely untrue. She truly missed her parents, but it didn't bother her any more than what she had just learnt.

Gilbert listened closely to her story, but he was troubled by the fact that she didn't appear to be telling the truth. Perhaps he was just overthinking things, but the way she presented the narrative didn't seem credible. She cried so much because she missed her parents? Even if such was the case, what prompted her to flee? What motivated her to run in the first place? Was she fleeing something or someone?

"You're lying," he blatantly said.

"I am not," she responded a little too quickly, looking at him but not being able to hold his intense and suspicious gaze. "What makes you think that I would be lying?"

"I have my reasons." Gilbert broke the stare. "A lot of what you said doesn't exactly add up."

Florence looked surprised, and long after she realized that she probably knew his reasons. There was no use lying anyway. Nothing good ever came from doing that.

She sighed, accepting defeat. "Alright, I'm lying."

Gilbert took a deep breath and shifted closer to her on the bench, hesitantly taking her hand into his own. "Who hurt you, Flo?"

Florence glanced down at their intertwined hands and blushed profusely. She slowly let go and looked away from him, realizing that she would be able to confess nothing properly if they kept their close proximity. "It was . . . It was Billy."

His hands involuntarily fisted, but she didn't see.

"I . . . I found out that he was the one who caused the ladder to fall during the Pantomime preparations."

"What?" Gilbert looked beyond furious. "Andrews did this?"

Florence nodded but there was no emotion on her face. She felt numb. And numb, she knew, was a lot worse than any other feeling imaginable.

The boy beside her huffed in irritation. With his mind bent on revenge, he stood up immediately, preparing to go teach the Andrews boy a lesson. However, before he could begin walking, Florence grabbed his hand and stopped him in his tracks.

"I didn't tell you so you could go pick a fight with him."

"Do you even know what he did to you?" Gilbert argued, still standing.

"Of course, I know," she responded, "But I also know that randomly picking fights is a poor way to deal with your problems."

He took a moment to consider his options, and after realizing that Florence was probably right, Gilbert let go of his wits and took a seat beside her once again. "I'm only stopping because It's really cold right now and I don't fancy beating someone up at this particular moment, remember that."

Gilbert laughed as he slowly turned to look at her, noticing how she was plainly trying to disguise her amusement.

***

It had been a few months since that tumultuous day on the snowy school grounds, and Florence's memory of the incident had quickly faded. She wasn't feeling miserable anymore, partly because she didn't see any reason to, and partly because her arm had healed and she no longer needed to wear an unpleasant cast, which she was instead grateful for.

She was sitting in her normal seat next to Prissy one day when Mr Phillips began droning on about another tedious lesson about Canadian historical landmarks. Florence's gaze was drawn to the window, where the glorious sunlight shone down across the fields. Spring was only a few weeks old at the time, but there was still some snow on the ground. She'd much prefer to be outside enjoying the beautiful weather than crammed into this god awful building.

Florence was avoiding Billy Andrews, which irritated him. He didn't understand it at first, but he began to notice strange things, such as her refusal to make eye contact with him, even when they were working on projects together. She'd barely said five sentences to him in the last month, and none of them was caustic or irritating. That was highly uncharacteristic of her, given how often she used every opportunity to put him in his place (especially after what he'd done to her in the past). Every time she saw him at school, she would deliberately turn and speed-walk in the other direction, and whenever he did manage to strike up a conversation, she'd hastily make up an excuse and leave as though he had some dreadful, infectious disease.

While Florence was dreamily staring out the window, he had a few rocks saved up in his pocket that he was using to hit her with every little while in order to catch her attention. But she just wasn't having any of it. Even if she had noticed something hitting her, she clearly didn't make much of it.

Yawning, Florence eventually broke off her attention from the window and her eyes drifted across the room until they landed on the Andrews boy and saw him waving at her like an idiot. For a moment, she locked eyes with him, her brown irises meeting his blue ones, and he could've sworn he saw something in her expression flicker, but it was gone the next second.

Billy had recognized her expression when she saw him, and it had hurt him a little on the inside.

"Forget it," he murmured under his breath before burying his face onto the desk.

***

"I have a confession to make," Prissy told Florence later that day as the two girls made their way home from school.

Florence furrowed her brows, noticing how solemn Prissy looked for some reason. Was the wedding called off or something? Gosh, what was she thinking? She shouldn't have been thinking this way . . . Prissy loved Mr Phillips.

Before she could ask what the confession was, the blonde girl continued with the same sadness that was inhabiting her expression. "Stephen, in fact, does not support my idea to continue with my education. He told me the other day that after we marry, he wants me to serve him only and move to Toronto right away."

That she wasn't expecting.

Florence pondered what to say for a moment, feeling quite literally speechless for some reason. After some thinking, she eventually mustered, "Are you alright with this idea?"

"It doesn't matter whether I'm alright with this idea or not," Prissy argued immediately. Both of the girls had now stopped in their tracks and faced each other. Florence felt remorse for her dear friend; Prissy looked like she was on the verge of tears.

"Prissy⸺"

"I'm getting married, Flo, that too to Stephen. This is what I've always wanted for as long as I can remember. I should be happy, right?"

"Prissy, you have every right to be happy, but It's all about being equals in marriage, not simply husband and wife. If Mr Phillips refuses to accept this one request from you that you have been anticipating for a long time . . . You should be quite aware already that he doesn't regard you as an equal."

Quickly wiping away unwanted tears from her cheeks, Prissy took a deep breath. "Know what? Forget it. I am not alright with this . . . But I will be. Eventually."

"You don't seem certain," Florence tried to argue.

"That is beside the point, Flo. I am getting married in a few short weeks and I love Stephen dearly. I know that he knows what's best for me."

Florence scoffed. "You don't know what's best for you, so you'll entrust the decision to your fiancé?"

The blonde looked slightly taken aback by this claim, and instead of agreeing to what she knew was very much the truth ⸺ she grumbled. "I do not wish to have this conversation anymore. It's better if we end it at this."

Prissy continued down the path herself, leaving a shocked Florence behind.