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There it is.I flipped my hair over my shoulder and settled farther into the couch, ready to give my sister a heart-to-heart. It actually felt good to focus on someone else’s problems. “Who is ‘everyone’? Be specific so I know who to beat up.”
“Ha ha.” She rolled her eyes. “Literally everyone.”
“You don’t even like business things, so what do you care?”
From a young age, she’d made no secret about her desire to get married and have her husband worry about the serious parts of life. She’d struggled in high school and loathed anything even remotely intellectual. To say this news about how she felt was coming from left field was putting it mildly.
She huffed. “Just because I don’t like them doesn’t mean I can’t do them.”
“But why would you want to if you don’t have to? I don’t understand where you’re coming from.”
“I’m bored,” she admitted. “So I suggested to Phil that I could go in to his office a few days a week and help out. He laughed at me.” Her shoulders slumped, and her voice sounded so small.
I had the urge to punch my brother-in-law in the nose, but I couldn’t blame him. If she’d suggested she help me at the law firm, I would have laughed as well. The thought that I might easily have been the one to make my sister feel unworthy made me uncomfortable. I’d never considered myself a judgmental person, but maybe I was.
“I’m sure you caught him off guard,” I said carefully.
Phil was a good guy, and he adored my sister exactly as she was. I doubted he would belittle her on purpose, just like I wouldn’t. Not seriously, at least. But Steph and I joked about this kind of stuff all the time—I was no fun, and she was too frivolous. Had every joke inflicted a small wound? She gave as good as she got—and I cringed inside, just a little, every time she called me a bore. Maybe the same was true for her.
“Oh, he knew he messed up. He tried to backtrack, but it was too late.” She sniffed. “It was a stupid idea, anyway.”
“No, it wasn’t.” I hesitated, though, because she would hate working in an office. Surely she realized that too. “But maybe a better idea would be for you to find your own thing, you know?”
“Like what?”
I shrugged. “What are you interested in? It’s never too late to go to college.”
She laughed. “Yeah, right. I barely graduated from high school.”
“You’re a different person now. You could start small—take one class at community college or something. See where it takes you.”
She scoffed. “What will everyone think when Stephanie Markham signs up for Math 101? My husband is the CEO of Markham Corporation.”
To someone else’s ears, that might have sounded like snobbish talk, as if she thought she was better than everyone else. I knew it wasn’t that, though—she simply worried about what others thought of her. She always had.
“You are not defined by your husband,” I said sharply.
Our mother was always in search of her nextMrs.title. I shifted uncomfortably as I realized my mom and I might not be as dissimilar as I’d always assumed. She was no one without a husband, and I was no one without my job. Perhaps the Holden women were cursed with being unsatisfied with who we were. It was a sobering thought. I downed half the wine in my glass.
“You know what I mean. I can hear them now— ‘Isn’t she cute, trying to make a career for herself.’”
I could hear it just as clearly as if those assholes she was talking about were in the room with us.Fuck them.The situation hadn’t even happened, and I was angry on my sister’s behalf. No one had the right to judge her.Not even me.
“Who cares what other people think?” I knew the answer to my question—shecared. She was so enmeshed in socialite society, where gossip and status were currency. I shuddered. “Anyone who gives you grief over it is a jerk who isn’t worth your time. And again, I’ll beat them up.”
Maybe it was the wine talking, but I felt I could do it. Then I’d be the one everyone was talking about. Did you hear about that disgraced lawyer who was arrested for assault? Tsk… poor thing. Her boyfriend cheating on her must have sent her over the edge.
A tiny smile graced her face. “I took a kickboxing class with you. I’ll take my chances on my own, thanks.”
“Hey.” I poked her arm. “I’m serious. If you want more from your life—not that what you have isn’t enough, but if you want something else, I’m behind you one hundred percent.” I wanted to face-palm. So much for not passing judgment.
“Maybe I’ll think about it,” she said, which was more than I’d expected. In another few days, she’d probably forget all about her crazy idea of being more than a society wife.
I had mixed feelings, because while she was listening to me, I was ignoring my own advice.It’s not the same.Stephanie had a wealthy husband who took care of her. For all she joked about being a trophy wife, she did love her husband, and they seemed happy together. Still, the fact remained that she could decide finger painting was her true calling and do that happily for the rest of her life. I didn’t have that luxury.
I only had myself to rely on. That was my goal, and I’d achieved it. But suddenly, it didn’t seem as appealing as it once had. I drained my second glass of wine and reached for the almost empty bottle to refill. I was perfectly capable of making my own way in the world, but what did that matter if I was too lonely to enjoy it?
***
