Total pages in book: 116
Estimated words: 110624 (not accurate)
Estimated Reading Time in minutes: 553(@200wpm)___ 442(@250wpm)___ 369(@300wpm)
Estimated words: 110624 (not accurate)
Estimated Reading Time in minutes: 553(@200wpm)___ 442(@250wpm)___ 369(@300wpm)
When she was sleeping, it was easy to imagine the old Ivy. I only got to experience that girl for under a year before things started to dramatically change. The past five years have been a steady decline.
Ivy and I dated for six months before we eloped to Vegas on a whim and were only married for about six months more when her behavior started to deteriorate. At first, I didn’t understand what was happening or what to even call the episodes; I just referred to it all as hell.
The first time I ever took her to the hospital, by the time she was discharged, it finally had a name.
***
“That went well, don’t you think?” my co-worker Henry said as we exited the meeting.
“Yeah. Lunch?”
“Sure. The Ninety-Nine?” he asked.
I turned the corner toward my cubicle. “I’ll meet you in five.”
I had been doing my co-op for a technology company north of Boston. It was a hip start-up, and I loved the fact that they didn’t give a shit about my piercings. As long you worked hard, they left you alone. Management had called some of us in to talk about possible job opportunities after graduation. They were scoping out the co-op students for computer hardware engineering positions. We would be developing computer chips, circuit boards and routers.
I didn’t like working so far outside the city, where we lived. Ivy’s behavior had deteriorated lately, and she was really starting to worry me. She had dropped out of school and lost her job several weeks ago, which meant she was now home all day. She wasn’t in any condition to work, but not having anything to occupy her was making an already bad situation worse. I didn’t know how to help her anymore, but losing my job too wasn’t going to help either one of us. So, I drove the forty-five minutes every day and left her alone, hoping for the best.
Rachel, the receptionist, spoke through my phone intercom as I was counting my cash for lunch.
“Jake?”
“Yo.”
“Please come out front.”
Her tone was strange. I immediately grabbed my wallet and walked to the front desk.
My heart dropped.
No.
No.
Not here.
She was standing there in the lobby with mascara running down her eyes, wearing her pajamas, her hair disheveled.
“What are you doing here, Ivy?”
She kept her distance and pointed at me, her index finger shaking. “You know what I am doing here. You know what you tried to do to me this morning. I know you tried to poison me!”
No.
I briefly closed my eyes unable to believe this was actually happening at work. Her words shouldn’t have shocked me, yet every time she accused me of something like that, it fucking ripped my heart out. This was the first time other people would witness it.
I looked behind me to see Rachel looking at us like a deer caught in headlights. I could only imagine what this must look like to someone who didn’t know my wife.
“How did you get here?”
She didn’t answer, but through the sliding glass doors of the lobby, I saw there was a cab waiting outside.
I grabbed her arm. “Let’s go. Now!”
“Don’t touch me!” she yelled.
I started to push her out the door when she resisted.
Her scream echoed in the lobby. “He tried to kill me this morning. He put something in my coffee before he left for work. He’s wanted me dead for a while.”
I looked over toward the desk and saw my three co-workers who were supposed to be meeting me to go to lunch, staring at us speechless. I shook my head at them to let them know this wasn’t what it seemed.
Bob, the office manager came out. “What’s going on out here?”
I started to sweat. “Bob, we were just leaving. This is my wife, but she’s ill and doesn’t realize what she is saying. She shouldn’t have come here. I apologize for the scene.”
She was crying, and I pulled her out the door, as she struggled with me. I held onto her arm so she couldn’t run away as I stuck my head in the open cab window. “Did she pay you?”
The cabbie shook his head, so I took out my wallet with the one available hand I had. “How much?”
“Ninety-seven dollars,” he said.
I didn’t have enough cash. Fuck.
Humiliated, I held onto Ivy, as we walked back into the lobby. More people were now standing there to witness the drama. Henry came up to me. I told him I would explain everything later and he gave me the extra cash to pay the cab driver. As Ivy stood there whispering to herself, I think he was starting to get the drift of what was really going on.
I paid the driver before dragging Ivy to the far end of the parking lot where my Jetta was parked. She was still trying to get away from me and was threatening to call the cops. Cars were speeding by on the nearby highway and I feared if she got away, she’d run into traffic and get herself killed.