Return to Me

by Katie Winters

  Due to the party, the staff members had closed both Maggie and Alyssa’s bedroom doors. Without thinking, Janine stepped toward Maggie’s, there on the left, and pushed it open. She sped through the crack just as her eyes took in a view that she hadn’t anticipated.

  There was a couple, a man on top of a woman, there on the bed.

  Immediately, Janine jumped back and whipped the door partially closed so that she couldn’t see. She cried out at first, saying, “I’m terribly sorry!” But just as she said it, the woman of the couple cried out as well.

  The scream was familiar.

  It was so familiar that it made Janine’s blood freeze.

  It was so familiar that Janine could do nothing but grip the doorknob. It was as though time itself had taken hold of her and forced her to remain there, unable to move forward.

  There was the man’s voice after that.

  The man’s voice, as he asked, “Did you see who it was?”

  “No. I didn’t. My eyes were closed.”

  “I told you. This was too risky.”

  “You said nobody would come into Maggie’s room. You said it would be fine.”

  They argued like lovers — like lovers who knew one another so well, so well that it didn’t matter if you irritated the other just the tiniest bit.

  “You really didn’t see who it was?” the man asked.

  “No. I swear. And I’m sure they didn’t see, either. Everyone at this party is hammered out of their minds.”

  “We should get back out there. But staggered,” the man said.

  “I know the drill, sergeant,” the woman returned. “We’ve been through this all before.”

  Janine’s heart hadn’t beat for a solid thirty seconds. She wondered what it would mean for her to die at her daughter’s engagement party. She wondered if it would scar Maggie for life. Probably, it would.

  Part of her told her to turn back.

  Part of her heart screamed for her to leave the door, step back into the party, pretend she’d never heard anything.

  Everything might have been okay had she done that.

  But instead, she pressed the flat of her hand against the door, and she slowly eased it open so that the creak of it was ominous, echoing from wall-to-wall of Maggie’s beautiful, still pretty-pink set-up.

  There, standing side-by-side, stitching up the buttons of their various garments, were Jack and Maxine.

  They looked at her.

  They looked at her as though she was a stranger.

  And she supposed, in a way, she was.

  She’d entered their private space of love and romance. She felt like someone from a different universe, and she’d discovered that they had a separate language, a separate rhythm, a separate love.

  She wanted to say something, but there were no words. Janine felt her head spin like she might fall at any moment. She was in complete shock. She heard the muffled words of her husband, saying, “Janine, now don’t fly off the handle. It’s not what it looks like.”

  And then there was Maxine, saying something in French which made Janine blurt out, “You haven’t spoken French properly in thirty years!”

  Then, there was the sound of feet behind her and the appearance of their guests—several of them, whose eyes scanned from Maxine to Jack and then, over to Janine, the jilted wife. It was quite simple to put together the pieces of this puzzle, to recognize what had gone wrong. In fact, in some ways, perhaps, it was the easiest thing in the world.

  It was a simple formula, the way Janine’s life now crumbled before her. It was as simple as one plus one. It was as easy as — French mistress? Why not also, the wife’s best friend?

  Cliché upon cliché.

  Chapter Four

  Years before, when Janine and Maxine had been twelve or thirteen, they had grown obsessed over the dreams they had at night, and what their dreams might represent about their futures. Janine remembered one particular, starry night when she and Maxine had stayed up till three in the morning, while Janine’s mother remained in the living room, smoking indoors and watching television. Nancy’s moods were difficult to decipher back then, but largely, depression dominated all of her emotions and actions, like a shadow.

  “I saw a black dog at the edge of a driveway,” Janine had said ominously on this night, as Maxine’s eyes had widened. “And then, he opened his mouth, and he told me to follow him. We walked through the woods, toward a large cave, with an opening like a mouth and from the edge of the cave, as I peered in, I could see the entire island of Manhattan. It was just there, inside the cave. The dog asked me if I wanted to jump into the cave, but I knew that if I did, I would fall to my death on 44th Street.”

