Love, My Hell Life

AB(B)Y... SS

CHAPTER 6

AB(B)Y... SS

In the car the journey seems long. She listens to ads on the radio. Back home she's still up in the clouds, arriving in a kind of One flew over the cuckoo's nest mode. She's still cheerful, biting her lips when she thinks back at the hanky-panky they had.

She puts on her victim face in line with today's fake illness. Playing the part of the hypochondriac, why not? I should do that again some time she thinks.

Lying suits her beautifully.

Something urges her to look up at her phone: a quick glance and... surprise, a short message from her sweetheart: "You can contact me tomorrow, gimme a shout. Keep in touch, kisses".

She immediately deletes the message. I'll check that out later on she thinks. It's not her main priority.

She quickly takes off her clothes and puts them in the laundry - who knows, maybe his smell is still on them or whatever ... quick, quick, quick!

While she's at it, she sends a short message to Rowan asking him to pick the girls from school.

She puts on her pyjamas and her bathrobe, a perfect disguise she thinks. She draws dark rings under her eyes with some foundation to keep up the appearances. She'd like to think she is revelling in the lies she is spinning, but can only muster an inane smile. Her stomach is knotted up and her arms are shaking with stress.

Abigail thinks: "Whatever the cost I need this new excitement, this new energy that blows my mind away."

She realizes that love is a dangerous weapon, that it can drive you crazy.

At the end of the afternoon, Rowan is back with the girls. Abigail pretends to be pleased to see them back. She pretends to moan without complaining.

Joe and Cayla come to her for a kiss, and Abigail's instinctive response is one of rejection. Here she is, she's got no other choice but to resume her life, the real one.

Then she apologizes: "Sorry, my princesses, it's not against you but I don't want to infect you. Come and hug me, I missed you."

While cuddling the twins Abigail thinks: "If I start lying to the girls too ..."

She starts to cry. She can't hold her tears back, she can't help it, she loses her self-control, floods of tears run down her face.

Her family watch her astounded, stunned. They don't understand her distress. They ask questions, but only run into a wall of silence.

Abigail becomes aware that despite the love she feels for her daughters, despite what is left of her feelings towards her husband, her heart and her head are somewhere else, with someone else. She feels disgusted with herself and her nerves are frayed.

Her hands cover her crestfallen face. Abigail looks sad and doesn't lift her head anymore.

Rowan and the twins look at her in utter confusion and wonder what's going on, imagining the worst. Did she get news she doesn't want to tell us, they think in unison.

Rowan decides to raise the tone and asks her: "Did you see the doctor? Did he tell you something - are you sick, or what is it? What's going on with you?"

She screams to leave her alone. Her body and her mind are tired, a migraine takes hold of her and she locks herself in the bedroom.

Abigail opens the window and closes the shutters. She hides away like a hermit, lying on the bed sobbing ... Her thoughts crash down in her as if someone was beating her in order to steal something from her. To steal what? Her heart.