Chapter XXII:

Love is a dangerous thing. I have come to see that over many years. Elizabeth is to blame for that. She came along and threw everything into chaos. She stole my heart when she took the ale out of my hand. For the whole night, I tried to find her again. The house wasn’t that big to begin with. But she had just disappeared. I couldn’t focus on what I needed to do.

For quite some time, I could get her out of my head. I didn’t know anything else about her. All I had was her name and her face. She definitely didn’t come from the village. The only place that I could think of was the town. I could go but I needed a good excuse to do it. My fishing job came into good use.

I used to go into town with two other guys to sell the fish. I saw the opportunity and took it. Nobody said a thing. We always got up around five in the morning, walked into town, and set up the booth. The older men did all of the talking. I had to show off the fish, making it look appetizing. Some days were good. Some were not so good. That morning, I kept my eyes out for Elizabeth.

I couldn’t forget her face if I tried. But there are so many people around. If I didn’t find her in time, my plans to get away from them would go off the rails. Still, I needed to focus on my job. Turns out, that I was good at making the fish look appealing. If we failed at sales, it would be because of the other two with me were too busy trying to woo some of the female customers. I could only shake my head. It looked like it was going to be another slow morning for our booth.

“I would like some fish, please.”

I whipped my head around. And there she was. Elizabeth stood on the other side of the booth, smiling. Her distraction grew worse as I stood with my cheeks turning red. My fellow sellers looked at me grinning. I cleared my throat.

“Sure,” I said. “What would you like?” No sooner had those words escaped my mouth, I had placed myself in a trap that I couldn’t get out of.