“Hey, Micah,” I greet him.
He’s sent me the new contract already; everything is in order for me to sign as soon as my current one expires.
“Hi, Louisa. How are you?” He doesn’t sound his normal chipper self and a knot in my stomach instantly starts tightening.
“I’m good, how are you?”
“Pissed, honestly. I’ve been busy booking you the best jobs, and I just got a call from one of the designers that confirmed they wanted you only yesterday.”
“What changed today?” I know the answer before I even ask the question, but I have to hear it.
“They wanted Pierre. I said that wasn’t an option, that we needed to find a different photographer. They agreed to that but must have told Pierre,” Micah says. “Who then told them you tried to trump up charges on him.”
“And the designer cancelled,” I say and Micah hums irritably. “Who was it?”
“Shania James.”
Well, damn. That stings. She’s one of the hottest in the business, right now. A few years ago, she wasn’t much more than a protégée; today, they talk about her heading one of the bigger design houses.
“Wait. Doesn’t she platform survivors of sexual and domestic violence?”
“That’s what I fucking asked,” he answers, near yelling.
I can picture his face beet red, imagining the contrast it must be with his strawberry blonde mustache.
Micah is a small man, maybe five-foot-five. I’d be surprised if he weighs a buck-twenty. His personality makes up for his size, though—he’s bold, direct, and energetic. “I don’t know how, yet, but I want to bury that bitch right next to him.”
“This is how I know you were the right choice for new management,” I tell him.
“I’m not sure you’ll be saying that if I can’t book you a gig because that fucker sabotages them all.”
“He won’t win every battle,” I say, though I’m not at all confident about that.
“We should get ahead of it, Louisa. That’s my advice, anyway,” he says. “But it’s your career, and your call, of course.”
“Let me have some time to mull it over, have a good cry, whatever,” I say. “I’ll be in touch soon.”
“You got it. Let me know what you want me to do.”
As soon as we hang up, I feel the beginnings of a panic attack as reality slams through me. He won’t give up. He won’t give in. He wants me to be afraid and alone.
And I am afraid. I’m always, always afraid of him. I’ve been trained to make every decision with his reaction in mind. Down to the simplest of things, he’d berate me over all of them. Once, I had my nails painted pale pink and he told me I not only acted like a child, but I looked like one, too. I’m not sure how a simple nail polish color could have been so offensive, but he kept at me until he dragged me into the bathroom and made me scrub it off.
Every day, there was something. He’d tell me I purposely did things to piss him off, that I liked his reaction. I didn’t.
On the contrary, I tried so hard to be the perfect woman, the perfect girlfriend. Someone who was pleasant, loving, fun to be around. God, how I tried. Only to fail again and again.
The tears come. Just like they always do when I’m mad at him and madder at myself. I shouldn’t be. I know I shouldn’t blame myself. But how? How do I stop? How do I move on when he won’t fucking let me?
He wants me to be afraid and alone.
But I’m not alone. Not anymore.
With angry swipes at my damp cheeks, I remove the tears I hate so much and walk out the back door. Squinting at the bright sun, making summer known, I take a minute to watch the waves. Letting my chest rise and fall along with the crests. Letting it penetrate me with that mystical healing it holds.
I can do this. I can be different, this time. I can fight back.
Grady answers my knock on his sliding glass door.
