Why the Village Beauty Pretended to Be a Shrew

Winter, 1994. A cold wind rattled the newspaper stuffed into the cracks around the window.

A bright red double-happiness paper was pasted on the peeling mud wall, and the cheap candle spat out a puff of dim yellow flame.

I sat curled in the corner clutching an old rolled-up bedroll, not daring to lift my head and look at the bride perched on the edge of the kang.

"We don't really have feelings for each other yet, so you take the bed, I'll sleep on the floor, and we'll let things grow slow." I forced the words out, stammering.

The moment I finished, there was a sharp swish. She yanked the red veil off her head and threw it hard in my face.

Her eyes were red, tears welling up in them, and she glared at me through gritted teeth. "If I hadn't faked being crazy, how could a bastard like you ever have gotten to marry me?!"

My name is Nathaniel Dickerson, born in a village so dirt-poor it barely made a sound, out on the edge of the Appalachian hill country.

Three generations of my family had scratched a living out of the soil. How poor? The iron pot we chopped and cooked in had been patched three times over.

I made it to the second grade, and then my family couldn't come up with the two dollars for the tuition.

My father squatted on the doorsill smoking his pipe half the night. The next morning he pushed a chipped, notched sickle into my hand, and just like that I dropped out and started working the fields.

That day the fall harvest had just finished, and the next village over, Fairview, had hired a rag-tag troupe to put on an opera.

Grown-ups and kids alike went pouring over there like they'd lost their minds, and I got swept along in the crowd.

Under the stage the dust hung thick in the air, and the whole place smelled of cheap pipe smoke and roasted sweet potato.

And right there in that rowdy crowd, I saw her for the first time. Carrie Fox.

She wore a floral blouse washed pale but perfectly clean, her hair combed into two glossy black braids.

She sat quietly on a little stool, cupping a small handful of shelled peanuts in her hands.

A bunch of runny-nosed little boys stood around her, watching her with hungry eyes.

She was smiling as she doled the peanuts out to them, and under that dust-covered stage her smile was so clean it hurt to look at.

The days went by one after another, and I grew into a half-grown young man.

My family was still too poor, so I borrowed a beat-up cart from the village and hauled our own cabbages and radishes to the town market to sell, up before dawn and back after dark.

The cart's wheels needed grease, so it screeched and groaned every time I pushed it, and the skin on my shoulder rubbed raw, scabbed over, and rubbed raw again.

That noon, the sun was fierce enough to melt the crust of the ground, and I was squatting in a corner of the market gnawing on a cold cornbread.

Then, from around the corner of the alley, came a burst of jeering laughter and a girl's cry of alarm.

I stuck my head out to look. A few small-town punks with dyed-yellow hair, the swaggering trashy kind, had a girl with a school bag pinned against a brick wall.

"What are you running for, sweetheart? Come watch a movie with us at the video parlor!" The ringleader reached out to grab the girl's braid.

The girl fought with everything she had, and her school bag dropped, the books inside scattering across the ground.

I looked closer. Wasn't that Carrie Fox? She'd have just started middle school around then, and she was scared so pale her face had gone white.

Something roared in my head. I slammed the half-eaten cornbread down on the ground, snatched up the carrying pole I used to shoulder my vegetables, and charged over.

"Let her go! In broad daylight, what do you think you're doing!" I bellowed, and swung the pole straight across the ringleader's back.

The punk went down with a scream, and the other two, seeing it, pulled bricks from their waistbands and came lunging at me.

I'd done heavy field work since I was small, so I was freakishly strong, and I saw red and swung wild until I'd flat-out beaten all three of them into scrambling off with their heads down.

Once they'd run off a ways, they stood at the mouth of the alley stamping their feet and cursing. "You just wait, kid! Don't you dare set foot in town again if you've got the guts!"

I stood there hauling in ragged breaths, dropped the pole, and turned to look at Carrie huddled against the wall.

She was shaking all over, tears welling in her eyes, but she bit down hard on her lip so she wouldn't make a sound.

I bent down and picked up her books one by one, brushed the dirt off them, and tucked them back into her bag before handing it to her.

I dug a folding pocketknife out of my pants pocket, the one I used to peel apples, its handle worn down until the red paint was all gone.

I pushed the knife into her hand and looked her dead in the eye, my face serious.

"From now on, don't back down. Any time some piece of trash like this dares to bully you, you take this knife and stab him!" I said, my voice rough.

She stared blankly at the little knife in her hand, then looked up at my mud-smeared face, and gave a hard nod.

The years slipped by until it was the early nineties, and everyone our age had reached the age for talking marriage.

The village head's son in the next village over was getting married, and they'd set out more than a dozen tables for an open feast. Since our two families counted as distant kin, far enough removed to barely count, my parents sent me off to go eat at the wedding.

