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I arch a brow at Kandy. “Theatrical much?”
“Not even kidding. Didn’t you read the contract they sent over? Being a savvy businesswoman, I know you read the fine print.” Kandy hands me another coffee, my third of the day, and I take it, happily ignoring her question or statement; I’m not sure which, since I wasn’t paying that much attention.
I’ve been dodging my own doubts. Hearing them from her only makes me want to drop out and what? Live like a shriveled hermit for the rest of my life? A celibate, shriveled hermit with cobwebs for vagina lips. Yeah, not this chick.
“I feel I need to do something, Kandy. Does that make sense? I can’t take this void in me anymore. I have to try and break it. Fill it, dump it...I don’t know!” I throw my hands up and drop them to my sides, rethinking the sexless hermit route. Would it be easier? Do I even want easy? Might make a good change of pace. Why make life harder than it already is, right? I can’t remember where I heard that saying, but damn, is it true.
Then again, I somehow never did manage to take the easy route. Ever.
Kandy’s tight-lipped expression softens from worry to understanding. She opens her mouth to say something, words of reassurance I’m sure, but my phone rings with an incoming video call and dread fills me.
We look at each other. “Want me to field the call?” Kandy puts a hand out for my cell phone, but I wave her off.
“She’ll just keep calling. I have to answer.” I flick the bouncing green button and perch a polite smile on my lips. A white room comes into focus before the perfectly Botoxed woman who birthed me fills the screen. “Mother.”
“Justice.”
Cold indifferent. Same old…
It’s all I can do not to sigh in her face.
“I need the Taylor and Bradshaw contract. Do you have it ready? If not, you’ll need to cancel your trip.”
She’s not looking at me, but is busy typing away on a second phone so she misses a huge eye roll.
I stand to gather the few files scattered over my desk from a morning meeting. Kandy holds up her thumb and pinky to her ear mouthing, “Call me later.”
“We talked about this, Mother. I’m leaving. One week. No phones, no contact, no contracts to revise. No fucking worries. Just me all by myself relaxing and getting some much-needed time off.”
“There you go again with that foul mouth of yours. I raised you better.”
“Don’t you mean you instructed the nannies to?”
White curtains slide closed behind my mother and her stark face comes into full view.
Now that the sunlight from her office windows is blocked, I can see the disgust crinkling the edges of her Botoxed eyes and forcing her thin lips into a fine slit of pink. And I don’t care one bit.
What’s the meme that goes around? Trust the person willing to say the gritty words rather than the polished bitch with fake pretty ones? Or something like that. I’ve only seen it in passing on Kandy’s phone when she sees fit to shove one thing or another in my face as she scrolls.
Yeah, I’ve gone through some changes over the last three years, and I’m ready for yet another one. Either that or I let myself drown, and I don’t much like the idea of suffocating inside my own thoughts and pain.
“I don’t like who you’ve become ever since...” Piss and vinegar drip from her words before she lets them drop. But too late the damage is done.
“Ever since what? The night you barged in on me in my own apartment and saw me with three lovers? Shoved me into an elevator practically naked and made me walk to your apartment, my ass hanging out the back?” I never used the wordloveormyaround her. Showing my true feelings would seal my fate and theirs. Giving the enemy ammo was a bad idea.
If a few truth bombs riled her up, then my mother is sure the hell not going to like how I’m planning on spending my week off.
Speaking of, I check my watch just as a message pops up in a little bubble over my mother’s face. It’s from Kandy.
Confirmation of your attendance is needed. Do I send? House Pandora requires written confirmation.
Itap the bubble and shoot a quickyes.
My mother’s face turns colder than the Grim Reaper’s, and I sigh.
“I told you I never want to talk about that night again. The disgust. Shameful. They took advantage of you and you should be thanking me for dragging you out of there and saving you from yourself. You just make sure the connection is permanently severed or else I’ll be forced into something none of us want.”
Veiled threats never really were her style. She likes to remind me who holds the upper card every few weeks. As though I need a reminder to walk the straight and narrow. Personally, the woman would cut off her own foot if it proved she held all the control.
