The Memoirs of the Seventh Wife

Excerpt from the Diary of Piya Young October 17th, 2198

My youngest sister- the daughter of my father’s sixth wife- goes on and on about commitment. She wants a promise ring, and sweet words, and longing glances. She’s a dreadfully ugly girl, poor heart, but I could tell her a thing or two that would change her life.

“First,” I’d say, “You have to be a little bit easy. Hint that he can get further with you than he can with the pretty girls. Let him touch your breasts, slide his fingers into you, kiss you all over, but don’t let him stick it in. Hold that part back. You can do that because you’re still young enough that he isn’t getting any from anyone else, anyway, so the best he’s going to get is your chest- flat as it may be.

“Then, when he’s gotten used to getting to touch you, and you see his eyes divert from you a little- that’s when you have to start touching him back. Pet his dick a little, look at him with big doe-eyes and tell him that you don’t know what you’re doing. Let him teach you how he likes to be touched. And get really, really good at touching him like that. The relationship will shift, and you’ll find yourself giving more than you’re getting. But that’s okay because he’s becoming more and more obsessed with you without realizing it. Soon he’ll want to please you because he so appreciates it when you please him. Get really good at giving blowjobs, and you’ll get your pretty words.

“But to get the commitment? For that, you will have to work really hard. Cook for him. Cook for his friends. Bake for his mother, for his mother’s sister wives. Become a servant; bring his father cough drops when he’s sick. Fold the towels while the servants rest their feet and take the dog for a walk so that the page boy has a break. Make everyone important to him become ingratiated to you. They will whisper to him about how kind you are, how sweet, how giving. And in his mind, a switch will flip, and something will click into place.

“Then, disappear, just for a couple of days. Make him wonder where you are, who you’re with, what you’re doing.

“When you get back, he’ll present you with that pretty little box. The one with the commitment in it. The one with the pretty little silver commitment, all shiny and new.”

But I can’t say any of that to her because she doesn’t know that she’s ugly. She can’t go anywhere until she realizes her weakness so that she can overcome it.

There are twelve of us girls. My own mother is Second Wife, and I am First Daughter, so I enjoy a lot more power in the family dynamic than my youngest sister. If I were her, I’d be sucking up to me. The other girls get that, but she doesn’t. It’s her loss, and I’m not just saying that because I’m full of myself (although maybe I am full of myself; I have to be. No one else will ever be full of me).

Of course, we all know the numbers, that there are approximately thirty-seven women for every one man born in this district, and that it’s pretty much the same all over the world. We all know that all of the members of my sex are destined to be either a sister wife or a whore, basically, and I am not going to be a whore. Shanna might be a whore, but that’s not on me. I would help her if she would only admit to her greatest genetic fault- not her linear thinking or her late birth, but her genes- her ugly face.

We have the same father, but it’s like we’re not even related. I am First Daughter and Daughter of Second Wife, both positions of power. In contrast, she is Twelfth Daughter and Daughter of Sixth Wife, both positions of lesser importance- really, no importance at all, if you think about it objectively and not politely-, so perhaps that’s what makes all of the difference between us. She’s almost forgettable, and that’s such a dangerous thing to be for a woman.

First Wife Young is favored, and she represents my- every woman’s- goal. She birthed a son, and she was a First Wife before she birthed my only brother, so she is a Queen among women. She’s important inside of our considerable household, inside of the gate that holds my family and our servants and various close friends and acquaintances, but she is a whispered deity in the gated community that surrounds us.

The birth of a son is always cause for celebration, of course, and even a forgettable Sixth Wife can be elevated to the esteemed position of Son Bearer if she, obviously, bears a son. But for a woman to be fortunate enough to become a man’s First Wife and bear him a son, she becomes famous. She carries the titles of First Wife and Son Bearer, which tie together nicely to create one simple title: Queen. First Wife is Queen Young. There is only one other child-bearing-aged Queen in our village, and she and Queen Young are the best of friends or the worst of enemies, depending on their moods. First Wife is known simply as First Wife by those of us who are related to her, and respectfully as Queen Young by those who live outside of this household.

My brother Wills got married to my best friend Charity, and this made me intensely popular. All of the girls wanted me to insist that Wills marry them next- as if I had any influence over his pick of First Wife or any of the wives he chose next. He loved Charity for the same reason that everyone else loved her- she’s beautiful. Beauty is everything.

The secret is- I did have influence. A lot of it.