That day the yard was packed and loud, the smell of hearty pork-and-cabbage stew mixing with the sharp burn of cheap whiskey and drifting through the air.

I couldn't stand the racket. I gulped down two quick bowls of rice, then made an excuse about needing to check the irrigation ditch out in the fields and slipped off early.

Passing the tall cornfield at the edge of the village, I suddenly heard the sound of arguing.

"Carrie, I mean it, I'm serious about you! My dad just bought me a brand-new motorcycle. Be my girl!" a man's voice came, quick and urgent.

I pushed the corn leaves aside and looked. It was Dwayne Porter from our village, arms spread wide, pinning Carrie Fox against a haystack with no way out.

Carrie clutched the hem of her shirt, terror all over her face, backing away without stopping. "Get out of my way! I don't like you. Don't come near me!"

When she wouldn't say yes, Dwayne got desperate and stepped forward to grab her hand.

A hot, nameless rage flared up in me out of nowhere, and I strode out of the cornfield.

"What do you think you're doing!" I shoved Dwayne back with one hand and put myself in front of Carrie.

Dwayne stumbled, then saw it was me and spat on the ground with a sneer. "Nathaniel Dickerson? A penniless nobody like you playing the hero for a girl?"

I didn't bother with him. I turned and looked at Carrie, scared out of her wits, and my head went hot. I said it loud. "Keep your hands off her. She and I got engaged a long time ago!"

The words landed and Dwayne froze. Carrie stared at me too, her eyes going wide.

And right at that moment, a mess of footsteps came from the mouth of the path.

Carrie's parents had happened to leave the feast just then, and they heard every word.

Her mother rushed over two steps at a time, yanked Carrie behind her, and jabbed a finger at my nose, cursing at the top of her lungs.

"Ha! What are you, exactly? Go take a good look at your own sorry, dirt-poor self!" Her finger nearly poked me in the eye.

Her father's face went dark too, and he cut in, cold. "A family that can't even afford one whole ox, wearing pants patched in four places, and you think a toad like you gets to eat swan meat?"

People passing by stopped one after another to point and mutter, the buzz of their talk landing on my face like slaps.

"Dad, Mom! Don't talk to him like that, he helped me before!" Carrie was so upset the tears came, and she pulled hard at her mother's sleeve.

"You shut your mouth! Haven't you embarrassed us enough?" Her mother's hand came back around and slapped down on the back of Carrie's hand.

The crisp crack was piercing there beside the cornfield. Carrie clutched her hand, gave me one look full of despair, and turned and ran crying back into the village.

I stood where I was, both hands clenched into fists, nails digging deep into my flesh, and couldn't get out a single word to fight back.

That evening, sick at heart, I was crouched in the dim cowshed adding fodder for our old ox.

Then came a stumbling set of footsteps outside, and a figure slammed hard into the doorframe.

I looked back and got a bad scare. It was my childhood friend Morgan Clayton.

He had both hands pressed hard over his head, blood dripping down between his fingers, drip after drip, staining a big patch of his white undershirt red.

"Morgan! What happened to you? Did somebody rob you on the road?" I dropped the fodder and rushed to hold him up.

Morgan sucked air through his teeth against the pain, baring them as he swore. "Robbed my ass! I... I just went to Fairview to tell Carrie how I feel about her."

I froze. "She did that?"

Morgan bellowed, beside himself. "Damn right she did! I'd barely said I was sweet on her when she grabbed a rock off the ground, big as half a bowl, and smashed it straight down on my head!"

I looked at the three-inch gash on Morgan's head, and it made my skin crawl.

"Is she crazy or what? She used to be such a good, quiet girl!" Morgan kept cursing, the towel pressed against his head.

I stood in the cowshed, breathing the sharp reek of manure, and a heavy worry welled up in me all at once.

Was it her parents cursing her out in public that day that had done something to her? She couldn't have been shaken so badly that something had gone wrong in her mind, could she?

The next morning I was up at first light, too worried to eat, and slipped into Fairview like a thief.

I didn't dare go through the front gate. I crouched behind the big elm outside the wall of the Fox place, feeling every bit the sneak, and peered in.

The moment my head cleared the trunk, a shrill string of curses cut across from the far side of the wall.

"This land has always been ours! Don't push your luck!" It was Carrie's voice, but pitched so loud it sounded like a stranger's.

I turned toward the sound. It was Carter Lambert from next door, working a shovel, scraping the earthen ridge that divided the two plots over onto the Fox family's side.

Carter was a scoundrel known up and down the county. He kept digging and sneered, "Your name written on the deed for this? I'm taking it today. What are you gonna do about it?"

Carrie's parents stood off to one side, faces gone dark, but Carter's temper had them cowed, angry and silent.

