Lies & Secrets

Warning: Contains mature themes.

Prologue

BPOV

I blame movies. I blame fairytales. I blame him.

I thought he was prince charming; he swept in with his white Porsche, killer smile, perfect hair and expensive tux. I thought he was sweeping me off my feet: wining and dining, daily gifts and endless streams of compliments. I thought he loved me; he told me so, he acted as though it was true and he asked me to marry him.

The worst part of all this is that I really, really loved who I thought he was. And he hurt me. He really hurt me.

It felt like grief. I grieved my naivety, my engagement, and I grieved the man I believed him to be. I did this on the flight home, in the cramped economy seats that I knew so well, with a fraction of my useless belongings in a small suitcase overhead.

It felt like failure. I guess it was.

The sunglasses on my face and the phone in my pocket were the only things worth over a hundred dollars that were with me. Threadbare, faded black jeans were snug on my legs; an old tattered plaid shirt familiar on my skin. Everything else – I left it all in storage.

I was adjusting. But I hated it.

The lady on my left – an overweight, greying, tanned woman wearing a ratty university hoodie – turned to glance my way then back out through the window.

I wondered how the world looked to her. She wore a wedding ring on her ring finger, and she wore some hope in her eyes. Therefore, she was dressed better than me.

I looked too young to have the imprint of a removed engagement band on my finger. And I most certainly was. I knew I looked defeated, from the slight sag in my shoulders to the constant weepy eyes, blotchy cheeks and gritted teeth.

But I hardly expected to look like a supermodel. Storms postponed flights, so the first one I could get was a week later than when I had wanted to leave. I spent seven nights sleeping on a lumpy couch at my drug dealer's scruffy flat, dealing with random guys waking me up in the middle night, trying to tow me towards a bedroom and his never ending stream of women walking in and hobbling out.

It didn't come without it's price. He goaded me into dancing at a party of his, but was kind enough to load me up with enough shit that I can't even remember any of it.

Last night, I answered Mom's call for the first time in months. Partly due to the fact I needed to speak with someone that wasn't stoned, but mostly because she rang constantly for half an hour and I couldn't find it in me to turn the phone off.

First, she screamed at me. She really, really screamed. Eventually, she started speaking at an almost appropriate volume. Most of it was her saying, "I told you so!" and telling me, "You didn't listen!" and asking, "Why didn't you listen to me?"

I sat and took it without speaking a word.

She was very upset, and I guess it brought back memories of her own mistakes. I remember most of them. Ninety percent of them were just really shitty. The other ten percent were secretly married.

Twenty minutes later, my phone was on the brink of dying, and I finally spoke to tell her I needed to go. Sam would be back with some new girl any time soon anyway. She told me to come home now, because what I needed more than anything was peace.

She was right.

The plane landed and I acted as everyone else, calmly pulling my suitcase from the overhead carriers, and waiting patiently in the line to leave. My feet eventually hit the concrete floor. It was pitch black and drizzling just a bit. Everyone filed into the airport, one after the other. My palms were sweaty, my throat dry and my eyes teary. I hadn't seen this airport in two years. I hadn't been home in two years. Guilt twisted in my stomach.

Some people snapped pictures of me, recognising me despite the denim baseball cap, the sunglasses covering my makeup-free face and the plain clothes. Though it was painful how much I wanted to break out into a run, find the nearest exit and bolt, I stopped and took quick pictures with the little girls that asked, and held superficial, brief conversations with them before scurrying through the terminals and towards the door.

Waiting there, pacing by the benches beside the door, was my older sister and my mother. Mom noticed me first, and broke out into a run. I ditched my bags to meet them halfway. And as soon as the two of them tackled me into a hug, I ditched my dignity, too, and I started sobbing hard for the first time in months.

It was agonising bliss.

A/N: I finally found the file! I've been searching for this for so long so that I could reupload it and get back to work on it. Hopefully I'll have something up in the next few days. I hope you guys haven't given up on me yet. :)