CHAPTER 538: SURE, LET’S JUST GET MARRIED (3)

"What are you still doing here?!" A maid snapped at her colleague.

"They need the assorted butter platter for breakfast!" She shouted, and in mere milliseconds after this, she snatched the butter serving tray from the other person.

"Give it here! I’ll send it myself! Nothing ever gets done around here unless I do it myself!" She snapped and then, balancing the tray expertly, with one arm behind her, she walked briskly to the breakfast room. However, she did not see the scorn and mockery on the faces of the ones left behind.

"There she goes again, springing to life the second that the masters gather," one maid muttered under her breath. The others snorted, their eyes flicking toward the corridor where she had disappeared into, tray balanced perfectly in her hand.

She wasn’t incompetent. No, that was far from it. Her work was often spotless, her deliveries prompt, and her timing uncanny. But it wasn’t her hands they questioned—it was her heart.

This particular maid only ever moved with this much precision and elegance when there were eyes to see it, ears to praise it, and mouths to repeat it. Today, with Master Ian and Mistress Shelby freshly returned and the household bubbling with celebration, she was in peak form, as expected.

As she passed a wall mirror, she gave a subtle glance, then a slower one. Still balancing the tray like a pro, she turned her face slightly, examining the angle of her jawline and the soft curl of her lashes. No hair was out of place, as was expected of their dress code. She was impeccable! A tiny smile tugged at her lips, almost dreamlike.

The other maids peeping behind the door she had just exited rolled their eyes.

"Still thinks one of those rich men might marry her," one whispered, stifling a laugh.

"With Miss Shelby, master Ian has eyes for no one, so might have her sights set on Master Brad."

"Pfttt! I wish her good luck with that! He might be a player, but he’s a player with class and would never pay attention to the likes of us!"

"She’s got the silverware and the silver dream," another added, watching as the woman smoothed her skirt ever so slightly and resumed her confident pace, never once letting the tray wobble.

"She can carry ten teacups on her head, but she’ll never carry a title." Another snorted, dripping with jealousy.

The maid in question smirked as she could hear the mutters. She shook her head, then froze after taking just a step.

"Did something move?" She whispered, looking at the now eerie painting of a desert.

"Why am I getting the creeps from just looking at this? ... and why would something move? It’s just a painting!"

The large painting was hanging high on the walls above the mirror she had just used. She had never taken a good look at it before, but she could have sworn that something moved in the picture! .... something was off. The tiny figure actually looked like it was in distress, pulling her heartstrings, but that chilled her instead. She paused mid-step, nearly stumbling. Her eyes widened as the moving action repeated.

That small figure inside the painting had just moved. She saw it—right there—

The tray wobbled dangerously as she flinched. "M-Maybe I should get my contacts checked," she muttered, blinking rapidly. "What nonsense is seeing a figure move in a painting?! And in distress? Hahahaaaa! I probably need more sleep, too!" Despite this, goosebumps prickled down her spine as she steadied the tray, heart pounding, then took off in quick strides.

She entered the dining room just in time for a moment that seemed pulled from one of her silly daydreams: the family all gathered, warm laughter in the air, doting grandparents, and the two masters and Miss Shelby as well as the kids, all laughing at whatever had been said. But then....

"If you don’t have designs on my wife, then the next woman through the door will be your wife!"

She paused slightly, but strode forward on until,

"Fine... Do you mean, even the maids?"

"Why are they not human?" Master Ian snapped!

Then Madam Geneva also added in the same:

"I don’t care who she is, I will marry this boy off! Anyone will do—even a maid if she walks in right now!"

It should have been her moment. Should have. But she’d crossed the threshold two seconds too early.

Her heart plummeted. "Fuck!" she whispered sharply, realizing she had entered the room before the statement, not after it.

"FUCK!" she whispered again under her breath.

She hadn’t meant to say it out loud. But it was too late. A few heads turned, and she could already imagine the gossip already spreading among the workers.

But the maid didn’t care... at least not in that split second. She had missed the opportunity of a lifetime.

The ominous painting had ruined her shot at fate! It had creeped her out! If only she had lingered a second or two longer there, she would have been the next person in the room! The second Mistress, just after Miss Shelby! How wonderful that would have been!

For just a second, just one fleeting second, she saw it. A life where she wasn’t the girl carrying trays and cleaning, but the second Madam of the house. Rich, respected, served tea instead of pouring it.