  At this, Maxine had laughed uproariously. “Shh!” Janine’s eyes had flashed. “Don’t let Mom know we’re still awake.”

  “I don’t think she cares,” Maxine had pointed out. “She’s probably just glad to have some company at this hour.”

  Janine’s stomach had tightened at the thought. She knew very well that her mother was lonely. At thirteen, this was the sort of thing you began to pick up on in adults, she supposed. But it wasn’t as though she was equipped to understand how to help her mother. In many ways, her depression and loneliness made her angry, as she felt them like blockades between her and Nancy and this other, fantastical life of luxury. (Although, of course, the concept of luxury was a far-away one in Brooklyn.)

  “What do you think my dream means?” Janine had finally asked.

  Maxine had fluttered her fingers in the air between them as though this would conjure the spirit of Freud himself to come to explain it. “I think it means that one day, a long time from now, you will be very rich.”

  “Wow. Rich, huh?”

  “Yes. But it will come at a great cost to your soul,” Maxine had added, just before erupting in uncontrollable laughter — enough to make Nancy bound into the room and demand that the two of them quiet down, if only so she could hear her television show.

  IT HAD BEEN TWO WEEKS since Maggie’s engagement party.

  Janine sat upright in an enormous California king bed, located in the center of a grand suite in the Lotte New York Palace. She was dressed in a plush robe, no makeup, and sunlight from a glorious day in late May streamed through the curtains and cast its glow across the bed. She had been at the Lotte since everything had exploded — and she’d hardly seen another living soul in all that time. She hadn’t even informed her daughters of her precise location, as she didn’t want them storming in and catching sight of her like this. If anything, she kept them at bay with phone calls.

  Like this— at the end of her rope and in the middle of a nervous breakdown, questioning every single thing that had ever happened to her — from her love of Jack to every conversation she’d ever had with Maxine, trying to figure out what went wrong and when it went wrong. Why hadn’t she seen it coming? Were there any signs and if there were, why had she missed them?

  Janine had always thought the idea of imagining your own downfall was a bit perverse. She’d never been particularly fascinated with “true crime,” like several New York socialites she’d previously run around with, as she hadn’t liked imagining that those sorts of horrible things could actually happen. She also hadn’t been so into stories about natural disasters or even reading about whatever horrors the news had to offer. “Why should I darken my thoughts with reality when there is so much good in the world for me to appreciate?” she’d said once to Maxine.

  Maxine had, in turn, told her that she lived in a fantasy world.

  Janine supposed that was true. Especially now.

  Although she willed herself not to, Janine picked up her phone and flicked toward the stories on the local blogosphere, the various social media-famous New York socialites, along with the gossip columnists who normally wrote such stellar things about Janine and her family and the money they had and the parties they threw.

  Naturally, the conversation surrounding Janine had altered a great deal over th
e previous weeks.

  The first one had come out the day after Janine had moved into the Lotte New York Palace. The headline had burned holes into the back of her skull:

  Manhattan Socialite Maxine Aubert Steals Jack Potter from Best Friend

  One thing that had particularly stung about that headline was that Janine’s name hadn’t even been included. Maxine and Jack, Jack and Maxine — the world buzzed for them, despite not knowing them at all. Of course, when headlines and various publications began to list Janine’s name, she hated that just as much, and perhaps even more.

  “Janine Potter thought she had it all. She married the son of an oil tycoon, Jack Potter, had his two daughters, and went on to be just another Manhattan socialite, a woman who lives out her days some forty floors above the rest of us, whose only cares involve which tiles she might want to order in from, say, Italy, to switch up the decor of one of her five bathrooms. But all that changed on the night of her daughter’s engagement party when she, along with several of this writer’s sources, discovered her husband in the throes of passion with her very best friend, Maxine Aubert.

