1 — In Negotiation!

“Cohabitation,” “Removal of the Show Wife Clause,” “Prohibition of Lovers Other Than Mr. Fisalis”—a selection of highlights, brought to you by Mr. Fisalis, from the new marriage contract.

Am I the only one thinking that this is going beyond mere revision and into the realm of starting overing from scratch? ...but then again, I guess it doesn’t matter either way.

As far as I’m concerned, my main worry—my family’s debt—has already been settled with the betrothal money, so I don’t have any issues with it as far as that goes.

More importantly, Mr. Fisalis added something else.

“About socializing... since I’m only making you do the minimum necessary, I hope we’ll be able to keep doing business with each other ♡”

I see he’s planning ahead for my ‘optional events’! Dang it, he even included an entire “options” clause! ...er, oops. I’m ranting again.

“Understood,” I replied as calmly as I could, concealing my undercurrent of annoyance.

Apparently unaware of my inner turmoil, Mr. Fisalis smiled in satisfaction and nodded at my response.

“Well, that’s good enough from me. We can talk about issues when they arise.”

“Sounds fine.” I nodded back in resignation.

“Is there anything you’d like to add?” Mr. Fisalis had unexpectedly asked for my opinion.

“Terms and conditions that I want?” I cocked my head in confusion. It hadn’t occurred to me that I could ask for those.

Mr. Fisalis answered with a faint smile, “Exactly. It’s unfair to you if I’m the only one setting them. Honestly, what I want the most is for you to stand by my side, like a normal couple, without this contract business.”

He stuttered out his attempt at romance with his typical naïve optimism, only for me to ignore it. His shoulders drooped when I didn’t respond the way he’d hoped, but I continued on as if I didn’t notice that either.

A term? That I want? There can only be one, then. If he wants us to be together every day from now on, that means he’s going to want us to eat together, too.

My stomach couldn’t handle mountains of gourmet foods, and since I would rather not live everyday in fear of intestinal terrorism, I answered after a moment of consideration:

“...In that case, I have some concerns about mealtime.”

Now it was Mr. Fisalis who looked puzzled when I suddenly brought up meals.

“Our meals? Are they not to your satisfaction?” he asked with raised brows.

Yikes, his eyes turned scary! He wrongly suspects Cartham again, just like when I got fancy food poisoning!

“Nooo, no, no! Don’t be silly, there’s nothing unsatisfactory about the food! In fact, it’s too good! It actually kind of shocks my digestive system, ah ha ha.” I denied in a panic over Mr. Fisalis’ misunderstanding, but alas, I let too much slip.

“It’s too good?” he frowned in suspicion at my slip of the tongue.

“No—er, well, there’s more than enough of it. It’s just that the portions are too big for me. Especially at breakfast! It’s more than I could ever eat. It’s a total waste.”

“Breakfast, you say?”

“Yes. The portions seem much too large for a single serving. There’s no way I could finish all of it, and even if I somehow managed to, it would make me sick again.”

I had no complaints about dinner, though. My stomach has plenty of time to get to work after I eat breakfast and lunch, so I should be able to handle half-size portions.

It’s breakfast that’s the problem. In terms of both volume and quality, the two of them first thing in the morning basically spell certain death for my half-asleep stomach. Those breakfasts will be the death of me before I even have a chance to get used to living like this!

Mr. Fisalis seemed surprised by my claim.

“It won’t happen again! I understand now. You have a poor appetite.”

He absolutely overreacted when I said it would make me sick.

He leaned forward.

How do I put this in a way you can understand?

It’s not so much that I have a poor appetite as it is that my poor stomach can’t deal with anything richer than simple food.

Oh well. I wouldn’t dare say that out loud.

I needed to come up with something to get him to move away from me.

“So, yes, I’ll be having smaller portions from now on. But you...”

“Hm?”

“Do you really eat that much everyday?” I finally asked what had been on my mind ever since I arrived at the manor.

“Sure—er, no, well... I guess I don’t eat all of it.”

For someone who wanted to get up close and personal a minute ago, he looked away immediately and avoided giving a straight answer.

“You had the regular bread, soup, salad, and entrée when your father was here, though, right?”

“Yeah. The menu is always the same and prepared ahead of time when my parents are here. The dishes always go well together.”

“Rohtas told me that when you waste food, acting like your taste changes every day, that a green giant will put a curse on you!”

I li-ter-al-ly can’t believe that this man wouldn’t clean his plate!

“What?”

My sudden exposition about a certain jolly green giant caught Mr. Fisalis off guard.

Looks like someone hasn’t heard of the giant! Heh heh, I’ll have to give him a thorough explanation!

“The jolly green giant is the physical embodiment of all the little spirits of the food that gets thrown out. So, if you waste food, he’ll appear at your bedside at night and whisper ‘what a waaaste, what a waaaste...’

[edited for brevity]

And that’s why you should always clean your plate!”

“...Understood.” He drew away from me with an awkward grimace, but did I care? No, I did not.

“Alright, good. Now then, what shall we do about dinner?”

“Let’s see... I’ll have whatever you’re having. I’ve been worried sick about you ever since you fell ill that morning. Even more so than I am about green giants,” he answered after a moment of thought, as he rested his chin on his fist.

Unfortunately it looked as though my giant story had gone over his head.

Grrr! Oh well, so long as they stop giving me all that fancy food!

“Oh, thank you. I’ll let Cartham know, then.” My stomach marked itself safe for the time being.

“Okay. Is there anything else?” he gently pressed for more.

Typical me. I was very satisfied to have a good time chatting with the servants and working around the manor, so nothing else came to mind.

Oh, ‘I get stressed out when you come to the main house after work’? LOL. I can’t say that!

“Anything else... no, nothing in particular right now. But if something comes up, like you said, we can discuss it when it does.”

“Okay,” he replied, thus completing the renewal of our contract without incident (?).

Mr. Fisalis had dinner with me in the main house, but afterwards, as I chased him away—I mean, showed him out—I politely told him, “I hope you learned a valuable lesson tonight when your girlfriend broke up with you.”

Miss Calendula.

I wonder if we could have been friends, if we hadn’t met this way.

Be sure to get in touch if you’re ever back in Rozhe!