Then by her husband who preyed on her need forvalidation. He held it away, dangling it like a carrot in front ofher. If she worked harder, if she made more money, if she deniedwho she was, then perhaps, just perhaps, he would give it to her.But he kept moving the carrot further and further away, with nointention of ever meeting her needs. He was cruel andtaunting.
And then, by a virtual stranger, who laid heropen and then let the world in to see. He told her deepest, mostshameful secret. He exposed her, letting everyone see and judge,which she had confessed was her kryptonite. He left her bare andraw, and having to defend herself, despite herinnocence.
As she watched Peter drive away with herchildren, she was suddenly very angry. No more shame. She was thevictim here. She was the wronged party, not the other way around.Fuck Peter. Fuck Nancy Beemer. And fuck Jack Davis.
She was seething. She spun around and openedthe door. She slammed it, which made a vase on the nearby end tablewobble. Reflexively, she put out her hand to steady it. The heat ofher anger transferred onto the smooth ceramic exterior. She graspedthe lip of the crimson vase, and lifted it, the weight heavy in herhand. With her other hand, she re-opened the door and threw thevase as hard as she could. It shattered on the porch, sending whitelily petals and fragile red fragments splintering across herwelcome mat.
Elizabeth had never experienced such red-hotrage coursing through her. In addition to the vase, she had pulleda picture off the wall. It was Peter and Elizabeth on their weddingday. She threw that as hard as she could in Peter's study,shattering the frame, and breaking his computer monitor. He neverused the PC anymore, but it felt good to be destructive. No oneelse seemed to mind that they had caused such destruction in herlife. It was good to cause some of her own.
CHAPTER TWENTY-ONE: August 26,2012
She drove. She probably shouldn't have beendriving in her current frame of mind, but she was too enraged tothink of anything else. She definitely had some road rage going on.At first, she wasn't even sure of where she was heading. Shethought she should probably go see Susan to help her calm down andwork through this.
Elizabeth tried deep breathing as she drove toSusan's. She wasn't sure how Susan would be able to calm her down.Part of her was hoping that Susan would join her in her anger, inher outrage. How had Elizabeth not seen all this time that she wasbeing controlled? That she was being held down and beaten withwords into submission? Into the "acceptable behavior" out of fearof scorn and being looked down upon?
Somehow, that realization brought her some,albeit minor, relief. She still didn’t know how to make thingsbetter, but the enlightenment was the first step.
Elizabeth was not really paying attention asshe drove. She had made the drive so often this summer that she wason autopilot. A far cry from relying so heavily on her GPS thatOctober night when her life changed. She now knew that she got theflat tire approximately 1.2 miles from Jack's house. If she hadwalked the opposite direction, there was a house 0.3 miles away. Ifonly she had walked in the other direction. Why hadn't she walkeddown the mountain instead of up it? It seemed she always had totake the harder road. Literally.
A flash of brown off to her left caught hereye. She slowed, afraid whatever it was would dart out in front ofher. She focused enough to realize that it was a dog. Not just anydog. She recognized the animal, and the scarlet collar he wore. Itwas Harold, Jack's dog. She reflexively pulled into the driveway,not even really aware of what she was doing. Harold ran up to thecar to investigate his new guest. As she got out of the van, shesaw Jack, dressed in rumpled khaki shorts, work boots, and anorange t-shirt coming around the side of the house. He lookedsurprised, but not unhappy to see her.
"Hey, Liza. What's up?" He was so relaxed andcasual, wiping his forehead and hands on a navy bandana that hethen stuffed in a back pocket. She could not believe he was so calmand collected when rage and venom and hate were coursing throughher veins.
"How could you?" she yelled. She was headingtoward him, wrath pouring out of her.
"Wha—" Hecouldn't even feign innocence before she charged.
"How could you do this to me?" She was about afoot away from him, screaming into his face.
"I didn't do anything to you—I—"
"Bullshit." She wouldn't even let him attemptto defend himself. "That's complete and utter bullshit and you knowit. You ruined my marriage. You ruined my life!"
He leaned casually on the newel post by thefront door. She had stopped about ten feet from him, standing inthe middle of his lawn. Harold ran back and forth between them,looking for someone to pet him. When it became apparent that no onewould, he went and laid down in the shade of a large shrub by thefront of the house.
"From what I saw, your marriage was alreadyD.O.A. If it can’t withstand this, if he can’t believe you–"
"Believe me what? That's not it atall."
"Okay, then if he can't believein you," he continued, looking smugas the pained look on Elizabeth's face told him he'd hit the nailon the head, "then maybe it's time to cut your losses and moveon."
"Move on? To what? To you?" She askedincredulously.
"I never said that."
"You might as well have the night of Nancy'sparty."
"I thought you knew then and were fine with it.It wasn't until after that I realized you had no clue."
"Yup, that's me, clueless asalways."
"I wouldn't say clueless. I'd say more–"
"If you say innocent, I swear to God I willpunch you."
He chuckled, not taking her threat seriously.He obviously had no gauge on how angry she really was. It wasn'tuntil she had charged up on him and was cocking her arm back thathe realized. "Jesus, calm down, Liza. Holy crap, you're reallyupset."
He held tightly onto her wrist, bringing herarm down by her side. He