I was ugly. I was very, very ugly, but unlike my sister Shanna, I had two nicely powerful positions to cushion that genetic blow. I also had a charming disposition and the guidance of First Wife’s tutorial to guide me into the dating pool, and the gift of beautiful Charity’s friendship to cast a little light on me. I now have options.

“You have the potential to become a First Wife,” First Wife told me long ago, applying considerable mascara to enhance my tiny eyes. “You are smart, cunning, very wise beyond your years. You’re charming and can even appear to be kind when it suits you, but you know how to make yourself a priority without making others think less of you. These are all skills that you must have inherited from your grandmother.” She was speaking of Father’s mother, the Revered Queen Young before her. “I know you never met her, but you are so like her. You have her spirit and her looks. This is part of the reason Father spoils you as he does. He sees his mother in you.”

“How do I become First Wife?” I asked eagerly, discarding this valuable information about my grandmother. Even then, at fifteen, I knew that the best source of water would come from the experienced well and the best advice from she who is, not she who wishes she was.

First Wife put down the mascara wand and looked at me closely. She squinted her pretty eyes and tilted her head, considering me.

“If I had a daughter, I would save this advice for her, as you would be her competition,” she said, giving me the honor of her blunt honesty. If she didn’t care for me, she would woo me with sweet words, but because she loves me, she never uses anything but the truth in her instruction of me. “But because I only have Wills, and my granddaughters are not yet conceived and will not be your competition, I can tell you this. You have to embrace your faults and overcome them, and then you will be on a level playing field with the other First Wife contenders. Next, you must eliminate the competition. This is beneficial to both of us. You will help me bring the prettiest, sweetest, best, most promising girls into this household. Together we will make Wills fall in love with them, one by one, until you are the best prospect left on the market, and I have a harem of the most beautiful, well brought up young daughters-in-law who will give me grand daughters and a grandson.”

I looked at her hopefully, at her crimson hair falling over her pale shoulder, at her perfectly crystalized eyes. She was a sheer beauty to behold, and I loved her in that moment more than I’d ever loved anyone. “What are my faults?” I asked, all innocence.

She took a deep breath. “You’re ugly,” she said flatly.

My heart squeezed tightly in my chest and, at the same time, I felt myself deflating. To be an ugly woman is an awful thing, and in my childish willingness to learn, I hadn’t steeled myself against all of the possibilities that could be presented to me when I asked to be confronted with my faults. Of all of those possibilities, this was among the worst. The two words stung; that they were coming from her, whom I idolized and adored so much, hurt much worse.

Immediately my mind started racing, trying to better the situation.

“I am not lame,” I said aloud, ticking my points off on my fingers. “All of my body parts work. My cycles are regular and cause me little pain. I’ll have good child bearing hips, like my mother. I-“

“You’re making excuses,” First Wife said, quietly interrupting me. “You’re looking for the good in yourself. I’m asking you to look for only the bad. You can’t fix it if you don’t confront it.”

“What can I do, then?” I asked, weakly. I wanted to impress her, so I hardened myself against my tears. “How can I overcome ugly? How can I fix ugly?”

First Wife lifted her chin and looked down at me. “It will be painful, but it can be done,” she said. “You will have to learn to wake up before everyone else and be rigorous about your beauty standards. And Piya… Piccola Bellezza,” she said, using the child-like nickname that meant little beauty- a compliment that stung now like a tiny, angry bee deep inside of my chest- “how far are you willing to go for this?”

I lifted my chin and straightened my back, the same as her. “I will do what it takes,” I said, and First Wife could see that I meant it.

“Then forgive me, forgive me, my sweet Piccola Bellezza,” she said, tears welling in her eyes, and she picked up a wooden plank lying beside her floor cushion. It was an innocent thing, used as a door stopper on its busy days and forgotten on its worst; just a simple plank of wood, but that day, it changed my life when she slammed it into my nose. The worst part about the whole encounter is that I did not black out from the pain.

Now, running my finger along the bridge of my nose, I can feel the tiny bones beneath the flesh. Looking in the mirror, I can see the tiny scar along the left side of my face, right beside my nose, where the board broke the skin. But my nose, my nose. It’s my nose, not my mother’s bulbous nose, and not my father’s pug nose. It’s a beautiful, aquiline, Roman nose, long and straight and narrow, and carefully formed by a doctor who did what he was not supposed to do. He altered my genetic look and gave me something that my babies cannot ever inherit: my perfect nose.

