Gretta said she would always protect me and be my friend if I would agree to give her my lovely hair. I didn't understand business deals at that young age, but as much as I knew Gretta had been kind to me, I believed she would do me no harm. So I agreed.
My hair was long for a thirteen-year-old girl. It brushed the back of my waist, but it wasn't enough. Gretta gave me a potion that made my hair grow even faster. I remember to this day how it smelled—a mixture of anise, ginger, and rapunzel root. I foolishly promised not to cut my hair, even the slightest bit. We had a mutual understanding, Gretta and I.
One day she said it was time. I perched on a stool in Gretta's house as she used a razor to shave off my beautiful locks. When I reached a hand behind my head and felt nothing but stubble where the hair had once been, I grew terrified at what Mother would say. I decided in that instant that I would never tell her Gretta had been involved in the cutting of my hair. If I had, Gretta might not have seen another sunrise. As it was, I suffered the stinging end of the paddle myself.
At least my deal with Gretta had been satisfied. Or so I thought.
Often times, curiosity got the best of me and I roamed into places I shouldn't have. In an attempt to remedy this, Mother gave me the daily task of fetching pails of water from the stream to distract me. I can recall many years after that where I did nothing except this task. Thousands of times, over and over, each time as uneventful as the last. But, there was an instant when I was fresh to the age of seventeen that I found a hidden sanctuary near the stream.
Low-hanging branches from the leaning willow tree concealed the entrance. I almost missed it. I'd walked the same path day after day, but on that particular day it was blazing hot. The only escape from the heat was beneath the shade of a tree. One could only hope for a breeze. As I walked on the rocky path, a subtle breeze caressed my face and neck, cooling me down. My hair had grown to a good length at the time, and it brushed the back of my knees, so the coolness was very much welcomed. Instinctively, I moved closer to the breeze, wanting both to revel in all it had to offer and curious as to where the mysterious wind was coming from.
I found a dark cave on the other side of the branches. I wondered how long that mysterious cave had been hidden behind the veil, waiting for the day someone would slip through and find it. Its entrance may have been small, but inside it was roomy and easily the size of a small cottage, which is what I imagined it to be. My refuge.
One day, as I walked along the bank on my way to my cave, I noticed a man and his horse near the water’s edge. He was handsome—I could tell just from the glimpse I'd caught before ducking behind a tree and peeking over from the edge. Then again, I'd never seen another man—aside from Father, of course—this close before. He was exotic to me—foreign, intriguing, and pleasant on the eyes.
His deep windblown hair, with a hint of an unruly wave, framed the carved features of his face. As he rolled up his sleeves to take a drink, I caught sight of the muscles that hid beneath the fabric. This unexpected attraction was dangerous, but it was also intriguing.
Out of habit, my lip got a good biting as I continued to watch him. I hoped he'd leave soon so I could get to my cave, but also wished he'd stay for reasons even I didn’t understand. I didn't know what I wanted from him. The whole scene felt so strange.
Then, at the sound of a handful of crisp leaves crunching underneath my foot, he turned and our eyes caught. I never much believed in love at first sight. I’d only heard about it, wished for it every night, and when it never came, I gave up and went on thinking it was all just a hoax of some sort. However, in that instant, I felt something. A magnetic pull I couldn't quite understand. An attraction…a sense of being found even though I hadn’t known I was lost. Could this stranger be my true love? Could he be the one I would spend my life with? All I knew was that was what I wanted.
I wanted him.
We soon became friends, and before I knew it, he was courting me. Henry and I would meet by the stream as often as we could, and I spent less and less time with my friend Gretta. I did miss her, but rumors had started to spread through town that she was a witch—though I didn’t believe them. My parents, however, weren’t so trusting. They forbade me to go around her, which gave me more time for Henry.
Ah. My Henry. My heart skipped a beat every time we met. Soon, my days were filled with only him and thoughts of Gretta slipped to the back of my mind just like when a young woman goes off to college and leaves the past behind her.
The fondness Henry and I shared for each other grew stronger over the next year and eventually it matured to love.
By then, my hair had grown to a beautiful length and it brushed the sides of my ankles. I wore it in a long braid and gathered most of it at the nape of my neck.