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But I know I need him. And I hope he needs me. What we have is fucked up and twisted, but it serves a need. I know I’ve always been wired differently. He only brought to the surface what was already there.
I’m not saying I’m glad it happened the way it did or that I believe it’s somehow morally okay. But he’s not cruel as you might imagine, and he’s never lost control with me in all the time he’s had me.
I’m sorry I couldn’t play the role you needed me to play. I’m sorry I couldn’t go to therapy and have the approved victim response and recover. I know you’ll never be able to understand me making this choice. I know you’ll all believe it was a sick mind that led me to it, that no person in their right mind would do what I’ve done. Maybe that’s the truth of it.
Or maybe I’m just stronger than you.
ACKNOWLEDGMENTS
Thank you to the people who supported and helped bring Comfort Food into existence.
K: for offering critique, feedback, copyedits, and for taking fifteen pictures of chicken noodle soup, which didn’t end up making it into the final cover design.
M, C, and SEP: for beta reading.
C and J for their formatting help.
And to M, for believing in me.
The Game Maker
Kitty Thomas
Copyright 2020 © Kitty Thomas
All rights reserved.
Digital Edition License Notes
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THE GAME MAKER
ONE
The phone in my pocket has stopped ringing by the time I manage to unlock the door and stumble into my apartment, kicking the door shut behind me. In my arms are my last bags of groceries. I sit them on the floor and dig out my phone.
One new voicemail.
I recognize the number of the missed call. It's Carolyn, my landlady. A pile of eviction notices in an array of neon colors is stacked neatly on my kitchen countertop. I should have thrown them away, but I'm a masochist like that.
I press the speakerphone button and dial in to my voicemail where the robotic voice helpfully announces that I haveone. new. message.I love how each word is its own sentence. I take a deep breath and press one to listen.
“Kate, I need you out of the apartment by the end of the week. I've already got someone who wants to move in. I'm very sorry about your situation, but you have to find other arrangements. I don't want to have you forcibly removed; please don't make me the bad guy here.”
I slide to the floor and break down and cry. How did this happen to me? I once heard that nobody ends up truly homeless unless they have a drug problem or a mental illness. Well, let me just say, that is a big fat lie. I have no addictions and am the most put-together person I know. And yet, here I am.
It's hard to explain how someone becomes this isolated. Especially in a city of millions. A few years ago, fresh out of college and mourning the death of my parents—car crash—I decided to move to the city and put my advertising degree to good use. I have a few friends back home, but they’re casual acquaintances—not the kind of people I can ask for help.
And here in the city? I'm a workaholic. I was working in an agency with far more men than women. What few friendships I have, again, are shallow and not ahey, can I crash at your placesort of situation. And I'm the best goddamned advertising exec in a sixty mile radius. I didn't lose my job because I was irresponsible or bad at it.
I lost my job because of Andrew, my boss. Because I made the mistake of dating him and then breaking up with him. The sex was fucking awful. I would rather be single for the rest of my life than suffer through shitty sex with a man who doesn't know which end of his dick does what. Or where my clit is.
You learn so many useless things in school, but where to find the clit is probably the most useful knowledge many men could gain for practical life use. Followed by how to stroke it, tease it, lick it. Alas, Andrew missed that nonexistent day of class at Shit-you'll-actually-use school.
When he fired me, I told him to go fuck himself, if he could figure out how, and flounced off in a huff. I thought it would be easy with my reputation to find a new job, but Andrew beat me to it. I'm pretty much blacklisted in this city. I thought, no problem, I can move. I have no attachments here. But the economy isn't the greatest, and I can't give Andrew as a reference, so all that hard work and reputation I built? Gone.
And now I'm out of time. Out of savings. I'm going to be out on the street in five days if I don't figure something out.