He was later caught doing this same procedure for another girl, and as punishment, she was left scarred and broken, her nose unfinished, and his precious miracle-bringing hands were cut off. I’m told that she is now a whore of the cheapest kind, and he is her hapless dependent, a love story for the ages.

While I would love to shove a wooden plank into Shanna’s nose for purely selfish reasons, I don’t love her enough to be blunt with her. I could tell her all of the things that First Wife told me, for I now understand that First Wife said those things out of love, but I won’t. She’s twelve now, and eventually, she’ll figure it out.

Or not.

As First Wife said, I have the ability to put myself first when need be, and the current situation is definitely a selfish one. After all of my hard work, I am getting married, after giving First Wife five daughters-in-law of the highest quality- all of them except for the last could have easily been First Wife to some lesser man themselves- she has come through. I am being married today to a man of the highest esteem, as his First Wife.

The Beginning

“Her eyes are too small,” my new mother-in-law said, eyeing me warily. “If she does have a son, will he be handsome enough to warrant a top-shelf wife?”

“Of course he will,” my father-in-law boomed, his pale face turning red in his anger. He was of Italian and Irish decent, not unlike my beloved First Wife Young. The thought of her threatened to overwhelm me, and so I pushed her from my mind.

“He will be the heir to my fortune and the man of his household,” he was saying, “And any man in the Roy family clan warrants a top-shelf wife, regardless of his eyes.” He spat at Mama-Roy’s feet, clinching his jaw. He was infuriated that she would question his only son’s choice in First Wife, and he didn’t have the decorum to discuss the matter privately.

“I suppose her children could have my eyes,” Mama-Roy said quietly, looking down her nose at me. At that moment, I resented being so short. “We can hope.”

I kept my eyes trained on the wall in front of me, remembering the painting that had hung in First Wife Young’s bedroom for as long as I could remember: a beautiful woman, the painter some Italian with a strange name- Leonardo. The woman was called Mona Lisa, and she was the epitome of all that we should be, at least according to First Wife Young. We should be strong, resilient, and, most of all, emotionless. Worried? Filled with anxiety? Overly happy? Depressed? Jealous? All of these things could- and would- ruin a marriage and a family, and all of these things should be hidden behind a mimicry of that slight look, that sly and winsome façade.

So I plastered a Mona-Lisa smile on my face, practiced through years of tutelage in front of First Wife Young’s painting, and though my hands were trembling beneath my elongated bridal sleeves, I thought that I hid my emotions well. I was supposed to appear neither eager, like a whore, nor frightened or sad, as if the family I was marrying in to was undeserving of my love. First Wife taught me to stare at the ancient Mona Lisa every day, practicing her timeless patience. Was she happy? Frightened? Confident? Afraid? Confused? No one knew, and neither would my husband.

I bit my tongue as my mother in law, known as Mama-Roy in this household, circled me yet again, like a vulture, looking for faults and passing overtly loud judgments.

No, my husband wouldn’t know what I was thinking or feeling. Nor would his mother.

She walked in circles around me, examining me from head to foot with her watery eyes, large blue circles that seemed to take up half of her face. She was stunning in a sharp way, her features too pointy and her chin too clean-cut, but stunning nonetheless, even in her old age, and judgmental as only a mother to a son can be. She was a Fifth Wife, and my father-in-law had no patience for her beyond his gratitude for their mutual son.

“Mahmah,” my husband said breathily, speaking quietly. “I think I’ve made a good decision. She’s brilliant. She can do-“

“The only thing I’m interested in is what she can do with what’s between her legs,” Mama-Roy interrupted him. She smacked my behind, and I yelped, despite my careful concentration in upholding my Mona Lisa façade.

Mama-Roy smiled. “I see she’s ready for the bed, then,” she said. I could smell her, and she had a spicy scent, like a man. She was all coarse angles- filth-impropriety and embarrassment. I knew without being told that she held fast to the old ways and would brook no arguments when it came to new ideas. She wore no deodorant and had no need to emphasize her features with makeup, so she would expect the same from those around her. I would have to be extra careful to contour my face and line my eyes before she awoke for the day. It would be exhausting, and inwardly, I wilted at the thought of it, but I kept my back straight and my eyes forward under her scrutiny.

A woman like this produces a son, I thought. I cringed, watching my husband’s face blush with shame. He quickly walked forward and took my left arm while my new father-in-law took my right. Mama-Roy followed behind as we trailed slowly, ceremoniously, into my new life- through this unfamiliar mansion, down hallway after seemingly endless hallway, and finally to the bridal quarters, nestled deep within the wing of the building that would belong firstly to me and, later, to my sister wives.