  “The events that transpired after this initial discovery are difficult to decipher. It’s clear to this writer that many of the high-rollers at this particular affair (poor choice of word, perhaps) had more than a few drinks. However, apparently, Janine reached for a vase on the nearest bookshelf and flung the thing at their heads, only for it to shatter somewhere behind them. She then screamed for everyone to get the hell out of her penthouse!”

  Janine furrowed her brow at the words. It was as though she read a story of someone else’s life, someone else’s collapse. She had no memory of saying any of that, nor of throwing a vase at their heads. Perhaps these things had happened; there was no way to know, although they certainly didn’t sound like things the Janine Potter she’d always known would do.

  That said, the Janine Potter she’d always known had basically left the building. In her place, she’d left this creature, in a plush-robe, who hadn’t left her hotel room in four days’ time.

  Depression. Anxiety. Fear. Mortification. There were a number of words for her current state. It was difficult for Janine to imagine herself digging her way out of whatever this was.

  The only person on the planet who knew where she was (beyond the hotel staff, who probably gossiped) was Jack Potter himself. After all, he owned the credit card she had used to check herself in. For this reason, he’d already sent her a note, which she had read exactly once two nights prior before she’d vomited up the contents of her stomach and spent the next fourteen hours horizontal.

  “We will divorce. Don’t dwell on the possibility of a reunion.”

  There had been more to the letter, but not a lot more. Janine knew better than to argue with Jack. He no longer loved her; he saw no reason to continue their marriage after such a scandal, to pretend he still loved her, so he’d decided to throw in the towel once and for all and toss her out like a piece of trash.

  But then, what was Maxine to him? Janine wasn’t sure she wanted to know, or if she had the strength to know.

  Oh, but she was more beautiful. And funnier. And trendier. As her best friend, Janine had been proud of these features of Maxine. Now, they’d flipped themselves over, and she stirred with the kind of jealousy that could eat you from the inside.

  Suddenly, there was a knock at the door. Janine’s heart pounded in her chest so hard she thought it might rupture. She hadn’t ordered room service. She gripped the edge of her robe as anxiety spun through her. She was terrified that somehow, the gossip columnists or the paparazzi had caught wind of her location. She imagined opening the door to find flashing cameras, all of which would catch her looking haphazard in her robe, hair undone and wearing no makeup.

  When the knock rang out again, there was a voice that accompanied it. It was sweet and light and it triggered something in Janine’s mind. The third knock brought the voice a bit louder. It sounded like it said, “Mom?”

  Finally, Janine trudged across the suite. Frightened, she pressed her hand against the door and said, “Maggie? Is that you?”

  The voice on the other side was muffled but relieved. “Mom! Yes. It’s us—me and Alyssa. Dad told us where to find you. Open up, okay? Please.”

  Janine yanked open the door to find her beautiful daughters standing before her. They wore springtime dresses, which shimmered lightly toward the tops of their thighs, and their dark curls wafted beautifully across their shoulders. Their eyebrows were furrowed, and Alyssa looked as though she’d spent the past hour or so crying.

  Without another word, Alyssa flung herself toward her mother and let out a gut-wrenching sob. Janine’s motherly instincts took over, so much so that she nearly forgot her own trauma. She stepped back and held Alyssa tightly as Maggie entered the hotel suite as well and pushed the door closed.

  When the hug broke, Janine glanced up to view Maggie’s expression — one of shock and fear. Her eyes scanned the hotel suite, which wasn’t really dirty or anything, but of course, there were empty bottles of wine on the table and several boxes from take-out food. Janine hadn’t allowed the maids inside the room for a few days, and probably, the place had a musty scent she just didn’t notice. Probably, the musty scent came from her own body.

  “Mom. You can’t live here like this,” Maggie whispered. Her face was marred with concern and fear.

