Page 23 of Broken Beauty (Beauty 3)
It was probably time to give it up, anyway. There was nowhere to go from here, nothing to be gained from discretion. She sighed.
“I made a mistake. A big one.” Or several, depending on the way she portioned it out. “I was seeing someone. He was in the military but he’d left. And then he got an offer from the university and accepted it before we knew…before we knew he’d be teaching my class. My last class. By then it was too late to back out.”
“Oh, Erin. I can’t believe…”
She laughed shortly, understanding the speechlessness all too well. “Yes. Now it looks like we might be found out. Almost. So I’ve broken things off with him.”
What a thin phrase for what she felt. Broken things off, as if it were a twig from a tree. Instead of how she felt—shattered. Split apart into a thousand shards. Her stomach clenched tight, her head strangely thick and full of cotton. Not all of this came from leaving that note for Blake. Some was the humiliation of being accused of whoring herself, as she sat in an office in her university. She’d felt so low, so unworthy. How she’d always felt, really, but all her insecurity had floated to the surface. Her eyes closed tightly. In fact, maybe that was why she’d been so damn quick to write that note. She’d felt awful, disgusting, and she hadn’t wanted to tell Blake about that. Hadn’t wanted to see him defend her, knowing that she probably deserved the censure. Or worse—hadn’t wanted to see the light of agreement in his eyes.
“Of course you did the right thing ending it,” her mother said.
Erin said nothing.
“In fact, I… A professor, Erin? How old is he?”
“Not that old. It’s not like he was tenured or anything. Just a man with a graduate degree and a good academic reputation who they’ve hired for the semester.”
“I don’t understand. If you didn’t meet him through the university, where did you?”
Her stomach clenched. She took a deep breath. “I was cleaning his house.”
“Erin!”
“I’m sorry, Mom, but I just… It wasn’t a big deal.” A lie, of course. It had been a huge deal, and she’d known her mother would mind that most of all.
“Erin, men like that—”
“You don’t even know him.”
“I know enough. Men like that don’t respect women who clean their big, expensive houses.”
“Blake’s not like that.”
“Oh, so he’s not rich? He didn’t grow up with everything handed to him?”
“God. Not all rich people are like that.”
There was silence on the other end of the phone. They both knew what Erin meant. Whatever unspoken thing had been done to her mother by the man she worked for.
When she spoke again, her mother’s voice had softened into pleading. “Tell me this much. Did he ask you out, take you on a nice date like he can afford? Or did he make a move while you were working and suggest that you keep it a secret?”
She felt like she might throw up. She was just so confused, so upset. She didn’t really doubt Blake, but it was hard to explain. What could she say? I caught him masturbating and thought it would be fun to join in. That would hardly make her mother feel better. Besides, Blake had his own reasons for being so reclusive, and she didn’t want to get into that now.
As much as she disagreed with her mother’s assessment, she could also understand her worry. From the outside, it looked similar. Goddamned precedent. For reasons she couldn’t explain it made her angry to use Blake’s lesson in this, but she couldn’t ignore the implications. Her mother was the precedent here, the framework for analyzing her own situation. But in this case, the differences were so vital, so deep at the core, that it turned the precedent on its head. Her mother’s boss had taken advantage of his position. Blake was her friend. Her lover. And he didn’t deserve to be tossed away like garbage because she suddenly got scared. Even if she had a good reason to be scared.
She sighed. “I’ll work it out, Mom. Don’t worry.”
“Baby…”
“What about you? How are your knees?”
Her mother’s harrumph told her she didn’t appreciate the blatant attempt at distraction. “They’re fine. I’m always fine as long as my little girl is okay.”
She placated her mother with promises that she would focus on school and take care of herself. Which she would, but that included talking to Blake. Once she was tucked into bed, her tears fell freely. Melinda’s words kept replaying in her mind. I suppose the rest is just extra credit. God. What a bad day, that was all she could think. What a horrible day, and the one man who could make her feel better, she’d pushed away. She cried until she was exhausted and sleep finally overtook her.
In the morning her eyes were puffy. She felt tired and tense at the same time. A jog would loosen her muscles at least. She dressed quickly, throwing on her ratty workout clothes and graying sneakers. But when she opened the front door of her apartment, she stopped cold.
A small cardboard box sat in the alcove. Her body felt wooden as she knelt to look inside. A few of her books were stacked at the bottom. A sweatshirt. And a note. She unfolded it with shaking hands.