The wedding bed was a rope bed, old fashioned and expensive. Like any traditionalists, they followed custom here. Rope beds were used in the days of plentiful sons, so we used them now for luck.

Luck to fuck, I thought crassly and almost giggled at my own impropriety.

“You’ll do it like this,” Mama-Roy said, climbing grandly onto the bed. She bent over, on her hands and knees, and Papa-Roy climbed onto the bed behind her. He looked bored as he thrust at her bottom a couple of times, fully clothed, and then he rolled his eyes and climbed off of the bed. “I think he’s got the gist of it,” he said, and Mama-Roy reluctantly climbed off of the bed, too, disappointed that her moment to shine was over.

“Do it just the way I showed you,” she said, pointing her finger at my face. “If you want to produce a son, take my advice. That’s how I did it, and that’s how you’ll do it, too.” She hugged me roughly to her, kissed the top of my head, and left, Papa-Roy following behind. The awkwardness of the encounter left me speechless.

My new groom closed the door behind them and cleared his throat.

“Well,” he said, clasping his hands together, the sound echoing in the too-quiet room.

My own hands were sweaty, and I rubbed them on the inside of my bridal sleeves, where my mother had thoughtfully sewn two cotton patches into the silk for just this purpose. Thinking of this small kindness made me miss her terribly, and the feeling came on so suddenly that I thought I might weep, right there in front of my husband.

But I couldn’t do that. My place as First Wife wouldn’t be secure until we’d copulated and I’d produced a child, at least a daughter- but of course, everyone’s hope was for a son.

“We’ve… we’ve done things before,” he started, walking closer to me. “We’ve done all but… this. So it shouldn’t be as… painful for you as…”

I nodded my head at him, trying to signal that he could cease his rambling, awkward speech. He was trying to talk me into letting him have sex with me when that was his right. I was his wife. It was my duty. Even if I’d wanted to object, I couldn’t. There was no place for a First Wife who would not even try to produce a male heir to the family fortune.

But the truth was, I’d been silently looking forward to this night for months. It was getting harder and harder for me to tell Chan no, to push him away when he started to climb on top of me and do what he could not. I wasn’t exactly in love with him, but I was eager to finish what we’d started so many times in hidden sections of my family’s compound. “That’s for my husband,” I’d whispered, for months and months, and now- he was my husband. He could.

He nodded at me, blew out the candles, and made his way to my side. Slowly, carefully, he unbuttoned my wedding dress. It would have been sweet, tender, of him to unbutton all hundred of the buttons, from the back of my neck all the way down to my feet, but tradition called for ripped fabric on the bride’s wedding gown- a sign of unbridled passion and good luck for future sons. So I steeled myself, and he gripped each side of my dress. “Ready?” he asked, his voice a whisper at the back of my neck, and I nodded my consent. He ripped the fabric apart with a quick yank. Gray and pearl-white buttons flew away from me and landed with tinkling sounds all over the floors. I wistfully rubbed the cotton undersides of my sleeves once more as the dress slid off of me, saying goodbye to my former life.

Still behind me, he started kissing my neck, and I relaxed against him. This part was familiar to me, a dance we’d done a hundred times in my own home, sometimes in hidden alleyways in the city, or under un-judging stars and a glorious moon on the rare occasion I’d managed to sneak out past curfew.

Then he reached around and grabbed my breasts, stroking my nipples tenderly, and I turned to face him. I put my hand on his face, encouraging him, and he scooped me up as if I weighed no more than a feather and laid me on the bed. It made a hideous noise as the force of our weight fought with the ropes, but I refused to be distracted.

This was the night I would make a baby. A son, I prayed, and it became a chant in my mind, a force that pushed through from my brain to his, breaking the barriers of our skulls. A son, a son, a son.

Finally, skillfully, he flipped me over and pulled at my hips, positioning us the way his parents had instructed. I could feel myself opening up to him, wanting him, and I offered no resistance. I felt the tip of his member, familiar to my mouth but not to this new place, pressing against me, and I smiled, ready to receive him.

But when he pushed himself inside of me, I gasped and slammed myself forward, away from him, involuntarily. He slid out of me and drew in a sharp intake of breath, then grabbed himself and stroked, quickly, urgently, until he came all over the sheets between my legs.