That was when Carrie charged straight at him.

She wrenched the shovel out of his hands and flung it far into the drainage ditch.

Then she snatched up half a red brick from the ground, a jagged, sharp-cornered piece of it, and pressed it against her own forehead without a flicker of hesitation.

"Take one more step. Go on, try it. You lay claim to half a foot of this land today and I'll die right here at your door, and your family will never know a peaceful day again!" Her eyes were wide open, like a she-leopard gone rabid.

The reckless, life-be-damned look of her drove Carter back two steps. He muttered "crazy woman" under his breath, grabbed his shovel, and slunk off.

I stayed hidden behind the tree, staring, dumbstruck. Was this really the same Carrie who used to blush just talking to someone?

Right then she turned her head, and that fierce gaze swept straight to the elm where I was hiding.

"What are you doing skulking back there? Get out here!" she barked.

I shuffled out from behind the tree, awkward, and stood on the dirt road with no idea what to do with my hands.

When she saw it was me, she froze for a beat, plain as day, something complicated crossing her eyes.

Then, right after, that flicker was buried under cold contempt.

She looked me up and down and let out a sneer. "Well. If it isn't Nathaniel Dickerson. What, come to our village to beg? Or did you come to have a good laugh at my expense?"

The bitterness in her voice stabbed into me like a thorn driven deep.

I felt my pride thrown to the ground and stamped on. I didn't say a word. I turned and walked away without looking back.

Later, the young people in the village all decided there was no future in farming, and they started heading off in groups to the big cities down south to find factory work.

I went too. I figured I'd carve out something for myself in the city, and reality slapped me hard across the face.

I ended up in a sweatshop making hardware parts, fifteen hours a day in the deafening roar of the machines, worked so hard I couldn't straighten my back.

At the end of the year the workshop suddenly boiled over into chaos.

"The boss ran off! They hauled every machine out overnight!" The workers' furious shouts echoed through the emptied-out plant.

A whole year of work and I didn't see a single cent of pay. In the end I scraped together enough from picking through scrap to buy a hard seat on the green-skinned train, and I slunk home.

The moment I pushed open the door of the house and saw my parents' heads gone white and the roof letting in the wind, the shame in me was so heavy I wanted to crawl into a crack in the ground.

My parents didn't reproach me, not one word. My mother carried over a steaming bowl of dried noodles with two fried eggs nested on top.

My father drew on his pipe and sighed. "Nathaniel, money's gone, it's gone. But you're at the age where you ought to be starting a family. We're poor, sure, but a man's still got to leave a son behind."

Holding that bowl of noodles, I let the tears fall in big drops into the broth, and all I could do was nod, hard, and promise.

But matchmaking was never that easy.

Aunt Leila Lambert, the matchmaker, wore her legs down to nothing, taking me around to meet a few girls from the neighboring villages.

The moment they stepped into our yard and saw the half-collapsed pigpen and the blackened dirt walls, they left without so much as a sip of water.

"With the state of your place, I'll say it plain, even a mouse would come in the door and leave in tears. What decent family's grown daughter would jump into a pit like this?" Aunt Leila sat on our heated brick bed, mouth twisted, shaking her head.

My parents kept their heads down, wearing forced smiles, begging Aunt Leila to please keep looking a little longer.

Aunt Leila picked up the chipped stoneware bowl, took a sip of water, and sat there mulling it over for a long stretch without a word.

The room went so quiet you could hear a mouse gnawing wood in the corner.

Then she set the bowl down hard on the table and dropped her voice. "Truth is, there's still one girl left. Only thing is, I'm afraid your Dickerson family wouldn't dare marry her."

My father jumped in fast. "Whose girl? As long as she doesn't want a bride price, we don't care if she's missing an arm or a leg!"

Aunt Leila leaned in, all secretive. "Carrie Fox, from Fairview! Now that's a hellcat and a wild woman known for miles around!"

The name hit me and something in my chest lurched. The matches dropped right out of my hand onto the floor.

Aunt Leila launched into it, spit flying. "That girl's clean out of her mind these days. Every man who's gone to propose, no matter how good his prospects, she beats and curses him straight out the door. Day before yesterday she took a broom to the son of the richest man in Westbrook and left his head covered in lumps!"

She shot me a glance. "Nathaniel, if you don't care whether you live or die, if you've got the guts, your aunt'll take you over tomorrow and you can try your luck!"

My parents went pale as they listened, staring at each other, neither of them daring to say a word.

I shut my eyes. Behind them flashed the sight of Carrie Fox, that wild look on her face as she smashed a brick against her own forehead. Then I looked at my parents, at those eyes full of hope and helplessness.

I gritted my teeth and gave a hard nod. "I'll go! As long as she dares to marry, I dare to take her!"

