Rio and Polly

Chapter 14: Just For A Minute

You trip on the stairs and it's embarrassing -- but only a few people witness your moment. Your humiliation is temporary, something you shake off  with a wry grin, some pithy comment about being able to trip on air and move on with your day.

The stair-tripping is an entirely different level of humiliation than, say, having sexy pictures of yourself in lingerie spread over the internet that go viral. Aaannnnd let's not forget said pictures compared you to a pig. 

At that point, your humiliation becomes nuclear humiliation and there's no shaking it off with a wry grin and moving on with your day. There's only digging a deep hole and crawling into it and hiding for oh, I don't know...maybe the rest of your life? Since I didn't own a shovel, I thought maybe I could crawl into my bed and burrow deep under the covers.

I looked up from my phone at Frances and my face crumpled, and fast as lightning, she pulled me into her arms.

"It's going to be OK, Polly. I promise. It doesn't seem like it now, but it will be, I promise."

She held me while I sobbed into her arms, trying to pull myself together because we were at work and hello...professionalism, but at the same time, the tears wouldn't stop. It had taken everything in me to pose for those pictures and to send them to Rio, overcoming years of being so unhappy and embarrassed of my body, especially given Rio's perfect physique. It had been like taking a deep breath and jumping off the high dive -- while being terrified of heights. I'd jumped from the high dive, and now I felt like the pool had been drained on my way down.

 After a few minutes, I'd pulled myself together and pushed away from Frances's comforting arms.

"Not to be dramatic, but I have to quit, get plastic surgery to change my face so I can't be recognized, move to a new country, find a new job and start a new life, free from social media and all electronics. Thank you for all your years of friendship. I'll miss you."

Frances laughed in my face.

"I don't accept your resignation, Miss Overly Dramatic, and there will be no moving away or going into your version of witness protection. This will blow over, Polly. Trust me. There's already  so much hate coming at Danielle that I can't even tell you."

That didn't really make me feel any better because my pictures were still out there being laughed at. I could just imagine the sympathy they were generating for Rio -- poor Rio, stuck with a girlfriend who looks like that. No wonder he wanted to date Danielle Force.

"Frances, this is beyond mortifying." I practically choked on the words. "No one but Rio was ever meant to see those pictures and now the whole world is looking at them. Laughing at me. Wondering how someone like Rio could ever be interested in me."

Frances grabbed my upper arms. "Now you listen to me. You're a beautiful woman, Polly. Stunning. You're a full-figured woman and those pictures of you are gorgeous and sexy. You're real, Polly, a real woman and you're intelligent and funny and kind and giving. So that answers the question of how Rio could be interested in you and don't you ever wonder anything like that about yourself again. And I know for a fact that Rio counts himself lucky to have scored a woman like you."

"Yeah, so fortunate that he had to fake-date Danielle."

"He loves you, Polly. Rio made a huge mistake and a series of bad choices, but through it all, he loved you and still loves you. Not Danielle. Not anyone else. You, because you're an amazing, unique woman."

"Everywhere I go, people are going to point to me and know I'm the pig-in-lingerie girl. How am I ever going to show my face in public again?" I whined to her, and she gave me a little shake.