He collapsed onto the bed beside me, panting, and I curled up into a ball, cupping my burning, aching center.

“Did I… I’m so sorry,” he said, between gulps of air. “Did it-?”

“Yes,” I answered, my eyes filling with tears. It hurt. I didn’t expect it to, because his fingers had gone there first, smoothing the trail for our wedding night, but his fingers were not an adequate preparation for his penis, and I was humiliated by how badly it had hurt. My insides felt like they were on fire, and accompanying that feeling was a deep pulsing ache that synched with my heartbeat. I felt something wet between my legs; I held my hand up, and noted with disgust the streaks of pink blood.

“Oh, God,” he said, jumping off of the bed. “There’s so much of it. I knew that there was supposed to be a little but- Piya! Are you alright?”

“I…” I looked at the blood and remembered First Wife Young’s tutorial. No matter the pain, you must always try to get pregnant. You’ll have him to yourself for just a little while, a few months if you’re lucky, and then he’ll take a new wife. Prove your worth. Prove your fertility. Get pregnant right way, no matter what it takes.

“I’m fine,” I said, my voice losing its shakiness. “Would you mind just getting me a towel, please?” This was a business transaction. I’d been foolish to lose myself in the passion of the moment to begin with. I had work to do.

He slid off of the bed and ran to the bathroom, and while he was in there, I did what I had to do.

I slid my hand over the sheet, scooping up as much of his masculine mess as I could, and I shoved it inside of myself, biting my tongue to keep from crying out. I lifted my hips and felt a wet heaviness, already cooling with the temperature of the room, sliding into my center, and I relaxed.

This was my job. It wouldn’t always be pleasant, but I was First Wife now, and I would do whatever it took.

The next morning, when I awoke, Chan was still sleeping. This was the part of the marriage ritual that caused me the most anxiety in the months before my wedding- would I be able to set my internal alarm to wake me up before my husband? Before my household? I must always be beautiful. My status as First Wife would hold more power if I always appeared elegant and lovely, pleasing to the eye. I was relieved to be awake while everyone else slept, and I quietly pulled my body out of the bed, away from Chan’s freckled, warm back. He was snoring, and his breathing was quiet and slow.

In the bathroom, I quickly applied my makeup, first washing off the previous day’s face, and re-curled my dark hair. I then tousled it just enough so that it appeared natural, and I climbed back in bed. I had shut my eyes for only a moment before Mama-Roy was opening the door, barging her way into my marital bedroom.

“Up! Up, up, up, Channyboy,” she sing-songed, smiling at her only child. “We must see that the deed has been done!” She cast a disapproving eye at me and I knew that she hoped the worst for me. I had only to deliver a healthy baby, boy or girl, and my status would be above hers in all but the respect that I chose to show her, based on societal propriety. My respect to her would be a gift after the birth of my first born, but today, it was her right.

I climbed out of bed, feigning sleepiness, and wrapped my robe around myself, huddling into the far corner of the room. Chan stumbled off to the bathroom to relieve himself, the sight of his mother in his room something that wasn’t unusual to him. My husband was still very much a baby, a man-child, as so many men were in this world dominated by women but ruled by men.

Mama-Roy ripped the blankets back with no hesitation, and immediately my mistake was made apparent. There, on the pristine white sheets, were the blood smears- shaped like fingers, and running through a yellowing stain. It was obvious to both of us what that stain was, and I held my breath as Mama-Roy squinted her eyes. She stared at my bloody finger-shaped smears, at the stain, and I watched her face as understanding dawned on her.

To my surprise, she looked at me and smiled. She dropped the blanket and took the four steps to my corner, where I stood huddled in my robe, and she wrapped her arms around me, hugging me tightly to her.

“Good girl,” she whispered. “We’ll get a baby out of you yet.”

I was so shocked at her kindness that I didn’t remember to tell my arms to wrap themselves around her, returning her hug, and before I could do so, she pulled away from me, all traces of tenderness gone. She yanked the sheet from the bed and held it above her head. As she walked out of the room, it trailed behind her like a deflated flag.

“It’s done!” she called, her screeching voice echoing in the long master hallway. “The deed is done! Come and see!”

I sank to my knees and pressed my face into my palms, careful- always careful, no matter what- not to smear my mascara, not to undo the careful, face-shaping contouring I’d applied just moments ago. I took deep breaths in, held them, and released them, calming my heart, while I listened to my new mother-in-law parade my bloody sheets throughout the house.