I nod, grateful for the change of subject, and Vivian leaves me to unpack. The room is small, especially compared to the near-palatial bedroom I left at home, in my father’s grand Southern mansion. But it feels special. It feels like it’s really mine… no one can tell me how to decorate here, or demand I be downstairs at a certain time for dinner, or judge how long I stay in here reading or watching television. I’m on my own, this is my space, and for the first time, I feel more like an adult than I ever have before.
I hang my dresses in the closet, fold up my jeans and blouses and underwear in the narrow dresser, arrange my bookson the built-in shelves, set my laptop on the desk. I'm putting away the last of my clothes when my phone buzzes with a text. My stomach drops before I even look at the screen, knowing somehow that it's going to ruin this fragile sense of peace I've been building no matter who it’s from.
It's from my father.
Arrived safely?
I type back quickly:Yes. Just finished unpacking.
His response is immediate:Good. Thaddeus will be visiting this weekend. Friday evening. He'll make dinner reservations. Wear something appropriate.
My fingers tighten around my phone. I want to throw it across the room and watch it shatter against the wall. Instead, I take a slow breath and type:Okay.
Three dots appear, then disappear, then appear again. Finally:Remember our agreement, Savannah. Two years of graduate school in exchange for your cooperation. Don't make me regret giving you this opportunity.
I don't respond. There's nothing to say that won't make things worse.
When I emerge from my room, Vivian is in the kitchen making tea. She takes one look at my face and frowns. "You okay?"
"Fine." I paste on the smile I've perfected over years of Charleston society events. "Just my father checking in."
Vivian doesn't look convinced, but she doesn't push. "Tea? I have, like, fifteen different kinds. I'm kind of obsessed."
"That sounds perfect."
We spend the rest of the afternoon talking, and I find myself relaxing despite the lingering weight of my father's text. Vivian is easy to be around, funny and warm and refreshingly honest. She tells me about her family in San Francisco, her obsession with Renaissance art, and her terrible ex-boyfriend who she finallydumped last semester of university before coming here. She asks about Charleston, my undergraduate years at USC, what drew me to archaeology.
I tell her about the one time I went to Europe, when my parents took me on a tour of London, Paris, Greece, and Rome as a part of my “finishing” education. My mother wanted to shop endlessly, and my father was tied up with business most of the time, but I spent as much time as I could in the museums. I loved the art, but the history exhibits took up most of my attention, especially the ones about archaeology and all of the things that have been found that way. I went home and devoured every book I could find about ancient civilizations, taking Greek and Latin classes as part of my curriculum even though my parents thought that was as useless as the rest of my education.
After all, history and ancient languages don’t offer much toward becoming the perfect future society wife. But I don’t tell Vivian any of that. I don’t want my baggage following me here, and I’d rather she see me as the person I’ll get to be for two years than the one that I’ve been for all the ones that came before.
"That's amazing," Vivian says when I finish. "You're going to do incredible things here, Savannah. I can tell."
I want to believe her. I want to believe that these two years will be enough, that I can pack a lifetime of dreams into twenty-four months before I have to give it all up and become Mrs. Thaddeus Whitmore.
But I don't say that. Instead, I smile and change the subject, and we talk until the sun sets over the city.
As tired as I am from the trip and settling in, I end up laying awake in bed that night, unable to sleep despite my exhaustion.I keep replaying the conversation I had three months ago, in my father's study in Charleston, the air conditioning fighting a losing battle against the June heat. I’d just gotten my acceptance letter to NYU—I’d sent off the application in secret, thinking that maybe it was better to ask forgiveness than permission. It wasn’t as fruitful of a strategy as I’d hoped.
"Absolutely not." My father didn’t even look up from the papers on his desk when he said it. "We've discussed this, Savannah. You have your degree. That's more than sufficient."
"It's a master's program, Daddy." I hate how my voice sounds—pleading, desperate. I'm twenty-two years old and I'm begging like a child. "At NYU. One of the best programs in the country for classical archaeology. I've already been accepted."
"And I'm very proud of you for that." He sets down his pen and finally looks at me, his expression the same one he uses in business negotiations—calm and unmovable. "But what you should be thinking about is your future… about being a wife. That’s what your mother and I have raised you to be, someone who contributes to this family, who marries well and carries on the work that I’ve done here through the connections you can make?—”
"This is my future." The words come out sharper than I intend, and I see my father's jaw tighten. I force myself to soften my tone, to be the obedient daughter he expects. "Please. Just two years. I'll come home every holiday, I'll?—"
"Savannah." He stands, walking around the desk to face me. He's not an exceptionally tall man, but he's always seemed larger than life to me, filling every room he enters with his presence. "I understand that you're disappointed. But you're a Beauregard. You have responsibilities. Obligations."
"To who?" The question bursts out before I can stop it. "To you? To Thaddeus? What about my obligations to myself?" Just saying Thaddeus’s name makes me cringe. I know my fatherwants me to marry his protege. To be a wife to the man who has filled a role that my father has never been able to satisfy any other way—that of a son and heir. It’s the last thing I want.
Thaddeus is charming and handsome and the picture of a wealthy Southern gentleman, but to me something has always felt… wrong about him. I don’t want to be with him at all, much less marry him. Nothing about him is attractive or desirable to me. But none of that matters to my father.
His expression hardens. "Don't be selfish. This marriage is important. Thaddeus is going to take over significant portions of the business when I retire. He needs a wife who can support him, who understands her role. Not someone gallivanting around New York playing archaeologist."
The dismissal in his voice makes my chest tight.Playing archaeologist. As if my degree, my passion, my dreams are nothing more than a child's game.
My father turns away, and I know the conversation is over… unless I say something that will catch his attention. Something that will make him listen to me, understand how important this is to me.
