Playing Jacks

i. Life's a Bitch

But the foreknowledge, like everything else, is irrelevant.

“Sophie!” He calls from the top of the stairs. “Wait!”  But when she doesn’t answer, his voice turns angry. “You fat bitch!  Where do you think you can go?” 

Her only answer is the beat of her retreating feet.

Last night her only thought had been escape.  To run away from the humiliation and the horrible pain that wrenched her heart out of her chest.  The very thought sends her back to the bathroom to throw up the bile in her stomach.  There’s nothing else left.

Patting her face with a cool washcloth, she catches a glimpse of herself in the mirror; then stops to truly stare.  Bryce had called her fat.  Staring at her reflection, she bristles at the memory.  Just to make him happy, she’s suffered diets, grueling trainers and even his hints at liposuction; but she’s never been more physically fit than she is right now.  Sure, she’s got curves- plenty of them.  With a sharp tug on the hem of her shirt, she smooths the clingy knit jersey over her generous bosom and jerks her chin higher, defiant; but even Sophie has to admit that the woman in the mirror looks haggard.  Her thick, dark hair is frizzed a bit like the end of a Q-tip.  Her dark brown eyes are weighed with dark circles and puffy from the tears that come without her permission.  Her fair skin looks pasty. 

Digging in her bags, she primps until she feels beautiful- her dark hair glistening with soft curls, her eyes bright and her lips pink-  only to wander back to the bed and sit, dejected.  Her hands shutter the pain on her face. 

Denial isn’t enough anymore.  She needs a plan.

Money, she decides, then a place to stay.  Her own apartment is sublet to someone else, but maybe the Friedman’s.  They’ve always been good friends. 

With a deep sigh, Sophie pulls the oxygen into her body as if she could replenish everything Bryce had drained away and glumly looks around the extensive New York hotel suite.  Strewn over the bedroom is every piece of her matching luggage set.  She hadn’t meant for the bellhop to bring up everything.  She’d just been on automatic pilot.  When he’d grabbed everything from her trunk, she hadn’t said anything.  Now she’s got to call him back and drag the whole assortment back downstairs.

The small chore is  a disproportionately large burden.   

Under a calm façade, Sophie makes her way to the lobby and presents her debit card, strumming her fingers over the countertop as she waits for the attendant to process her charges.  Behind her, the bellboy struggles with the rolling cart.  She’s thinking that she really ought to learn to travel a little lighter when the clerk, with a tight smile, says, “I’m sorry, ma’am, but the card won’t process.”

“What?” Sophie blinks, taken aback. “What do you mean . . .?”

“I mean that your card won’t go through, ma’am.  I assume you have another means of payment?”

Choked, Sophie digs in her purse and finds the three hundred plus cash she needs to cover the room.  It’s almost all that she has. “Why . . . I’ve got plenty in the account . . . why wouldn’t it . . .”

“I’m sure I don’t know.  You will have to contact your bank, ma’am.”

The bank.

Soft, horrified curses numb her mind- Bryce has frozen her accounts.  Then the anger punches through her denial.  That’s her money.  She earned it.  She works.  Finally, panic: If he’s frozen her accounts, what else has he done?  Bryce has feelers everywhere.  His finger is in every pot- bank, businesses, even the justice system.