After a ton of hard work, I successfully fulfilled my duties as the goddess during the Founder’s Festival.
“Viola, you were amazing! It was such a touching performance!” both my mother and Jamie exclaimed. They were so moved by both my acting and the effort I put in that they started crying. They weren’t the only ones to praise my work, a lot of people praised me as well. I felt like my performance as the goddess was my greatest achievement to date.
“Viola, thank you. You did amazing,” Phil said. He showered me with more praise than anyone else, and he thanked me over and over again.
I’d spent my entire life running away from my problems and responsibilities, so I’d never worked this hard at anything. But doing so for the Founder’s Festival was an experience worth treasuring. It wasn’t all fun and games, and there were a lot of times I thought it to be so painful I wanted to quit. But now, I could say from the bottom of my heart that I’m glad I took on the role.
In the past, I was always hiding in Phil’s shadow, staring down at the ground. But now, I wanted to boldly stand by his side and live my life looking forward.
✦ ✦ ✦
Time flew by, and it had already been a month since Phil and I got married. Now, my name was Viola Lawrenson, and I lived in House Lawrenson’s manor. There were a lot of things I still wasn’t used to, but both my new family and servants treated me very well. I didn’t want for anything at all. The Duke and Duchess Lawrenson were often in their duchy, so I usually spent my days with Phil and Lord Cedric. Of course, Little Vio would be with us as well.
One afternoon, Jamie and Rex visited the manor, and I had tea with them in the garden.
“This was supposed to be your wedding gift. I’m sorry that it took me so long to give it to you,” Jamie said.
“It’s all right. Thank you, this is a great present.”
Apparently, both of them prepared a wedding gift together, advising each other the entire time. However, since it was a custom order, it wasn’t finished in time for the actual wedding. When they told me that part of the story, they had matching dejected expressions and slumped shoulders.
“Thank you so much, to both of you. I’ll treasure it,” I continued.
“You’re welcome,” Jamie replied. “Speaking of which, is Lord Phillip not home today?”
“He isn’t. He’s attending an acquaintance’s birthday party.”
Phil left in the morning and told me that he would be back in the evening.
“Huh, I didn’t know about that,” Rex hummed. “I’ve been pretty busy lately too, so I haven’t been able to meet up with Phillip at all.”
It had been a long time since I saw Rex as well. He worked as a civil official and recently received another promotion. He’s been the subject of the other noble’s gossip, saying that he’s one of the youngest nobles to reach a high position in the country.
“And you know what, my parents have been nagging at me about getting married, saying that it’s about time for me to settle down,” Rex sighed.
“I can’t blame them. You’re going to be twenty-five soon.”
Rex was slightly past the average age men got married, and he was supposed to take over his family as Earl Dowland. Considering his status, I understood why his parents were starting to get nervous about the fact that he was a perpetual bachelor.
“Lord Rex, you seem the type to have really high standards.”
“Oh? It’s that obvious? I simply can’t find a woman who would be a suitable wife for me.”
“I’m not surprised...”
I wasn’t joking when I said that. It was undoubtedly a difficult task to find a woman who could be Rex’s equal. Not only was the Dowland family one of the more important noble families in the kingdom, but he himself had great looks and an elite job. His only flaw was his personality.
“So many people have approached me about giving their daughter a chance that rejecting them all takes me the entire day. On occasion, I look through what information the matchmaker has on the daughters and guess whose name I saw in one of the folders? Natalia! I couldn’t stop laughing.”
Rex chuckled and added that marrying Natalia would be a pretty amusing experience. However, as I took another sip of tea, I thought that it would take Rex a while before he finally put a ring on it.
“All right, enough about me,” Rex said. “I wanna hear about you two.”
“I plan on marrying Hugo next spring, but nothing interesting has happened between us. Nothing that would amuse you, Lord Rex. It’s been very peaceful.”
“Oh, please. You don’t have to say it as if I’m always looking for trouble or poking my nose into other people’s business.”
“Aren’t you, though?”
From their interaction, it was plain to see that Jamie was also starting to get really familiar with who Rex was as a person. They both turned to look at me.
“So, how’s married life?” Jamie asked. “Have things been different?”
“I was pretty curious about that too,” Rex added. “Has Phillip been on cloud nine?”
They both leaned forward as they asked, pressuring me to answer them. I had a feeling I knew what they wanted to say, and I shook my head.
“Nothing changed,” I said.
“Oh, stop, as if. Living together makes you closer in lots of ways.”
“I’m not lying. Absolutely nothing has changed.”
I was telling the truth. Since we got married to each other, we were obviously living under the same roof. That was a change, for sure, but my relationship with Phil was the same. In fact, that was exactly the issue.
“Jeez, Viola. You’re making a face like you’ve only gone as far as a kiss,” Jamie joked.
“Well, that’s exactly it,” I replied with a solemn nod.
After I said that, both Jamie and Rex widened their eyes. “You’ve gotta be kidding” was written all over their faces.
“Wait, really?”
“Yes, really.” I repeated it again and again, and every time I said it my heart started to hurt.
“You’re joking, right? It’s already been a month since you two got married,” Jamie exclaimed.
“What, is Phil chickening out again?” Rex asked.
“No, that’s not it,” I said. I shook my head and heaved a heavy sigh. It was terribly embarrassing, but I’d been agonizing over this problem by myself for over a month now. I’d wanted to ask someone for advice, and these two would certainly offer me some.
I gave a tight squeeze to the skirt of my dress and said, “To tell the truth, I told him no.”
“Huh?”
“Because I said no, we didn’t go any further.”
It was really embarrassing to confess this to my friend and my cousin. It was hard to find the right words. But both of them were quick on the uptake and understood what I was trying to say.
“Are you saying that when you said ‘no’ because you were embarrassed, Lord Phillip took it at face value?”
I nodded at Jamie’s question. After our wedding ceremony, I tidied myself up and went into the bedroom where Phil was waiting for me. Things were fine up until that point. I didn’t think that there were any issues after that either. However, halfway through, I said no. Though I didn’t mean anything by it, Phil’s hand stopped immediately.
“I’m sorry,” he murmured, making a trouble and hurt expression. After that, he walked away from me. Our first night together as a married couple ended without anything happening, except for there now being an awkward atmosphere between us.
“It’s been a month since then and nothing has happened...”