The next day I carried two packs of the cheapest brown sugar and a bundle of low-grade glass noodles, and, steeling myself, followed Aunt Leila through the gate into the Fox family's yard.

The moment I stepped inside, the air in that yard was downright strange.

I'd braced myself for a broom to the head. Instead, the second Carrie Fox's parents saw me, their eyes lit right up.

Her father charged straight over, snatched the sorry little gifts out of my hands, warm as if he'd just laid eyes on the man who'd saved his life. "Nathaniel's here! Come in, come in, get up on the kang and warm yourself!"

Her mother flew into a fluster, dug out an unopened tin of tea, and steeped me a whole big mug of it.

The strangeness of it broke a cold sweat down my back and set my mind spinning.

Before long the door curtain to the inner room lifted and Carrie Fox came out.

She had a handful of sunflower seeds in her fist, cracking them as she came and spitting the shells right down by my feet.

She rolled her eyes, her voice sharp and grating. "Well now, who do we have here. Turns out it's the penniless wretch who can't even earn back his own bride money. What, you come crawling to my house to sponge off us?"

My face went hot and red, both hands clamped down on the hem of my shirt, and it took me a long time to force out, "I... I've come to propose."

Carrie Fox stopped cracking seeds all at once and stared me down, something in her eyes I couldn't put a name to.

Just when I was sure she was about to go for the broom, she let out a cold laugh. "Fine. I'll marry you."

The instant those words left her, the room went dead silent.

Her parents, like they were terrified she'd take it back, shot up off their stools.

"Really? Carrie, you agreed? Oh, thank the Lord above!" Her mother's tears spilled over, and she turned and started rummaging through the drawer for the household register.

Her father gripped my hand tight, tripping over his own words. "Nathaniel, let's set the date right now! The eighth of next month, that's a lucky day! We won't take a cent of bride price, and we'll send her off with a dowry too! Two sewing machines and a bicycle!"

I sat there watching this whole absurd scene play out and felt like a condemned man being marched to the execution ground. My whole life was about to be ruined for good in the hands of this hellcat.

The day I got married, the sky hung gray and heavy, and the cold wind bit at my face until it hurt.

For once, our village was lively, but my own yard carried a strange, unspeakable air.

Not a single one of the men Carrie had once beaten dared come to the feast. Word was they were afraid the madwoman would flip the tables mid-banquet.

The ones sitting in the yard were all elderly relatives and children too young to understand.

When the bride was brought through the door, nobody dared crowd in to tease the bridesmaid, and even the man on the horn kept his distance.

Carrie sat in a cheap red silk padded jacket, the red veil over her head, still and quiet on the heated brick bed of the wedding room.

Outside, everyone at the feast kept their voices low, eyes flicking again and again toward the window of the wedding room, like they were guarding against a thief.

The braised pork roast and glass noodles at the feast were usually fought over, but today everyone ate fast, scraped their bowls clean, and nobody dared linger. One by one they found excuses and hurried off.

By nine that night the whole yard had gone dead silent, and even the village dogs had stopped barking.

I carried in a basin of water for washing feet, stood at the door of the wedding room, and drew several deep breaths before my trembling hands pushed open that wooden door with the double-happiness paper on it.

Only one red candle was lit inside, the light dim, the smell of mothballs in the corner mixing with cheap face cream until I could hardly breathe.

The red quilt on the brick bed was laid out neat and even, and Carrie sat there under the red veil, not moving at all.

I set the basin down on the ground and turned to grab my worn old bedroll from the corner.

My heart was up in my throat, terrified she'd suddenly pull half a brick out from under the quilt and hurl it at me.

"That, um... there's no feeling between us yet, you take the bed, I'll sleep on the floor, and we'll grow into it slowly." I stammered the silence apart, my voice landing oddly loud in the empty room.

The room stayed quiet for a full ten seconds.

Then, all at once, a sharp whip of sound.

Carrie's hand shot up and yanked the cheap red veil off her head, flinging it hard into my face.

The red cloth slid down my face, and I stumbled back a step, my back pressed flat against the cold dirt wall.

By the wavering candlelight I saw her eyes rimmed red, tears dropping like a string of beads snapped loose, but the look in them was vicious enough to eat a man alive.

Her chest heaved hard, and she stared at me through clenched teeth, her voice shaking from how tightly she was holding it down.

"Nathaniel Dickerson, you are an absolute bastard!" She jabbed a finger right at my nose.

I was knocked completely dumb, my mind gone blank.

I opened my mouth and had no idea what to say.

Then she let out one wretched laugh, tears striking down her cheeks onto the bright red wedding clothes, and growled at me low, word by word: "If I hadn't pretended, with your family dirt-poor and rattling with nothing, how could a bastard like you ever have married me?!"