Mom's Marionette

My mother always said that a man is the sky a woman depends on for her whole life.

So she forced me to kneel and copy thick volumes of women's conduct rules, bound my feet until they became festering three-inch golden lilies, and went to every length each day to slim my waist and enhance my breasts, turning me into the most virtuous and perfect woman in her eyes.

But with bound feet, how could I possibly run out of a burning house?

Even so, she dressed my disfigured corpse in a wedding gown, accepted three hundred thousand in betrothal money, and made me a "bride."

This novel and its characters are entirely fictional. Any resemblance is purely coincidental. Do not imitate.