Friends With A Prostitute

Chapter 2

"Mom..."

"Huh? What is it honey?"

"I asked if I could go to Matt's house next weekend," repeated Cynthia's eight-year-old son, Sam. She was having some trouble paying attention to the kids today. Earlier in the morning, she had accidentally poured orange juice into a bowl cereal. Her six-year-old daughter, Mary, had to be the one to spit it out on the first bite and tell her it's a horrible breakfast. Now, while driving the kids to school, she had completely zoned out their chatter. She didn't notice her son had been talking to her.

"Of course, dear. You can go." She replied to him, even though, later, she would remember that Matthew seemed to be emotionally manipulating Sam and would withdraw her approval of the playdate.

She couldn't help being distracted though. As much as she tried thinking about something else, her thoughts kept going back to that woman she met the previous day, Stacy. Maybe Stacy was just playing with her. She must have been joking. She couldn't possibly be a prostitute.

Stacy seemed like a woman of class and elegance, a cultured and polished woman. She had a good figure, but she didn't look tucked and plucked like those attention-seeking Instagram models. She looked like a good human being, not someone who profited off destroying marriages. Cynthia thought back to her husband's shirt and the lipstick she found on it. Another Stacy?

When she got to the kids' school, she didn't bother to leave the car and go chat with the other moms. She wasn't up for the useless gossip and the Real Housewives talk today. In fact, she was never up for such useless conversations. They always made her feel like a part of her brain was slowly dying the longer she listened along. She always hated talking to the other moms, but she occasionally forced herself to suffer through it. Other than the coffee room weather chats at her part-time accounting job, it was the only socializing she got to do these days.

She had never been close to any of her family members, her three college friends seemed to have dropped her off their contact list the minute she graduated, and Andrew, her husband, had become even more distant lately. On her 32nd birthday, two weeks before, the only wish she got was from a random guy on Facebook. Andrew only remembered a week later that it had been her birthday when he needed her details to fill in another one of his business forms.

"That was last week, wasn't it?" he'd said. "All right, give me your ID number one more time." He brushed it off so easily and didn't look the least bit remorseful for forgetting. She pretended to be okay with his nonchalance, but in truth it stung her. Was there anybody who cared about her?

Stacy maybe. She looked like the kind of person that would care about her. She seemed so wise and enlightened. She seemed to think of more than just whatever scandal was going on in the TV reality shows. Cynthia would never be bored next to her. No, she couldn't really be a prostitute. Those people are the scum of the earth. They are shameless homewreckers who don't see how disgusting it is to sell their bodies. Stacy couldn't be one of them...

Back home, Cynthia did everything to avoid the pile of laundry. After her usual dusting and vacuuming, she decided to organize the bookshelf by author, and to sort her kids' toys by type. Then she rearranged the china in her cabinets, switched around the bowls and the plates and arranged the mugs in a color spectrum. She was about to go downstairs to sort out the basement when she realized the absurdity of what she was doing. Avoiding the pile of laundry wasn't going to make it go away. Andrew shirt would still be there. And the lipstick too.

"What did I do wrong?" Cynthia thought as he blinked away the tears. She walked to the laundry room, picked up Andrew's shirt from the pile and stared at it. She never wore lipstick herself. Lipsticks always made her sick so she always used Chapstick or some clear lip gloss. This bright red lip print on Andrew's shirt was not hers.

Was she not pretty enough? She worked out every day and tried her best to stay thin. He loved his meat and she always made it for him the best way she could, but ate none of it herself. She drank her water, she exfoliated, she used her coconut oil, she hated make-up but she always put it on for him every evening. She wore her best dresses whenever he wanted to show her to his business partners at the luncheons. And when he told her he didn't like a particular dress, she would change for him, and never wear that dress again.

They lived in a three-floor mansion and she did her best to keep every single part of it clean and organized. Even when her cramps made it difficult for her to stand up straight, she still picked up the vacuum and the duster.

He never had time for the kids, but she always made sure they were taken care off. She helped with their homework, she attended all their school functions, she played with them. He never liked noise so she always told them, "Be quiet when Daddy comes." At the dinner table, she always made sure they showed flawless table manners.

She always tried to entertain him. She always asked him how his day was. And every day she would sit across from him and listen to him complain about his frustrating business deals and his "idiotic" business partners. She would always try her best to listen and understand. And she would try to allay his concerns, to comfort him, to make him feel heard. She always showed him her support even when she clearly saw that he was the one being jerk to his partners. He never asked her how her day was, but she was okay with that. All that mattered was that she was being a good wife to him, his rock-solid support.

She tried. Her very best, she tried. And now this?

She tossed the clothes into the washing machine, then sat down next to it, and let rumbling muffle her crying.