Arranged Marriage With Adnan

Chapter 3

The raindrops rolled right down the window. I watched each drop trickle down slowly. I hoped the car ride home would be a quiet one, but it wasn't quite what I had wished for.

"So, how was he?"
"Getting along well?" My dad questioned after.
"Sure," I said, still gazing out of the window.
We pulled into the driveway of our house, "Well, you better start to get ready for dinner," my mom said.

I didn't respond back, I just left the car straight away and went inside to go up to my room. I kicked of my shoes and then took off my dress to put something else on. I didn't know what to wear. I figured that Adnan wouldn't dress up or anything, so I went for more of a simple look.

I looked into my dresser and found a navy blue polka-dot skirt, a light blue top, and a cyan coloured sweater. The shirt was annoyingly long on me, so I tucked it into my skirt. Then, I threw on the sweater and didn't bother to zip it up.

"Hey," my mom walked in.
"What?"
"Your hair's gone flat."
"Oh well, too lazy to fix it."
"Your father is just downstairs, are you ready?"
"Yeah, where are we going?"
My mom laughed a bit, I didn't quite understand, "Oh no. Get ready quickly, it's almost time to go."
"I am ready, mom..."
"You can't go to dinner dressed like that!"
"Why not?"

I didn't see the problem here. Adnan doesn't try at all, so why should I? There was no point in dressing to impress if I didn't want to impress in the first place.

"Mom, what's wrong with my outfit?" I said raising my voice a little.
"Scarlett, listen to me. Remember we bought you that dress last weekend?"
"No."
"You need to wear that one, we picked it out."
"I don't know which one you're talking about," I folded my arms across my chest.
"I'm pretty sure it'd be in your closet, Scarlett."
"Well, where are we going to eat?" I said, trying to change the subject.
"Ah, now we're going a restaurant in London, so that's why I'm rushing you to get dressed. We're going to meet Adnan and his parents there and then we have something special planned for you two!"
"And that is?"
"Oh, you'll see!" She said with a smile on her face.

She left my room and closed the door. I wondered why we had to travel all the way to London just for a dinner. This was all so stupid and frankly the actions of my parents were greatly confusing me.

I didn't want to change, even though the dress my parents picked out was gorgeous. Of course I knew which one she was talking about, I just denied it.

I opened my closet just to take another look at the dress. It was beautiful. It was a crimson lace dress, which ended around knee length. The sleeves touched my elbows and a thin black belt wrapped around my waist. It was nice, but I didn't want to wear it.

Marrying someone you hardly knew felt wrong. Spending the rest of your life with a person who you didn't love seemed like punishment. There was no point in any of this.

I didn't understand why my parents would not allow me to find someone on my own. They wanted me to marry a someone who was handsome, nice, friendly, polite, and who had money. They thought money could make a person happy and that was why they wanted me to marry a rich man when I was older, so that I could be happy. Well, I am not happy. I just wanted to find a nice guy who cared about me, that was it. As long as we loved each other, it would all be fine.

After a while, I heard my name being called, "Scarlett!"
I came to the top of the stairs and peered down below, "What?"
"It's time to go."

I walked down the stairs, my dad was putting on his shoes in the entrance way. He was dressed in black jeans and wore a white dress shirt with a grey sweater overtop. He had his car keys in his hand and was ready to leave the house.

"Liana!" He called my mom.

My mom came down the hall wearing a grey long sleeve dress that almost touched the floor. My parents cleaned up their look quite a bit.

"Scarlett!" My mom shouted, "Why are you not dressed?!"
"I am."
"Get- get changed!"
My dad disagreed, "Liana, we've got no time. If we want to get there, we have to leave now!"
"Paul, she can't go dressed like that!"
"Enough, there's no time, let's go!"

I hopped into the backseat of the car, with my dad driving and my mom in the passenger seat. I was most definitely not looking forward to the drive to London. I braced myself for the long lecture that I was about to receive.