Shattered and Charred

It was raining heavily that night, she would never forget because she had forgotten her umbrella that day. She had a feeling right before she left the apartment but she was too late to even care. In the evening she walked up to her doorstep drenched in the cold rain of June. The key was under the mat where it had been for the past five years that she had been living with her husband Mark. He was an economist and had just recently branched out on his own, they would soon be able to afford a second car for her, that was what she hoped at least, and then she wouldn't have to go home cold when her husband couldn't pick her up. As she opened the front door she had an uneasy feeling at the pit of her stomach that something was wrong. She had seen Mark's car up front so he was home. Was he okay? Had someone broken in? That was when she noticed the door was slightly ajar. A wave of panic came over her as she prepared for the worst. Could it really be the love of her life was gone so soon? She unconsciously held her breath as she opened the door wider. She was met by a deadly silence, it scared her. Mark usually listened to the news at that time, or watched some rugby. She cautiously walked to their bedroom and was met by something that changed her life forever and that of her unborn baby. "Mark!" she shouted as she walked into the room her wet hair stuck to her pale face and her lips red from the cold weather outside. She stood there unable to comprehend what she was looking at. A mixture of emotion overcame her and she was unable to speak. "Mark what is this? What are you doing?" she watched her best friend Betty scramble out her marital bed in utter disbelief. "Betty! What the hell is this? How? When?"  "Rose give me a chance to explain. This isn't what it looks like..." "Don't use that cliché line on me, Mark. We both know that this is exactly what it looks like. You're having an affair with my best friend, with our best friend. How Mark? Why would you do this?" "Rose. I..." "Get out of my house the both of you." "Rose you can't do this. This is our house. I have every right to be here' "Get out! Get out now!"   She sat on the floor crying. She cried for her relationship with her husband, she cried for her best friend and most of all she cried for herself. For how stupid she had been, there had been signs he was withdrawing, she had just ignored them. She had slept with him all this while in the same bed he had been having his activities with his best friend. Then she remembered almost a year ago when she had been away on a trip, when she came back he had not even waited for her to rest or take a shower. He had made love to her throughout the whole night. He told her how much he loved and cherished her, how important she was and how lucky he was to be with her. She felt stupid. After all this time she still wasn't aware of the man she married. Her memories reverted back to when they were teenagers.                                                              *flashback* "Betty who's that new kid?" "He's a boy who just joined the school. Isn't he handsome? I think you should go ask him out." "I would never be able to Betty. Plus, he looks like your type of guy anyway. Go get him." "Okay girl. Wish me luck." Betty ran off to the tall boy who had just joined Springfield High. He was tall and muscular, with long dirty blond hair that blew with the slightest gust of wind. He looked like the main character from a teen-romance novel, almost perfect. Unlike Betty, Rose wasn't the slightest bit interested in him, he looked prideful and she saw the way he was looking at Betty, eyeing her like a piece of meat. She made a mental note to mention this to Betty. He spelled trouble and she could see it.  She was surprised when at lunch time Betty and 'the new kid' were standing outside her home-room class waiting for her. The 'blond boy' had his back against on the lockers opposite her classroom while Betty was standing in front of him chatting away. He was quiet, didn't seem bothered by her, in fact it was like Betty didn't even exist to him. This made Rose even angrier and the fact that her friend couldn't see this saddened her even more. She walked up to them and even before she could get a word in Betty was already introducing her. "Jake, this is my best friend Roseline but she prefers Rose. Rose, this is Jake Hartman, he moved here from New York." she shook his hand unwillingly and straightened her posture to look more intimidating. Then... She looked up. Into his dark blue eyes. She hadn't noticed they were blue. It was like staring into a beautiful galaxy she didn't want to be pulled back out from them. She could feel herself being drawn closer to him as he looked into the deepest part of her soul, a part she wasn't willing to let anyone into, even Betty. Yet she wanted him to know. To know her. "Rose, won't you respond to what he just said?" she heard Betty ask. "I'm sorry, what did you say?" "It's nice to meet you." he repeated once again "It's nice to meet you too."                                                                 *end of flashback* She sat there wishing that somehow she could turn back time and stopped Betty from going to him then maybe Jake would not have entered her life. Maybe then she never would have met Mark, but no matter how much she wished for this to be true it wasn't and now she would have to decide what she was going to do. Would she be able to forgive him? No, but was she supposed to throw what they had outside the window? Life was unfair. What had she ever done? She had been perfect. The perfect student, daughter, friend, wife, employee, she had done it all. She had pushed herself beyond her limits and chased after her dreams. Yet now she was sitting alone on her cold apartment floor downing a bottle of French wine that burned her all the way to her stomach. She liked it though, it distracted her from the mess in her life. It made the pain better. "Hey Mandy, I won't be able to come in for work for a few days. I've got some issues at home." "It's okay dear take all the time you need." Mandy, short form for Amanda, had been her mother's best friend. Her mother had died when she was sixteen and her father had left both her and her mother when she was three and she had never heard from him since. She didn't even remember the man. Amanda had told her how much her mother had loved her father and that her father had been a good man, that one day he just vanished and never came back. She didn't hate her father. To her, he had never been a part of her life. Her mother had been her only guardian and when she died, it was Amanda, she had walked her down the aisle where Mark had been waiting for her smiling from ear to ear, when Betty stood next to her as she exchanged vows with the man she loved. Now there was no one else to turn to. She would have to be away from the office for a bit. "I hope that everything is fine with you love. You seem off." "Can we talk about it tomorrow please? I don't have the strength for it now." "Okay dear. Just remember I love you so much. Say hi to Mark for me dear. Bye" "Bye." How was she going to tell her what had happened. Betty and Mark had been her best friend's for years. Amanda loved them almost as much as she loved her. Mandy had not been able to have children of her own, so she was Mandy's only child and they shared a strong bond because she had always been present in her life.  She picked herself up from the floor and dragged her feet to the bathtub where she soaked. She made sure to turn the tap on, she couldn't bear listening to herself cry. She fell asleep that night alone for the first time in five years but deep down she knew it had been the first time in a period of one year that she felt safe. She thought of her mother that night as she slept. And although she loved Mandy, she wished her mom was here, so she would tell her what to do.    She didn’t think that it would get better by the third day, but she didn’t expect to feel as bad as she still did. She had barely eaten anything and had drastically lost weight. Betty had tried to call her multiple times already and Mark had come knocking on the door begging her to listen to him, but there was nothing he could say to her that would change what had happened. On the second day of her isolation she had read the email that Betty had sent her, she had felt different types of emotion on that day, a mixture of betrayal, hatred, disgust, anger and sadness. She had blamed herself for not noticing earlier, for not reading in between the lines, she would have saved herself the trouble she was going through now. Betty had told her that the affair had been going on for a little over a year, that they had ‘s****l tension’ between them. She said it had been a mistake. She laughed at herself, two years, a mistake that they had been making over and over again for the past two years. Had they thought about her? Had he really cherished their marriage? And she, had she felt any remorse as she slept with her husband? She didn’t think so, otherwise they would have done a better job at keeping the secret for a while longer.   On the third day she had noticed that her periods were two weeks late, she hadn’t had time to worry about it, she had been busy with work. She hoped that it wasn’t what she thought it was, she wouldn’t be able to handle it on top of everything else that was happening in her life. She would die. She had cried continuously but it didn’t solve anything, so she went out and bought a test. It came back positive. She decided she couldn’t handle this alone she had to talk to someone, normally it would have Betty, but she was the cause of her dilemma. So Mandy came over to be with her.   “I really don’t know what to do with myself, I think I’m going to go mad.” she said as another drop of tear rolled down her pale cheeks. “Don’t say things like that, it’s going to be alright.” Mandy had taken the news very calmly, she hadn’t over-reacted like Rose had expected her to. She had been the voice of reason over all the madness, she had kept her sane and Rose knew then how valuable Mandy was to her, more valuable than her husband, best friend and father had ever been. “What do I do from here?” “Honey, I can’t make that decision for you, I can only be here with you as you make the decision for yourself. I can only tell you one thing, it is very hard for people to change who they are.”   With that Rose knew exactly what to do. She didn’t force herself to be okay. Because it was not okay, instead, with the supervision of Mandy, Mark collected his things from the house. His existence was erased from her life every memory that they shared, she either trashed or burnt. Then she filed for a divorce, she cut off all contact with him and with Betty too, her betrayal had hurt the most. She was the reason that Rose had given him a chance, she had pushed her to do it and stupidly she had fallen in love with him. Bullshit! She thought as she scrubbed their bathroom for the third time in a spun of three days. Mandy was there with her, she moved in temporarily to be with her through it. It didn’t get better instantly there was still a void inside her. Everything reminded her of him. She had to sleep on the bed they had shared for five years, the same bed her betrayal had taken place on, the bed that they had shared their hopes and dreams on, she had to bear with that. Some days were better than others but on other days she felt as though the sadness was swallowing her whole pulling her deeper and deeper into an abyss of loneliness where she would never be able to crawl out of. His sweet words over the years taunting her when she closed her eyes at night, the sight she had walked in on tattooed to her brain.