"Don't you take that tone with me, Monica."
That was mother. Monica had just added the wrong ingredient into the donkers they were routinely making. She had added some beans. Mother got all mad and was currently watching Monica pick out every one of them. "I've told you very many times how to make donkers, why don't you listen? If you don't want to listen then you will lose out form your own benefit!" she scolded. Of course this meant that she would not be able to teach a daughter of my own how to do the 'womanly' things. "I would rather be out milking the cows like my best friend Levi, than sitting in this sweltering hot kitchen." She muttered. "It's not like I'm going to follow in your footsteps, and force my children against their will to not be educated and make them cook or clean, for I am totally against that." Of course Monica would never say that to her mother's face, so she stood in silence while her mom bickered on by herself.
Monica was thinking of what Levi said to her the other day, about how his brother asked his father why he never birched him 5, 6, or 8 times but only 7 if he wasn't superstitious. Then Levi told her the whole town only birches 7 times, never more, never less. This made her wonder if her dad Timothy ever birched her brother, Scott. If so that really made her quite sad, and wondrous. "Levi said I should get over it because it happens all the time." So, that kept Monica occupied all during supper. She hadn't even realized that her mom had already called Scott and Timothy in for dinner, or that she had already eaten half of that night's dinner. Timothy was giving Scott a speech about what happened in the town meetings and what he would have to do in there. Monica took the opportunity while every one was pre-occupied, to go up to my room, unnoticed.
Monica woke up startlingly in the middle on the night. Scott was sitting on her bed, at first she thought this had been what woke her up, until she took in the yelling from outside, it sounded as if the whole town was awake. She then noticed that Scott looked extremely scared. Monica asked him what was going on, he seemed unable to make a sound. He was moving his mouth, but nothing came out. I told him to get a grip on himself, and he slowly started telling her, like talking would get him into trouble. "Le-Levi's dad was yeh-yelling, a-and it woke me up...then.. then he started banging on our door,... an-and ... and then dad woke up and started ... he started yelling at Moses, for waking him in the middle of the ni-night. And I he-heard him tell dad tha-th-that a man had come riding in to town.... on a .. a hor-horse.
"And he tol-told everybody that the the British were coming to att-attack our town.
Mo-most people believed the rider, bu-but dad didn't want to, bu-but he he's going into a war." Monica could hardly believe her ears. It just never occurred to her that a small town like hers would ever have to actually go to war.
That night the town had a meeting, it lasted most of the night. All the older guys had gone, woman weren't allowed. Scott wanted to go, but mother wouldn't let him. We were restless and eager the whole night, waiting for dad to come home, so that we could hear what was going to happen. It wasn't until morning when father came back. Scott and Monica were siting on the stairs, watching them in the parlor, Timothy told mom that they were going to fight the redcoats.
Later that day, many very tired looking men were stationed on the common along with my dad. Scott had still put up a fight to go and sign his name on the parchment they were using to see who would be up in battle. Mother still wouldn't let him out of the house.
As Monica watched out of the top most window of the house, where her room was situated, she had seen the men standing there, for about and hour and a half. None of them looked too very pleased to be standing there waiting. Some of the fathers were complaining about the wait. And the men who didn't after all even believe in the first place the British were coming, were threatening to leave and saying that it was pointless to stand there and wait, for they were not coming. Nevertheless they stood there along with the rest of them and waited.
Not long after she could hear the distant sound of drums. All at once everybody became very anxiously stiff, and attentive. They looked more professional, but also with a hint of fear in their faces. The redcoats started to come into view. It was like watching them come out of fog, they were so far back that you could not clearly see all of them. People were waiting for all of them to come into view, they, unlike me did not have a top view and could not see that they went back as far as I could see. There was so many of them. And as thought the common people realizes this they got sincerely scared, since they were outnumbered about fifty to one.
Our fighters were very jumpy and Monica was pretty sure she saw one of the men accidentally fire a single ringing shot into the air, out of nerves. There was a second of complete shock, and there was a stunned silence. Then as if it were going on for an hour there was a mess of muskets firing from all over the field. Monica just couldn't bring herself to watch any longer. It was complete agony to hear men screaming in pain, all around, never mind watching them die. It went on for a while, slowly the shots died lower and lower until there were none and the redcoats had passed.
Monica ran out to find her father. And see if he was okay. She was looking through tens and tens of bloody bodies. She started to cry thinking how she would feel if she saw her father like this. She started to cry even harder, she couldn't find him, and she was starting to think that he had after all survived. it was getting tough to see through her tears, but she did not stop looking, she had to find him, she just ha to. She was thinking that he wasn't gone after all, that he wasn't dead, those thoughts were soon clouded by the dread that she would soon find him lying on the ground somewhere, that she was just being stupid to think that he survived, for he couldn't possibly not have, for all those other people were gone, how could he not? Just then she heard a peircing scream, , it wasn't like the others, she knew this scream. It was Levi's. He must have just found his father, Monica passed him a couple of minutes ago, only have registering it for deep in search for her own father.
My mother was now crying while making dinner. Monica had a bad case of grief and was sitting down at the kitchen table. She couldn't cry. She felt ignorant and evil for not crying, but tears were just not in her. There was the possibility that timothy was dead somewhere, or worse captured and was being tortured by the British. They couldn't find his body, it wasn't anywhere on the grounds. He just wasn't there.
Levi was seemingly mad at her, he wasn't talking to her, and because he was convinced that timothy was out there somewhere or she was just not telling him. And he was jealous that her dad was still alive while his wasn't. Monica just wanted to make him understand that he wasn't alive, and she wasn't hiding from him that he was. he just wasn't there, wasn't anywhere.
"I no longer have a dad" she thought. Mother set the dinner down on the table. Scott mother and Monica all set their plates eat. But none of them ate anything. it was just so strange to eat without timothy.
Just then came a knock at the door, mother was walking towards it, when it opened. The thought flashed through Monica's head that it was her father, but then cutting into that was that the probability to that was close to her liking to cook. And that it was probably just some British guy checking out the houses to see if there was any one left in it. "Oh no! MOM! Don't go near there!" she was panicking. It was all in slow motion, the door was slowly swinging more and more open and then, Timothy walked in.
With a rush of excitement and joy she smiled and then ran over to him and gave him a big hug, her mother burst into tears, and was also hugging him, Scott had heard the commotion, and came running in, a second after and was also in the group hug. "how would I feel if I knew 24 hours ago that I doubted my dad smart enough to get out alive. And that I thought even just for a second that I would never see him again, that he was dead?" she thought. Half ashamed she hugged her father even closer, glad that he was home. But was also worried what Levi would say when he found out Timothy was back. Would he believe her that she had no clue he was still alive? That she was not conceiling from him his where abouts. But for now, she just wanted to savoir the moment that he was home.