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I mean, she expected me to go inside, after all. So what if she’d been wrong in thinking I was a maid? That was her own damn mistake, not mine. This was what she’d wanted me to do, what she had ordered me to do.
It wasn’t as if I was really breaking and entering. B & E was wrong. It was as wrong as what that thief asshole Diego had been doing picking rich people’s pockets in the ballroom.
But I wasn’t doing anything wrong here. No way. Because—because really, it wasn’t as if I was actually going to take anything; I just wanted a little peek to see how the other half lived.
No harm in that.
Except, I knew better. This wasn’t right, no matter how I tried to angle it. And yet, I looked around, anyway, not leaving, but staying.
The first thing that struck me was how fresh and open it felt. The air just seemed so clean and easy to breathe. I inhaled deeply, getting myself a huge lungful as if I could store some of the freshness up inside me and take it home to savor later. Then I glanced around at all the space.
Gah, so much space. And brightness.
Lamps and wall sconces and overhead fixtures in the ceiling lit up the entire room until it was almost too illuminated. But after living in the dingy, dark apartment where we currently resided, all this light was…
Well, it was nice.
Jealousy nipped at me hard and fast.
It just wasn’t fair, I decided, stepping farther into the room with a little more confidence now. Someone that rude and outrageous should not have such a pretty, bright home.
Everything in the front room was either white, silver, glass, or mirrored. Even the shag carpet was a pristine eggshell. I found myself picking up each of my sneakers and checking the soles to make sure I didn’t have any dirt on them that might track across the floor.
“Jesus,” I murmured, shaking my head and dropping my clean foot, only to yelp and jump when I glanced up to get an eyeful of myself, because the entire wall in front of me was made up of mirrored panels.
I set my hand against my chest, easing my racing heartbeat back to normal. Once it was settled again, I crept forward some more, curious to see what else the woman had here that she totally didn’t deserve, until I came to the opening of a wide hallway. Catching sight of the deep burgundy stain the woman had called room service to come clean, I tsked and shook my head slowly.
“Aww, did the bitch spill her merlot?” I moved forward to check out the mess. “What a pity.”
But all sarcasm aside, if someone didn’t fix this soon that stain was going to set in.
A moment of actual, genuine empathy filled me. For the carpet. Not its owner. Poor thing. It already got walked all over, day in and day out, by evil incarnate. Now, its flawless, white coat was going to have a permanent blemish, because we all knew, good and well, no maid was going to rush right over to help that nightmare of a woman clean anything. They were probably still arguing amongst themselves and drawing straws, debating over whose turn it was to deal with her this time. The carpet was so pretty and soft too, like seriously soft; my shoes felt like they were traipsing over cotton balls. It didn’t deserve such cruel mistreatment.
“Dammit,” I muttered when I realized I had knelt down by the stain to sympathetically stroke the carpet around the mess.
Before I could stop myself, a sudden brutal vision bullied its way into my head, uninvited.
And just like that, I was fifteen again, watching Dad, with tears bleeding from his eyes as he knelt on our floor, scrubbing with a vengeance and swearing fluidly in Spanish while he filled his washrag with a rusty red tinge, even as the stain in the carpet stood firm.
“Cabrón. Damn you, come out,” he cried. “Come out already.”
But the blood had never come out. Maybe someone had gotten a new carpet and replaced it after we moved. I had no idea, though I suspected they probably had. That carpet was no doubt curled up in a roll, abandoned and alone in a landfill by now, buried under old banana peels, broken washing machines, and bicycle parts, where no one knew its discolored fibers had once cushioned my mother’s head as she’d breathed her last few stuttering breaths.
“Dammit.” I jerked to my feet and shoved such thoughts away. Then I pointed at the floor sternly, as if reprimanding it. “This is for you,” I told it in no uncertain terms. “Not her. You got that? I would never in a million years help that vile woman.”
But I couldn’t handle letting that stain set in, either.
Marching with determination, I found the kitchen and knelt before the double doors under the sink, only to fling them open wide and pull back in disbelief when I beheld the contents.
“What the hell?”
There was absolutely nothing under the sink, except drain pipes.
“Okay,” I said to myself, nodding my head in complete bewilderment as I shut the door and cleared the embarrassment from my throat. “So then, where do rich people keep their cleaning supplies?”
I tapped my fingers against my mouth, thinking, thinking, until—Lightbulb! “Why, in the broom closet, of course, Gabby dearest.”
So I rose to my feet, in search of such a place.
