This is an automated archive made by the Lemmit Bot.

The original was posted on /r/nosleep by /u/According-Oven-7597 on 2024-09-16 04:37:42+00:00.

I’m getting married. The person I’m marrying owns many shops in town. My mom married my dad when she was 16. I’m already 19, so I should get married.

He’s a bit of ugly, but that’s not a problem to my family because, compared to my family, he’s wealthy, and my younger brother needs money to get married. My family tell me I’ll have three children, and live in a beautiful house, if things go well.

The only problem is, he’s not my lover.

My lover isn’t a good person, and she admits that. She think the reason is that her father isn’t a good person either. He drinks, and when he’s not drinking, he beats his wife and children.

But she is beautiful and has great ambitions. She says, “I’m going to Oxford to study.” I tell her it’s impossible, that she doesn’t even know where Oxford is.

She says, “I’ll go.” If people ask, we’ll say we aren’t lesbians.She once went to a school for internet addiction recovery for a year. She hated it there; it was hell. She doesn’t let me say I’m a lesbian because if I admit it, I’ll end up going there too.

“You should get married and have kids, not be with me,” she told me when we first kissed.

Back then, I knew I wasn’t going to finish high school because my younger brother’s middle school fees were a huge expense. I’m not a man, and getting an education is useless compared to getting married.

Everyone says this, everyone believes this.So, we can’t not believe it either.

But she doesn’t. She doesn’t believe that’s our fate, which is why she’s seen as a bad person in our little town. All I had were those months after I graduated from middle school. During that time, you can drink as much as you want and run away from home because no one cares if you go to high school or not. I used to be a good student, and that time all I want to do was study to get first place. But I didn’t want do that anymore, because three months later, I wouldn’t be able to study anymore.

So, I spent three months messing around with her. My parents didn’t care, as long as I came home every night. If I didn’t get pregnant, then there was no problem. If I did get pregnant, they could force the father to marry me,then there was no problem.

Three months later, she disappeared again.

I knew she probably went back to that school. I really don’t understand why some people would rather spend 100,000 a year to torture their child instead of addressing their own issues.

She never told me the details. Our internet wasn’t developed, so I still don’t know exactly what happened, and maybe I don’t want to. But if reincarnation exists, I just want her to be born as my daughter. My fiancé wants a son, so I don’t know if I’ll have a daughter in the end.

The next time I saw her was at the police station. The police said she was cruel because she tortured her father for three days before he died. He was electrocuted and hadn’t eaten anything for three days.

But she wanted to see me, so I came.

“You’re smarter than anyone I know, so you should understand that I had to do it.”

I knew why. She used to have beautiful long hair, but it was all cut off when she went to that school. Just like how she used to love drawing, but after learning how much art classes cost per year, she could no longer draw. To her, this was the only way to be free.

I’m different. Do I care about free will? No, because caring only brings me pain.

I used to love collecting stones because they were free. The pebbles by the river were actually very special, just no one noticed. But she was the only one who talked to me about it. My fiancé doesn’t care about that. When he talks to me, it’s about his business. He doesn’t care about intangible things, like the sky or love.

Of course, I’ll always remember our kiss, but you can only kiss, not marry. We both understand that better than anyone.

“I just… I just made him experience what I went through at that school. And the electric current was only a third of what I endured. I told him if I went back there, I would die, but he didn’t listen. I guess he never experienced what I did.”

I guess I’m not a good person either because I didn’t save her. I was working in a clothing store at the time. Living at home suffocated me, so I never went back. I’d sleep on a mat on the floor of the store at night. If I had gone back, we could’ve talked. I don’t know where Oxford is, and I don’t know if I could ever get there because you need to fly. I’ve never seen an airplane in my life. I don’t even know how they fly. Once, I saw a diagram of a plane in a magazine, but whether it flies vertically or horizontally, we still have no answer.

But together, we always found a way. I asked her if there was anything else she wanted, and she shook her head.

“You once said you wanted to be a writer. I think you can do it because you’re much smarter than me. I once told you to get married and have kids, but I think you don’t need that after all.”

You see, I really am not a good person because I let her down. All I can do is write this .

Once, after drinking beer, she told me that when people die, they don’t go to heaven or hell. We won’t see God. We’ll just go to the stars. I said that’s something you say to trick little kids. She said no, and when the time comes, you won’t need a spacesuit because you won’t need a body anymore.

So, when I found a beautiful little stone at my doorstep, I knew it was her way of saying farewell.