Secret in the Stables

by GardenPrincess21

The year is 1874. The place is a sugar plantation in Western Virginia. Miss Isabella de Swan, who just came of age, is expected to marry a man of high society. But what happens when she falls in love with a mere stable boy? All Human

1. Wishes and Expectations

Secret in the Stables

Chapter 1. Wishes and Expectations

(BPOV)

The year was 1874 in Western Virginia. I was the only child of a highly wealthy sugar plantation owner and about to turn 17. Which meant I was expected to get married soon. However, I have yet to meet a man of stature to capture my interest. A wealthy man who's favorite conversation subject is who makes the most money. A man with a title who sees me as more than just a pretty face and a slender body. A man who is well know and well connected, a man in general to treat me as more than just a woman with money.

My mother, Madame Renee de Swan, trained me from birth how to be a proper lady. Stand and sit up strait, sit still, don't run around like a wild animal, keep clean at all time, stay quiet as a mouse, don't speak unless spoken to, and be careful with my tone and with what I say. I felt like I was being stifled with rules, regulations, proprieties, and expectations. When inside, I knew I wasn't like that at all. I was a free spirit who needed to be free. But alas, society was an invisible cage. One I could never break free from.

Now my father, Charles de Swan, he understood me greatly. When I was a child and my mother went out on one of her little private tea parties and such, he'd let me go out into the gardens and actually let me be a child. Run around, play with the butterflies, imagine I'm a bird flying through the air, get dirty. Sometimes he would even come out and play with me and get dirty himself. My beloved father always tried everything he could to make sure I had at least a small, real childhood.

But I wasn't a child anymore. I was a young woman now. A woman whom people expected things of. But I didn't want any of the things others wanted for me. Yes, I'd love to get married and hopefully have children someday. But I was to get married to a man I knew and loved, not some stranger with a fancy title in front of his name or a pile of money beneath his feet. I didn't care about stature or money or propriety. But being who I am, I don't really have much of a say in the matter.

All I can do now is wait and see who I'm fated to spend the rest of my life with, and I can only pray there's love somewhere in there.