Deliciously Deadly: a Red Riding Hood retelling

Chapter 2

Thirteen years later

Unlike many of the villagers who dreamed of doing big things in big places, or being told one day that they were a long-lost offspring of some Earl of Piggleton, all Lottie had ever wished for was an ordinary life.

For a village girl such as she, an ordinary life entailed growing up in an ordinary village, marrying an ordinary husband, popping out a dozen ordinary spawns who would go on to marry other ordinary spawns, and so the cycle of ordinary life continued.

Many people confused ordinary with mediocrity. That was not so, at least not for Lottie. Ordinary was safe. Ordinary was going about the day following an organised routine. Ordinary was having food in the belly, but not so much as to suffer from a food coma. It might lack adrenaline rushes and fireworks, but those things didn't always turn out as good as they sounded, anyway.

Yet as a spinster at the ripe old age of twenty, she'd long lost hope of living an ordinary life.

That adventurous night thirteen years ago had left her with a prominent, ugly scar across her left cheek, drawn by an angry swipe of sharp wolf claws when the beast had tackled her to the ground. Only she was too concussed, too dulled by pain everywhere across her body, to have noticed at the time.

Since then, whenever her heart tempted her to rebel, whenever her mind asked her to be curious, whenever any part of her told her to be brave, to stand up for herself, to not cower before other village children who mocked her ugliness, she touched her fingers to the four thick lines of puckered skin and shied away from being the stupid, rebellious seven-year-old she had once been.

Beauty may be skin deep, but some scars ran deeper than they appeared.

"Lottie dear, would you take these to Polly, please?" Grandma hobbled over with a basket of freshly-baked pastries to interrupt her latest bout of self-pity.

The seven-year-old her would've crossed her arms before her chest and tossed her head to the side. Once upon a time, Polly had been her best friend. She was still friendly enough, but given the opportunity, she would gloat about her most perfect marriage to the most handsome Luke, which would have been fine if it wasn't Lottie's one sore point.

Worse still were Polly's friends, who seemed to rely on being nasty to make their ordinary lives feel less ordinary. And all of them used to play with Lottie until 'The Incident'.

It wasn't all their fault. After that fateful night, every parent in the village warned their child away from Lottie. She was bad luck and bad influence rolled up into one bad egg, they said.

Last night, Polly had given birth to their third child. She would be surrounded now by friends and family showering her with congratulations and compliments for her beautiful child. Lottie didn't want to feel jealous and sour, but here she was, still living in the little cottage she grew up in with her grandmother (who she loved, but that was not the point) with no hope of marrying anyone who wasn't widowed and more than twice her age.

Why should she go over there and make herself a laughingstock so all the residents of Wilkin Village could feel better about their ordinary lives again?

"Lottie, you know I would go myself, but my legs—"

"Yes, Grandma." Lottie pulled on her favourite red cape before she accepted the basket from her grandmother.

She could never become one that others would praise as being smart—she bears the mark of stupidity on her face, after all. But she could still be good and obedient. She wasn't seven years old anymore.

➶ ➶ ➶

"Hello there, Lottie." Polly beamed from her bed.

Milling about the cozy little cottage were a few other villagers who'd come bearing gifts and the latest gossip from town. At Polly's greeting, they turned to inspect the village spectacle.