  With a jolt, Janine was reminded of herself with her own mother, Nancy — all the judgment she’d cast on the woman, who hadn’t been able to give her a life of prosperity and comfort. She’d had trouble with alcohol; she had dated all the wrong men. Janine wanted to insist that she was nothing like her mother, especially now, although since Maggie and Alyssa hardly knew their grandmother, she knew this would sound like jibberish to them. Probably, they would want to form her, put her under observation until she started to make sense. (There had been talk of doing this with Nancy when Janine had been around eleven, and Janine had been terrified of the concept ever since.)

  Of course, The Lotte Hotel was a far cry from the world Janine and Nancy had fumbled around in back in the ‘80s and ‘90s. This wasn’t the time to point that out, though. Not with Maggie and Alyssa looking the way they did.

  “Mom, you know it’s only three in the afternoon, right?” Alyssa asked as she pointed at the half-drunk glass of wine on the bedside table.

  Janine didn’t say anything. If she was honest, she would tell them it was her third of the day. This made her stomach swirl with shame. This was her mother’s game, not hers.

  Maggie grabbed her mother’s hands, looked at her with tears in her eyes and said, “Mom, I love you so much. We love you so much and it kills us to see you hurting like this. What Dad did...What Maxine did. It’s inexcusable and we’re completely disgusted with them both.”

  Alyssa took a step closer to both of them and grabbed her mother’s hand as well. “Everything Maggie is saying is true. We’re so disgusted and angry with Dad right now that we’re not even talking to him.”

  “Mom, I know this is hard, but you have to rise above. Hold your head high even though you’re hurting. We’re here for you,” Maggie finished as a tear rolled down her cheek.

  Janine wiped it away from her cheek with the pad of her thumb and felt her own tears fall. She let out a little gasp before saying, “You girls are too smart for your own good. You know that?”

  Both girls laughed through their tears and Janine followed suit as they talked a little more. After a half-hour had passed, Maggie looked over at Alyssa before saying, “I think we should get out of here.”

  Janine arched an eyebrow. “I’m not going anywhere.”

  “Mom. When was the last time you, I don’t know, ate a salad?” Alyssa demanded as she pointed to various pizza boxes.

  “We could just go into the Village for some nutrients. Maybe a green smoothie?” Maggie coaxed.

  “Girls, I really shouldn’t leave the hotel,” Janine returned. She crossed her ar
ms over her chest as a wave of fear crashed over her.

  “Mom, we haven’t seen you in two weeks...” Alyssa said softly. “You didn’t tell us where you were! We had to find out from Dad.”

  “We’ve been talking on the phone. You both knew I was fine,” Janine returned.

  “Yeah. But we’ve just been out there. Dealing with all of this on our own,” Maggie pointed out.

  “You’re not the only one whose life fell apart that night,” Alyssa said somberly.

  Janine had to hand it to them: when they wanted it, they could be manipulative. Maybe this was Jack’s personality, shining through her beautiful daughters. They had a point, though.

  Even still, maybe, if she dressed carefully, hid enough, perhaps nobody would notice her. She dropped her chin to her chest and heaved a sigh.

  “You really can’t hide for the rest of your life, Mom,” Alyssa whispered as she placed a hand on her mother’s shoulder.

  “This isn’t a Dickens novel,” Maggie affirmed. “People move on with their lives after stuff like this. You’re young and so, so, smart, Mom.”

  “You can get through this,” Alyssa insisted. “We’ve got you.”

  Janine looked at both her girls with defeat and turned toward the bathroom. Just before she headed to the shower, she gripped her wine glass and took a sip. If she was going to make an attempt to head back out into the world, into the springtime that surrounded Manhattan, then she wanted a drink to help her along.

  She was beginning to understand her mother, Nancy, more and more as the days passed. How dreadful.

  Chapter Five

  Daphne’s Green Garden was a Millennial-friendly hangout in Greenwich Village and one of Alyssa and Maggie’s favorite spots. Janine had been there a handful of times with them, the last time, most notably about a month before, when they’d gone over the details of the engagement party and fantasized about how marvelous it would be. Hindsight, as usual, was twenty-twenty.