Accidental Housemate

21: attacking

when the noise disappeared,
I could finally hear
the shape of what I missed.

ATTACKING

. . .

When I went to work, people were giving me weird looks.

Unable to see why, I dismissed it and didn’t let it bother me. My mind didn’t have space for additional issues, anyway. That day, I was determined to tell the manager the truth about Hannah, even if it cost me my job; what she did shouldn’t be brushed off as normal. Who knew how many other people she was hurting?

Besides, after my encounter with Dave, I felt as if I had lost whatever goodness was between us, so I had nothing worse to lose.

When I reached the studio where Ellen was working alone, I finally had some privacy away from prying looks. Tired and pregnant, Ellen couldn’t care less about anything that didn’t have to do with her job, so she was the perfect companion for such a time. She was behind her computer screen.

“Morning, Ellen,” I greeted her, closing the door behind me.

She straightened up quickly, as if I was the manager, and faced me. “Perrie…”

The look and frown she gave me mirrored every other look from earlier.

I sighed and rolled my eyes. “Not you too. What’s going on, Ellen? Did I grow another head?”

The woman fidgeted with her fingers, probably trying to phrase her next words the best way possible. “Ummm… your previous occupation.” She bit her lip as she watched my expression morph into a scared one. “Everyone knows now.”

Processing her words and their consequences took me a moment. I stared back at her, waiting for a revelation to tell me that was all a joke to mess with me. Because my life couldn’t have gotten any worse after Hannah had assaulted me, and I discovered the only person I thought was genuinely interested in me turned out to be hiding fangs behind sweet lips.

“Explain?” I stammered.

Please say it’s all a joke, or I’m dreaming.

“Well, uh, you know what you did better than me.” She sent me an empathetic look along with her implicit statement. “I’m shocked, Perrie. But it’s not like I have a say in your life.”

The nightmare was real then. As real as the disappointment I saw in Ellen’s eyes.

“Ellen…” I trailed off, rethinking whether fixing my image in her eyes was worth it.

“No, no. You don’t have to explain anything.” She got up, struggling with her huge belly, and walked up to me. “As I said, I don’t have a say in your life, but I fear working in this industry won’t be as easy for you after this revelation.” Again, she sent me that empathetic look I was starting to hate; it meant she expected the worst for me.

“How… How did this happen?”

She rubbed her temples. “When I entered this room and started working… Hannah was pretty much gossiping about it to everyone.”

She explained some more, but my brain had stopped listening after the word ‘Hannah’. The cunning woman had preceded me; she’d had me for lunch before I could have her for dinner. Who knew what else she had told everyone about me? I worried about whether reporting her would work anymore, considering my smeared reputation.

The devil entered the room with our other coworkers, cutting off my thoughts. My body spun around to face her, and right there, right then, I felt done. I was done with her, with that job, with figuring out Dave, with hiding my past, with the flat… I couldn’t take it. I couldn’t pretend to be composed anymore. If my patience had its limits, it had reached them.

“Look who we have here,” she started with a malicious smile. On another occasion, I’d have thought she was genuinely gleeful.

Was I going to reply or try to defend my stinky status?

No.

Was I going to launch myself at her and attack her with all my might?

Yes.

So, I did. I attacked her and pinned her neck against the wall as everyone watched us in horror, preferring to stay away from the scene to save their jobs and their lives. As for me, I couldn’t care less anymore. Everything had already fallen on top of my head.

“You filthy shit!” I yelled through gritted teeth. “A horndog with a barking mouth!”

Her rough hands, the ones that had assaulted me before, didn’t affect me the same way when they tried to force me to let go. She scratched me, and I didn’t know where I got the strength to ignore the pain. I got it, though, and I used all I could to hurt her back.

“Crazy… let… go.” She struggled to get the words out as her face turned red and purple.

I only squeezed harder, wishing to see her last breaths leave her disgusting chapped lips in front of me. The revenge was short-lived because security interrupted us, along with other staff.

“Ms Addams! What are you doing? Let go!” my manager yelled at me, and the guards pulled me away from her.

Hannah fell against the wall in front of me, coughing and wriggling in pain. I’d have paid every penny I had to make the guards leave me alone and let me finish my job at making her feel at least a fraction of the pain she had made me feel.

The guards tried to push me out, but I screamed at them not to touch me and said I could walk on my own. I was guided outside to the manager’s office. He let me in, then shot me an angry look that would have made me blurt out a series of apologies in normal circumstances, but not at that moment when my rage was in full control. I could not believe I was wrong, even in the slightest.

“Do you realise what a big mistake you made there? If you were trying to get fired in the worst way possible, congratulations. You’ve earned it.” He slapped his hands on the desk.

I finally looked up at the man; it was time to make my big announcement, “Sir, Hannah sexually assaulted me before. She planned all of this—she planned to smear my reputation, so no one would believe me when I reported her!”

He sat down in his swivel chair. “Not only did you attack her physically, but now you’re accusing her of this? Have some decency, Ms Addams. Collect your things and leave with what dignity you have left.”

I was in awe of his ignorance. I certainly hadn’t expected my statement to be brushed off so easily, unless he was hiding something. “Are you not even going to investigate what happened?!”

His eyebrows furrowed even more than I thought possible. “Woman, do you really wish to destroy your career?”

That statement hid meanings beyond both our abilities to fix anything. Back then, I didn’t know what they were yet. All I knew was the feel of a tear sliding down my cheek.

. . .

evil people usually have you for lunch before you have them for dinner. perrie’s hesitancy opened the door for hannah to do worse, imo

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