Refusing A Marriage Proposal

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After taking a few photos, -- yes they did the 'fake photos' too. She cracked the wine bottle open and poured herself a glass.

The sky had gradually changed its hue. From this small patch of grass, it wasn't evident for the street lights next to their building automatically turn on as soon as the sun hides for the day.

"Mei Mei's older brother, the one that came earlier was the one that was arranged to marry you when you were nineteen, right?"

"Hmm," she poured her glass more wine. "It was an arranged marriage out of pity."

"A marriage out of pity? How does it come about?"

"I told you before that when Mei Mei and I became friends, so were our fathers. They even had a few business dealings. And then shit happened…"

"You are not going to tell me about this shit that happened, right?"

"No."

Bella nodded her head. She understood the need for keeping things in private when one isn't ready to open up. She knew Laurie had a lot of scars that she was hiding and she wouldn't like to touch the sour topic of her father's death.

Without actually talking about it, she knew she was talking about her father's death, for it was the only one that could trigger that hurt in her eyes.

"Hideaki was acting like I did him wrong -- prolly I did. For no one told me before that honestly could hurt. I was taught that honesty was the best policy. Apparently, when it comes to the matter of the heart, it has a different set of rules. I wasn't informed." her laughter sounded hollow.

"You are here now. Whatever happened in the past you can do something to fix it."

"Don't be naive, Bella. Those things only happened in your book; the things that went wrong in the past were referred to as regrets because you cannot fix them."

"Aren't you being too pessimistic?"

"I'm not. I am being realistic." she scoffed sarcastically, "We were supposed to just take photos, why are we talking about gloomy things. Show me the photos you took!"

She crawled at the end of the picnic blanket to reach the SLR camera mounted on the tripod. She unscrewed it from the tripod and crawled back to her friend.

She showed her the photos they took. The supposedly 'fake photos' ended up looking extremely good that they both agreed that it was the best photo post on Facebook for her mother to see.

"I can see the allure of these fake photos and why people are doing it. It's just like the saying of fake it till you make it. You do these fake shots, and if you get lucky you'll have the money shot."

"Hmm… where should I send these photos?"

"Aren't you going to post it on your social media? Just tag me on Facebook so my mother could see it. After running away, I could at least make her at ease in knowing that I am laughing, even though the laughter in the photo was 'fake'."

"Okay, I will post them now."

"These sandwiches you made are good," she was eating her second serving while drinking wine as though they were water.

"Posted." she put down her phone and stared at her face, "So, tell me, why did you not marry Hideaki?"

Her mouth was full because of the sandwich, thus, she didn't answer. After swallowing the food she was chewing she pushed it down with the wine.

"Why are you asking about Hideaki? Do you like him?"

A gasp ran through her when she noticed Bella blush and avert her eyes. "Oh, what do we have here? A girl who has a crush on the one person she should not be crushing."

She was annoyed that she got caught. However, getting caught and admitting it were two different things. She has no plan to admit to anything.

"How did you know Hideaki? If you have a crush on him, today wasn't the first time you met here, right?"

"I saw them and his friends in that basement. They sometimes came up and used the kitchen, or they would hang out on the sofa there," she cocked her head to the direction of the open receiving area.

"Hideaki? That's news to me. The Hideaki I know doesn't hang out in this house. He used to bury himself in his textbook. He has a lot of girls though. That's the reason why I said, you shouldn't have a crush on him."

"I don't care about his girls. It's not like I am interested to know him." she rolled her eyes, downing the wine in her wine glass to the last drop.

"So, what your saying was, you don't want to hear things about Hide-nii."

A burst of laughter rolled on her throat seeing the conflicted emotion in Bella's face. "I was fourteen turning fifteen, I think --" she tilted her head trying to remember the correct time but she wasn't sure if her memory was right about dates, so she just shrugged it off.

"He was seventeen at the time -- about to graduate high school. He has his eyes set on a university, finishing his degree, and working at his father's company when he was given the terrible task of being my fiance," she scoffed softly at the memory.

"I wanted to know why you didn't marry him." Her action of being indifferent about the topic has abruptly changed.

"Well, it was the same reason. I wasn't in love with him and at that time I was dating my first love. Why would I agree to a fixed marriage to someone I don't see as my potential partner."

"That's a valid reason," she nodded in agreement.

"Of course, it was a valid reason! That's why I could not understand why Hideaki was asking like I cheated on him or something." she poured her glass more wine but the bottle was already empty.

She lay down her head on Bella's lap, "Truly I don't understand. Was it because I accepted the ring before saying no?"

"Wh -- what?"

She was startled when Bella pushed her head off her lap.