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“Well, if coming onto your best friend and taking her to a sex club to be a toy for a whack job without her knowledge isn’t bad…then color me stupid.” Her actions were pretty unforgivable.
“I know you won’t forgive me, but I wanted to say I was sorry before I left. He said he wasn’t going to hurt you and I thought it would be us with him just watching or something. He said he was a voyeur, you know a watcher.”
“Still fucking creepy, Ella.”
“He told me to bring you because that’s all I talked about. He was jealous of my feelings for you.”
“This isn’t about jealousy, or forgiveness, Ella, I feel sorry for you. I feel sorry that you felt breaking my trust was worth an ounce of his time. If you needed money, a place to stay, anything, I would have given it to you freely. Heck, I could have been into you, but this killed it completely.” I rubbed the flesh above my heart that ached from the betrayal. I would get over this eventually, but the hurt would take some time.
“Jude?” Ella cried into the phone and I’m glad she didn’t just show up at my house while Lorand was here. There’s something about him that is dangerous and I didn’t know how he would have taken Ella’s apology, meaningless as it was to me.
“Please don’t ever call me again.” I hit the end button on the phone as she cried and put it down on the nightstand.
A shower would clear my head and help me with what to do next. Lorand and I had a lot to talk about and I wasn’t sure where to begin.
* * * * *
Stepping out of the shower, my phone was ringing again. It was like Grand Central Station opened up and everyone wanted a piece of me today. I reached for a towel that blended into everything else and stubbed my toe hard against the cabinet. Hobbling and trying to not hit my toe with anything else I hopped into the bedroom thankful I owned no clutter that could otherwise sabotage my walk to the bed.
“Hello?” I answered feeling annoyed. I wanted Lorand to come back and the shower didn’t do much in the way of making me feel better. I sat on the bed rubbing my foot to massage the sting away.
“Judith, sweetheart.” My uncle’s voice came through the phone. Deep and clear, he addressed me formally as he always did. I really needed to set individual rings for people so I knew when to pick up and when to let it go to voicemail, but I was stubborn.
“Hi, how are you?” He’s known me since birth. He’s my mother’s much older brother. My uncle lived as a confirmed bachelor for years with no children of his own and often stepped up to be my father figure when my own couldn’t be bothered.
“I’m fine, but I was calling to check in on my favorite niece and take you to lunch if you have the time.” It’s not often we got together and I didn’t want to pass up the opportunity. Unsure how long Lorand would take, I decided to use my speech to text program to send him a text message when I get the chance.
“I always have time for you uncle. I just showered so I can dress if you’ll pick me up.”
“Perfect, I’m actually in the neighborhood so I should be there in about fifteen minutes.”
“Okay. I’ll be ready.” I reach for the first hanger in my closet. The organized band around the hanger tells me I’m selecting an easy sundress that I know has short sleeves and a modest top that will cover the bruises on my chest. I hired a personal shopper to select a few nice pieces and to arrange them in my closest so I don’t have to worry about looking like a mismatched hobo with my limited sight. My mind wanders for a minute and I feel a flashback overwhelm me. I don’t have a ton of them anymore that feel this real, but when I do, I’m left rattled and this one has me sinking to my knees shaking.
Antiseptic smells sting my nose and a bandage covers my face I can’t seem to reach. Panic grips my chest and I tried to breathe through the ventilator. “You’re going to be okay, Judith. I’ve got someone keeping an eye on you now.”
My uncle’s voice permeated the drugged cloud they kept me in. Sedated someone said. Scarred for life another said. She’ll never be the same, my mother’s words laced with horror as she dictates plans around me.
I was the new freak show since the accident at school. The science lab off campus exploded and I barely made it out alive. It was an accident that killed two of the school administrators who were meeting there. I don’t remember leaving the building, just opening the door and then struggling to breathe and my eyes on fire. Someone helped me out–Lorand–I know that now, but it’s all hazy.
My uncle always protected me since then. He helped me get my townhouse here in the complex and filed the law suit on my behalf for damages. He held me when I cried over emancipating myself from my parents who wanted to take me away from here to Connecticut to another school I refused to go to. I needed my freedom and he understood that, but I also needed what was familiar. There was a strange comfort to staying in Karim. I didn’t have to start all over, and people here at least knew what happened to me so the stares seemed less probing and curious. At least here I was their freak show and if I couldn’t see who pitied me at least they weren’t all strangers.
Knocking at the door jolted me from the memory locked inside my dark head. I finished getting dressed slipping on flat shoes to answer the door.
“Uncle!”
“Sweet girl!” He wraps me in a hug and kisses my head guiding me to his car where I slipped inside on smooth leather seats. A smell that reminds me of metal and Lorand jolts my nose, but I dismiss it because it’s impossible.
“I haven’t spent time with you in a while. What’s been going on?” I asked him.
“Traveling for work, you know how selling airplane parts go....” I don’t but wait for him to elaborate when he doesn’t. “I decided to take some time off and wrap up a few things in town. I got a letter for the final settlement amount from the Academy’s lawyers.”
“Oh.” Now I felt awkward. I’d never asked for anything, but the court has been more than generous thanks to my uncle’s team of lawyers practically parading me around like a puppy. As long as the school paid the settlement and secured the science lab, paying the environmental fines for the chemicals that leeched during the explosion, it was supposed to be over. I needed for this to be over.
“I’ll have it deposited into your account by the first of the month my dear.” He patted my hand reassuringly as he drove the car into town. It wasn’t that I wasn’t grateful to him for doing all of this but he had a tenacity that almost scared me with how he went after them.
“Thank you.” Simply put that’s all I wanted to say on this matter.
“I hope you like the Tumbleweed Café. It’s a beautiful day and I thought we could enjoy sitting outside.” He pulled the car to a stop.
