Now, I feel a swell of relief that I don’t have to fake another night, feeling his hands on me again.
“Miss McKenzie?”
I turn. It’s the maid I hired to serve and staff the dinner. She’s a petite girl, still in college, now watching me with a bright smile.
“I’m all cleaned up, so is it OK if I take off?”
“Sure,” I agree, finding my purse and writing her a check. “Big plans?”
“Nothing. Just, meeting a guy.” The girl flushes.
“Well, be careful,” I say brightly, handing her the paper.
She laughs. “He’s the one who needs to be careful.” She winks boldly at me, and I blink in surprise.
“Thanks again,” I murmur faintly, and I watch her leave. When did I get so old? It feels like only yesterday I was the one waltzing around campus, flitting from one guy to the next, keeping them dangling on the end of my breezy calls.
And then college was over, and reality came crashing in, more painful and heartbreaking than I could ever have imagined.
I let out a sigh and turn back, listening to the silence of the empty house. It’s beautiful, a masterpiece now, after all my months of work. I slowly walk through the rooms, my footsteps sinking in the plush cream carpets, trailing my fingertips over the glossy polished surfaces, feeling the heavy silk of the drapes. I slowly pad upstairs, past the procession of heavy, framed photographs mounted on the walls. Alex and I out on a friends yacht, at the beach, dressed up for a charity gala. We look like models in a magazine, but passing them now, I pause, remembering the truth behind every laughing smile. How I got sick sailing, but Alex refused to go back early, so I spent the afternoon passed out on Dramamine in the cabin below; when a co-worker at Alex’s firm tried to grope me during a slow dance, and he told me not to make a scene.
I always thought it didn’t matter. Every relationship is just a transaction, we all have to pay a price. And I was willing to pay to keep this life afloat. As long as I could paint a pretty picture on the surface, everything would be just fine.
I catch my reflection in the hall mirror. The broken expression in my eyes makes my heart clench, painful in my chest. I drift closer, searching the face I see framed with gilt and gold as if seeing it for the first time.
I’m not beautiful, not even close, but I’ve learned it’s easy to fool men into thinking I am. Serums and creams, contact lenses and braces. The blonde hair that needs highlights every eight weeks, the blue eyes I help with brightening drops and expensive French mascara. “The world likes pretty things,” my father always used to laugh when I was a kid still burdened with dark tangled hair and a crooked smile. “And no offense, sweetheart, but you’re not smart enough to be so plain.”
Now, I push back my hair and see the color blooming just below my hairline.Some good pretty is now.
The panic rises up inside me again, fathomless and dark, but this time, I have nothing left in me to keep it at bay.
I stumble into the master bedroom, my breathing coming in shallow gasps, my chest suddenly tight. My sister, Juliet, suffered panic attacks for years. I always rolled my eyes and thought she was making a big deal over nothing, but now I feel the crushing weight of fear tighten around my whole body like a vice, and I know there’s nothing to laugh about.
Stop, I order myself. Stop this right now.
But for what?
There’s nobody here to pretend for anymore. Nobody to smile at and put on a happy show. All that’s left in this perfect, empty house is me. Me and the lies I’ve told myself, all the empty, rotten lies.
Oh God.
I hug my arms around myself, sobs coming now, wet on my cheeks. I’ve worked so hard to hide it, but all my life, I’ve felt like I’m balancing on the edge of a tall cliff, inches from the fall—fighting to keep my grip and keep from tumbling into that endless black void of doubt, darkness, and icy insecurity. The place where I’ll be forced to take a long, hard look at my life, and own up to all the terrible things I’ve done. The people I’ve betrayed, the love I didn’t deserve.
I’ve pulled myself back from the edge time and time again, clinging to the only things I know. I’ve filled my days with bright parties and pretty things to outshine the darkness, the chatter of gossip to drown out those whispers of insecurity. I’ve told myself that if I can just be perfect, if I can make the perfect home, be the perfect wife, the perfect mother…
Then I’ll be safe. It would prove I’d made the right choices, done the right thing, and all the ugliness of the past would be smoothed over and forgotten under the gloss of fresh paint.
But now, weeping on the bed in the silent cavern of my perfect life, I realize that it was all a lie.
Every promise I made myself, every bargain I struck. They’re all make-believe: counterfeit notes I spent with abandon, as if fake tokens could buy real love, as if the picture of perfection could magically be made real and true.
I was wrong. God, so completely wrong.
What the hell do I do now?
A desperate surge of adrenaline races through me. I spring up from the bed and head to the closet, grabbing my suitcase and armfuls of clothes. I pack in a whirlwind, grabbing things from the dresser, my makeup bag, toiletries, and more. Before I can take a moment to think, or talk myself out of it, I hurry downstairs and through the side door to the carport, hurling my suitcase onto the backseat of the car.
My hand shakes as I turn the key in the ignition, but it’s not until I back out of the driveway into the dark night that I realize I don’t have anywhere to go.