My boyfriend and I had been together three years. Then came our wedding day, and the moment the firecrackers died down, my future mother-in-law's true face came out. In front of every last relative, she decided to put me in my place.
"In the Simmons family, we have a tradition. Every woman who marries in washes her mother-in-law's feet on the wedding day. It means the daughter-in-law submits to the mother-in-law's authority."
At first I only felt a flicker of distaste, but I didn't make a scene.
I told myself it was just a show of respect.
My husband was murmuring to me too. "Sweetheart, I know this is hard on you."
"Don't worry, this is all just for the relatives to see."
"You're marrying into this family. No one is going to bully you."
I nodded.
Someone brought over the basin of footwashing water, and I crouched down to wash her feet.
She watched me with a smile, looking thoroughly satisfied. "Not bad. A good, obedient daughter-in-law."
She paused.
Then she waved someone over with a paper cup.
"I'm not thirsty," I said.
I thought she was worried I'd tire myself out and wanted someone to bring me a drink of water.
But she gave a strange little smile.
"Thirsty or not, you're drinking this."
Then she filled the paper cup to the brim with the footwashing water and held it out to me.
"Drink this cup of footwashing water."
"After that, you're a real Simmons daughter-in-law."
...
I've always thought I had an easy temper. I never argued with anyone.
I almost never lost it.
But looking at that steaming cup of footwashing water held out right in front of me—
a wave of pure rage shot straight up through the top of my skull.
I surged to my feet and glared at her.
"You want me to drink your footwashing water?"
And right then—
I saw that all the Simmons relatives were watching me with a mocking look in their eyes.
Before she could even answer,
someone else jumped in first.
"What's wrong with drinking a little footwashing water?"
"This is the old Simmons family tradition."
"It means the daughter-in-law will never go against her mother-in-law."
"A city girl like you—"
"—far too pampered."
"If we don't lay down the rules before you marry into this family,"
"then down the road,"
"where's your mother-in-law going to fit in this house?"
"Exactly. She asked you to drink footwashing water, not poison."
"You're overreacting."
"Tsk. City kids just can't take a little hardship."
"..."
Listening to all of it,
fury boiled up in me all at once, and I swept my glare across the lot of them.
"What does drinking footwashing water have to do with taking hardship?"
Then
my eyes landed on the woman who'd been the nastiest of them all.
She was Eustace Simmons's aunt.
I snatched the paper cup of footwashing water out of my mother-in-law's hand.
Then I walked straight toward her.
"Hey, hey, hey, what do you think you're doing?"
"The bride's going to hit somebody?"
Eustace's aunt started shrieking.
"You seem to think you can take hardship so well."
"Why don't you drink a cup and show me?"
Eyes cold, choking down the rage inside me, I held the footwashing water out to her.
The color drained from the aunt's face.
"Are you the one getting married, or am I?"
"If you want to marry Eustace,"
"then you are going to drink this footwashing water!"
"Otherwise this wedding is not happening!"
Looking at the smug expression on her face, she clearly thought that with the wedding this far along, I wouldn't dare call it off—that no matter how badly they humiliated me, I'd just have to take it.
Too bad for her. She'd read the wrong person.
I pulled the headpiece from my hair and threw it on the floor, my voice cold. "The wedding's off!"
