"What do you mean?" Debra's voice rose a pitch higher as a sense of trapped helplessness overcame her.
Her father, Larry, turned to scowled. "Are you questioning me, Deb?"
"Yes, I am. I'm only fifteen, papa. You can't be serious. What about school? What about what I want?"
"Life will continue as it is. You will only be living in a different house."
"I'll be married," she screamed, "to a man that is thirty years older than me."
Her father got up from the table and turned his back to her -his usual method of indicating that the conversation had come to an end.
Debra, however, was not daunted that night. "But he is disgusting. He goes out with disgusting women and he already has two wives."
He stopped at the doorway, walked back to her and explained slowly, "I have agreed to his proposal. You should be glad I did. Sabri is one of the richest man in the city. He has a large home with servants. Believe me, those people can handle your bossiness better than us here."
"Papa no," she begged.
Larry slammed his fist down on the kitchen table and glowered into her face. "What do you think I am doing? Giving you a death penalty? All those stuff that you read about in your romance novels or the stuff you see in the movies, you think those things are real. No. Life is real; not some advertisement of a pretty girl wearing cheap perfume that turns a man's head. Stop day dreaming. I am giving you a better life than most of your classmates will ever have."
"Money isn't everything."
"Oh, you think that shirt you're wearing is free. I pay for the water you drank a few minutes back, I pay for your education, your books, your computer, your shoes and even your cheap perfume."
"Papa, no."
Her father walked away. Debra leaned against the wall, crossed her arm over her chest and slid down to the floor. Her lovely face crumpled into a sob as she again wondered why her father hated her so much? Why would he let her elder sister do whatever she wanted, yet make her life so miserable? Even her brothers had life good. When her mother came to squat down next to her, she kept her face bowed as though shamed.
Her mother, Sarah, touched her hair. "Debbie darling..." No reply. Sarah embraced her and rocked her gently.
Duncan, Larry's brother, came to the house that night and they had a huge row. Duncan demanded, "Give Debra to me. I will take care of her."
Larry laughed. "She is my daughter by legal right. If you take her out of the house, I will report to the police that you've kidnapped her."
Sarah pleaded, "Please Larry. Please, don't punish Debra for my mistake. It was my fault."
Larry snorted, a sound so bitter it elicited both disgust and pity from the other two. "Oh.. so now you think of it as a mistake, eh? Why didn't you think of that when you were fucking my brother in the abandoned playground behind the school? Two of my colleagues saw. You made a laughing stock out of me."
"I asked for a divorce."
Larry pointed a finger right in front of her nose. "I beat those two so bad, they ended up in the emergency ward. Nobody dared to question my loving wife's faithfulness to me after that. If I had divorced you?" The hand returned to his chin in a mocking thoughtful pose, "hmmm, let me see: You'll leave me and marry Duncan. Then I'll be the labeled the hoodwinked husband for the rest of my life. Why, somebody might even eulogize about it at my funeral."
Sarah started to cry. Duncan said, "I will give you the twenty-acre land that grandfather left me in exchange for Debra. The city council is going to develop a residential area there soon. You will get a lot of money out of it."
Larry laughed. "What? That piece of useless tract. How much do you think I can get from that? Two million ringgit? Maybe a unit or two? Sabri has agreed to take me in as a subcontractor in one of his six hundred million ringgit project. On top of it all, I will be known all over Kuching as his father-in-law."
Duncan paled. There was no way he could cover that kind of opportunity with his carpenter's workshop. The built-in furniture business was good and he had eight men working for him, yet even if he were to sign over the business to his brother, it would still not match Sabri's offer.
The door leading to the kitchen swung open and Debra walked in with a tray laden with three glasses of lemonade. Her face had calmed but tell-tale signs of her grief were still evident in her puffy lids and tender nose. She would not look at Larry as she placed the glasses down. Then she walked out without a word.
The whole time, Larry smiled benevolently, and once the kitchen door was shut behind her, he said, "All things considered, I think I did well for her. She will be loved and spoilt by a very rich man. After she has gotten over the fact the brat in her bedroom poster doesn't even know she exists, she will grow to care for him. Funny, isn't that the movie star's name? Brat?"
Sarah looked away from Duncan's crushed face. She knew that Larry only wanted to hurt Duncan, to make him feel utterly helpless because he always treated Debra better after one of their confrontations. But this was too much. This was beyond any punishment he could think of to hurt them. She decided to talk to Debra and to help her make the transition as easy as possible. Debra only had to bear Sabri's attention until she becomes an adult, then she can choose to ask for a divorce if she wanted to. If she were to run away now, she would be thrown into a correctional home and if she went to Duncan, he would end up in jail for kidnapping. Sarah covered her face with her hands as she tried to think of words to use to persuade her daughter that life could be good and wonderful with a rich man. She hoped Debra was too young to see through her exaggerations because if she went into the marriage with better expectations, things would be easier for her. Having made up her mind, Sarah got up and went into the kitchen.
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