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Stop the panic attack.
then
Change the ring tone.
“Yes?” I muster as much strength as I can for the call, because chances are good it’s my father again.
“Honey, I almost forgot,” he says, as if we hadn’t hung up at all. “We need to have a meeting tomorrow morning. You and I. Breakfast, at nine am, in my office.”
“In Washington?” I choke out.
He laughs. “Good lord, no. I’ll be home late tonight. You know I hate to spend any more time here in D.C. than I have to.”
Click.
The room spins, and not because I’m actually dizzy. Meeting. Breakfast. Tomorrow at 9am. I stand and search the desk for a piece of paper to write that on, then stop. I stare at the phone in my hand.
I have so much to relearn, I think, as I open the Calendar app and teach myself how to enter the appointment in the app.
I’m also very, very aware that while this is my phone, it’s not my private phone. Everything I say, everything I do, every tap and swipe is being monitored by someone. Maybe Daddy. Perhaps Drew. More likely, it’s someone I’ve never met, who is being paid to make sure I stay within the lines Daddy wants to keep me in.
And that’s life, right? As long as I paint within the lines I’ll earn my gold star. Four years ago, someone dragged my bloody body across those lines and made a big, huge mess on the canvas called life. None of that was my fault, but I’ve been held responsible for it for four years.
I’m still being held accountable for it.
But that’s all about to change.
Chapter 10
One of the best tips I picked up on the island is this morning drink called Bulletproof Coffee. You mix hot coffee, unsalted butter, and this weird brain-building oil and drink it on an empty stomach. The island staff claimed it helped to boost endorphins and elevate neurotransmitters and a whole bunch of biochemical neurochemistry blah blah blah that never made sense to me, but I did know one thing:
I felt great on the mornings when I drank it after waking up, and then went for a run.
Connie, the woman who runs the kitchen, is new to me. She’s short and plump, with greying, chin-length hair, and she wears square, fashionable glasses with red frames. Her apron is red and has nothing on it. Not a single stain. I only know who she is because as I walk into the kitchen, she looks up and walks toward me like a drill sergeant who finds an errant recruit wandering around an Army base.
“Connie,” she says, shaking my hand like it’s an old-fashioned water pump. “So nice to meet you, Lindsay.”
“Thanks. You too.” I don’t ask what happened to Michelle, the former kitchen manager. I’m sure my mother fired her. Household staff rotate through the compound like balls on a roulette wheel.
“What can I get you?” she asks.
“I can get my own, thanks. I just need a blender.” I smile, trying to put her at ease. She’s tense and aware, but not in an anxious way. She’s like a general.
“No need. It’s my job to get to know your tastes, Lindsay. I can make your life seamless if you let me.”
The bark of laughter that comes out of me can’t be contained. If only it were so easy.
She reddens. “I meant in terms of your diet.”
“Right.”
Connie clearly isn’t the type to give lots of warm fuzzies, and yet some emotion is there. Nothing negative. I think she’s the type who likes to be in control of her space. I met a lot of staff members like this at the island. Figuring out where their boundaries were became an art. As I stand here and try to figure out the fragile social space between me, my own home, and this new woman in charge of food in my home, I realize how sick and tired I am of reading other people to make sure I fit within whatever box they think I should be in.
And yet, I don’t have a choice.
Daddy could send me back to the island in a heartbeat.
And I have way too much work to do here.
