B-Side: All Tied Up With String #3
Page 3
Now, it was open to interpretation.
A stiff slap wrenched Jackie from her daydream.
The woman glanced up, drool dangling from her bottom lip. A sheen of hot sweat coated her forearms and face, and tickled her neck.
Lorraine stared back at her and smiled. “Hello.”
Jackie tried to slide away, but couldn’t. Her hands were bound to a kitchen chair, her feet too. She struggled and wobbled to no avail. Her small frame was no match for the tight restraints. Her bare arms ached where they bit into her flesh.
“Oh, don’t worry, Jackie. You’re not going anywhere.” Lorraine was also perched on a kitchen chair, inches from her captive. A sickening grin parted her lips.
Jackie groaned, “This is inhuman. You can’t do this.”
“I can’t … but I am. Isn’t that your philosophy? I can’t meddle in my friends’ marriages, but … oh yes, I will. Because I can. Because I’m a nosy fucking bitch. I’m just preaching your mantra. I thought you might be happy about that.”
“This is kidnap, pure and simple.”
“You came to my house. Anyone who saw you leave your home and cross the street probably could vouch for that. You did it twice today, twice … despite you knowing how I feel about you. You’re organising a barbeque, after all. You like to be seen parading down the street, doing your bit for the social strata.”
Jackie wailed, panic setting in. “I’m sorry, okay … I’m sorry … for everything.”
Lorraine chuckled. “You’re not sorry. You refused to apologise before, woman to woman, despite being on shaky moral ground. Why should I believe you now?”
“I’m sorry, I really am,” Jackie pleaded. “Please, let me go.”
Lorraine leaned forward, her face an inch from Jackie’s. “No.”
Jackie slumped in her chair. “Rick was right. You are a cold-hearted bitch.”
Lorraine’s face didn’t change or flinch, didn’t register the insult. She snickered and stood up, tossing the chair aside. “You just made this a little easier for me, Jackie.”
“He said that, you know. Multiple times.”
Lorraine rubbed her face. “How many times, Jackie, huh? How many times did he utter those words during those … however long he was confiding in you?”
Jackie surged at the retort, her inner compulsion activated, her need to drive salt into the open wounds of Lorraine paramount. It started as an irritant, when Rick had first approached her, but as he had laid the layers on thick, exposing their fractured marriage for the sham that it was, Jackie came to despise the woman who was driving the nice man to desperation.
This woman made Rick a shrivelled husk.
A man I could have been happy with, a man who should have found me first.
He should have been mine.
“A year, twelve solid months. We spoke on a daily basis, sometimes more. You happy?” Jackie spat, satisfied.
Lorraine nodded. “How many times did he say those words?”
“Fuck off,” Jackie spat. “It’s none of your business.”
I have you now, she thought. React, show your weak side. Keep going.
Rick always said you were weak, noncompliant, too scared to act on impulse.
She’ll break eventually. Then there will be hell to pay.
Lorraine walked across the kitchen and closed the blinds. The sunlight faded, leaving comfortable warmth and hot air in its wake. She nodded. “That’s all I needed to know.”
Jackie frowned. The sweat was dripping off her flesh now. “What?”
“A year. I always wanted to know that, how long he’d been running to you. You see, despite his betrayal and his dishonest confessions, I wasn’t the weak one in this relationship. He was. He led you along like many others before you.”
Jackie tilted her head to the side; the perspiration squelched on her slippery neck. “Huh?”
Lorraine chuckled. “You think you were the only one? The only woman he spoke to about us? Rick suffered from Histrionic Personality Disorder; a need to discuss and converse with other women. Women with no emotional bond. Some wives classify that as cheating, without the evidence of course, and some call it a host of other things. Society is a funny place. For him, it was his one true solace, his solid excuse to break our commitment. He wanted to dissolve our marriage; so he did what he had to. He wanted to speak to new women, and he made it happen.”
Jackie shook her head. “No … no, I was his only confidant. It took him a lot of courage to speak to me, said it was going against his morals. He told me so.”
“No, you were his last. Not only were you his last, but you’re the only one he didn’t sleep with, too. He didn’t fuck you, Jackie. I mean, look at you. Who would?”
Jackie swallowed, the truth becoming apparent.
Rick had lied to her.
A stunned silence overtook her.
Lorraine stepped forward, hands behind her back. A swagger wove her hips from side to side, and Jackie noticed a confidence in those graceful steps, one she had never seen before.
This isn’t Lorraine.
Something happened to her.
Something…
The woman paused a few feet before her. “And here’s the kicker; you want to know the only difference between you and them?”
Jackie shook her head.
“You’re the one dumb fuck stupid enough to live on my street.” Lorraine brandished a large bottle of lye from behind her back. She dabbed a finger on Jackie’s forearm. Droplets of sweat slicked the fingertip. “And I owe you a year of payback…”
Yo-Yo
All Tied Up With String #4
Available April 2017
Primitive
All Tied Up With String #5
Available May 2017