Haute de L'amour

On the day Mary Beniot was engaged to Rheal Chaisson, she did what any girl of 15 in 1942 would do; faint, in St. Luc’s Cathedral. It served her papa right! Mary was not insane of joy that her papa chose a rotten cabbage for a husband.
Father Fitzpatrick called Mary Benoit forward. She faced the congregation along side Monsieur Chaisson. Jean-Claude, her papa, was invited next. A bewildered Mary was gauchely bumped, as her papa and Rheal shook hands across her front. The Priest, blessed the union announcing their engagement to Saint Agnies, the etiquette society of the front pews, the humble Saint Antonie of the back pews, and to the horrified shock of Mary, and her beloved Michèle Papineau.
Mary was traded for hogs. What a generosity, hein? Rheal bartered with Jean-Claude the local bootlegger. Jean-Claude was pleased. His daughter Mary would run the household of a pork farm, he’d have one less mouth to feed. Rheal gave him steady work.
Rheal in mid 40s was a papa of seven. He reeked of ode-to-hog, his shirt oozed of chewing tobacco, and they say he lost his second wife of thirty during childbirth. The women of the villages knew better. It was not a big secret that he was twice a widower by his own drunkard hand. The heat of the Grand Cathedral was suffocating. Mary felt her body sway. Her knees went weak beneath her. That’s when it all went blank.