This thing keeps writing itself! It won't be everyone's cup of tea, but fan-fiction is all about experimenting, right?
Advice and constructive criticism is most welcome.
And then there was Monday evening.
Miranda waited in the dim and empty study, glaring at the chair on which she had faked an orgasm in-front of her assistant. Wishing she was dead.
A click of a latch. The front door was open. Dead would definitely be better. But then Miranda could not breathe at all, so perhaps it would not be long.
Then the snap of pretty little heels, across the floor and towards the closet, stopped Miranda from that thought. As quick as a cat. Lickety split. They snapped inside Miranda's pensive head.
Stephen was out with his boss, Andrea was in with hers. Andrea and her skin and her smile and her beauty. Really it was too much for just one woman.
Miranda pursed her lips at the empty room and prayed for something. She did not know what. She could not begin to guess what could make this right, but she lived on hope, so she prayed a silent prayer of resolution.
Then a flash of a body through the wide open door, and Miranda had to inhale air into her lungs. There was no choice. Andrea did that to her. Made her do things she did not want to do, like insulting Andrea's weight or flaunting her body or breathing when she wanted to be dead. It just happened. The consideration came later.
Andrea clacked towards the table, and did not once look towards the study. Why would she, with the lights out, with what had happened on Friday.
Good job. If she had looked, she would not have made the table at all. Because Miranda…well. Miranda was empty and small in her chair, small on account of her lumpy sweater and flat hair. Small on account of her error.
As if in competition, Andrea's hair swished arrogantly in its ponytail, swished like her little tartan skirt, swished as though it knew Miranda was staring.
A soft thud announced the book had been placed on the table, so Miranda closed her eyes to memorise the snippy click of desperate heels back out the door, only they did not come. The air was still and silence rolled through the house like a wave of trepidation. Miranda dared not open her eyes. Black was better than that empty chair and that memory of her husband's lap.
One, two, three, the slowly loudening snap of Andrea's heels shot through the air, much slower and more confident than the one two three, slowly loudening beating of Miranda's heart. Instead of the click of the front door though, there was silence. Even with closed eyes, Miranda knew where she was.
"Miranda."
Miranda, for reasons unknown, looked.
Andrea in the doorway. Miranda in remorse.
Of course, now they were alone, Miranda could no more tell Andrea she was sorry than she could stop the tennis ball forming in her gullet. Thick and grating, it lodged so as to prevent her from speaking. Good job, really. After-all, speaking had only got her into this mess in the first place.
Stephen, how about another scotch? …Stephen, you look so tense….Hold my skirt darling….Stephen don't stop…Promise me you'll stay.
Her mouth had betrayed her awfully. She was thankful then, for that tennis ball in her throat.