Damn her luck.

That quick dream—draped in pearls, reclining on a silk chaise with that handsome, playful, highly eligible second young master beside her—disintegrated as fast as it appeared. Her tray nearly tilted in her hand as she stood too long, lost in the heartbreak of what could have been.

And worse—far worse—she was so shaken by the supposed whole ordeal that she forgot to serve. She was rooted in place.

The tray remained in her hands, unmoving, as everyone stared. A tense beat passed.

"Dear, the tray’s not going to serve itself, is it?" Suzie’s cheery voice, laced with an edge of steel, sliced through the air as she appeared in front of the maid right then.

"I- I-"

"Do you want me to repeat myself?!"

It was the first time she’d been openly reprimanded. But more importantly one wondered, how someone with a sweet as honey voice, bright as the damn sun—yet somehow more terrifying than any thunderous scolding. With time, the maids had come to fear the sunny Suzie more than the severe Katie for some reason.

Suzie was infuriatingly pleasant with her eternal smile and rosy cheeks, two pigtails that seemed to bounce no matter her mood as she walked. Suzie looked as if she would never raise her voice, and she never did, yet still made seasoned workers break into nervous sweat like this one.

The question remained,

’How could someone who looked like they sprinkled cinnamon on their oatmeal scare her out of her wits?’

And yet, she did, as did even the strong-looking males in the estate.

She snapped to attention, cheeks flushing crimson, mumbling a string of apologies as she quickly moved to serve, snapping into motion like a spring-loaded toy. But her mood had dipped entirely. The magical horror, the missed opportunity, and now this humiliation?

She quickly set down butter with a clatter that earned her another sharp glance from Geneva.

Her one glimmer of fantasy had crumbled—and all she had left now was the dull clink of cutlery as she laid out the other dishes, she no longer had the heart to carry.

She muttered a quick "sorry," teeth clenched, heart hammering, willing her hands not to tremble.

She dared not look at master Brad, her would-be that never was.

Then—click.

The dining room door creaked open again.

Her eyes flicked toward it instinctively.

No. Way.... No FUCKING WAY!!!!!

She saw one of the maids, who had been in the kitchen with her, pull the door open, as did everyone else! She dared not say those out loud, though, her eyes nearly brimming with tears at the supposed loss.

Meanwhile...

Brad was having a whole breakdown of his own. His palms sweated and he placed them under the table to hide his reaction, knowing his mother and brother and what their teasing might be.

"Who is the lucky bastard?" the same maid cursed under her breath, barely managing to keep the words from spilling out loud as a new maid stepped in, but she never came all the way into the room, and she stood on the threshold.

The timing was perfect. Impeccable.

Brad slumped down into his chair, sweat glistening on his forehead in a room that could refrigerate meat.

"Another maid?" He whispered, dejected.

"Uncle Brad, Dad said that even mai-"

"Shut up! Third Brat!"

"Okayayyyy....."

Brad stared across at the same maid and started wondering why she was stuck on the threshold and not coming in. Obviously, he wished that he would turn and go back, but he couldn’t tell her to. The room seemed to brim with anticipation of what was coming next.

Brad studied the maid who still stood there, head lowered but not entering,

She was decent. She had a... face. Two ears and all the other human stuff, but could he even find her if she were lost in a crowd? He doubted because she was too plain-looking.

He had standards!

Brad winced, just as the maid took a step back and Geneva asked,

"Well, are you going to come in or are you going to keep us waiting?"

Brad was thinking in disbelief,

’Why is Mum so eager to get anyone?’ Most importantly, he was pissed at the door... of all things.

"What is with this door today? In the past, it stayed shut like a loyal friend. Now it opens like it’s got a vendetta!"

He turned slowly as the maid cleared her throat,

My apologies, Madam Geneva. The governess is here, but I opened the door a bit early; she has just arrived, and she wanted to greet Master Ian and Miss Shelby, as she had never met them before.

The governess stepped into the dining room right then, and wondered why everyone was looking at hr strangely, but before she could say a word,

"Ian said anyone," Geneva declared dramatically. "And there she is!"

The unlucky-now-jealous maid nearly bit her tongue in fury. Of course. The fates didn’t just rob her—they mocked her. She was still fuming, though no one had wronged her. It was all in her head.

The unlucky maid’s fingers clenched the edge of the tray until her knuckles turned white.

What kind of rom-com-fantasy-trope nonsense was this?!

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