Starting Over

Chapter Four: Facebook stalking

Elle sat on her bed amongst the bags of new clothing her mother had insisted on buying for her. Pant suits in every colour, cashmere sweaters, and silk pyjamas.

She heard the girls giggling as they played with grandpa in the living room. Pulling her phone out of her pocket she opened Facebook and began scrolling mindlessly. She gnawed at her lower lip as she began typing Brandon's name into the search bar.

His profile photo hadn't changed, neither had his timeline photo - it was a picture of the girls. But his relationship status had changed to "single". The blood boiled in Elle's veins. She'd been gone less than 2 days and already he was publicly announcing he was single!

He couldn't call her - or even text her back - but he could update his Facebook relationship status. Fine. Elle clicked on her own profile page and updated her relationship status. Hopefully he'd see it and begin to regret his recent decisions. She turned off her phone and tossed at the end of the bed.

This was so unlike him. What was he trying to do? It was all so sudden. Completely out of the blue. Elle ran her fingers through her hair and stared at her phone. She reached out, picked it up, and switched it back on. She navigated back to his page and began checking out his recent posts, looking for any 'likes' or 'comments' from unknown women. Nothing. She knew everyone who had interacted with him on Facebook.

Next she clicked on his 'friends' list and scanned through all the names and pictures. Again, she knew everyone, or had met them sometime during their relationship. They were mostly old school acquaintances, work colleagues, old soccer team buddies. Then a profile caught her eye. It was a woman. Jade Black. The picture was of a young woman, wearing a skimpy bikini, and performing some kind of gymnastic-contortionist-yoga pose on the beach as the sun set behind her.

Elle's heart began to thump harder and she had a sickening feeling that this could be the 'someone' Brandon had met. She clicked on Tiffany's profile and began scoping out her page. Yoga teacher. Lived in the same city as Brandon and Elle. Lots of shared articles on self-love, vegan food, and yoga poses. Elle was particularly drawn to Tiffany's most recent photo. It was captioned, "You're the reason I'm always smiling."

Uh, cheesy.

Tiffany was what appeared to be a restaurant on a balcony overlooking the beach. She was dressed in a lacy white dress, her golden blonde hair was blowing in the breeze, and she was wearing sunglasses. Reflected in the sunglasses was a man holding a phone; Obviously he was the one taking the photo. But it was too hard to make out if it was Brandon or not.

Elle clicked on the photo, and began zooming in. Her palms were sweating and she was silently praying that it was anyone but Brandon. Her heart sank as she recognised the man. It was Brandon. Her husband. Her stomach churned but she couldn't tear her eyes away. She was angry, and hurt.

It was no wonder he'd fallen for Tiffany - she was gorgeous, and young, and carefree. She did exciting things like yoga on the beach, and drink cocktails at cool locations. She smiled - a lot - and she had a lot of friends.

Elle shut her phone off and caught a glimpse of herself in the mirror. She stared vacantly at the woman staring back at her. Dull, unwashed, frizzy hair. Blemished skin with uneven tone. Her eyes moved down to her waist. It certainly wasn't trim and toned. She had rolls. Her skin was pale and flabby. Her clothes covered the stretch marks that she knew were painted across her stomach. She was disgusting.

There was a knock at her door, busting Elle out of her self-loathing pity party.

"Who is it?"

"It's me," her mother called through the closed door. "Can I come in?"

"Not yet, I'm naked." Elle lied. "Just getting into the shower."

"Ok. Well I have some good news, so don't take too long, Ok?"

"Ok," Elle replied.

She waited for the footsteps to disappear down the hallway then wiped away the silent tears that had fallen and began to undress to shower.

Elle stood under the hot water for a long time, searching the deep recesses of her mind, trying desperately for any sign she'd missed that Brandon was having an affair - or that he was even unhappy in their marriage. Nothing. He'd always seemed happy. He'd always given the impression that they were fine.

She was sick of crying. It wasn't fair that he'd caused all this grief and misery and left her to pick up the pieces while he was off doing God only knew what with Tiffany.

Eventually Elle turned off the shower and dressed in her new silk pyjamas. They fit perfectly, but made her look like her mother.

She double-checked to make sure her eyes weren't puffy then walked out to the living room.

"There you are," Melinda said.

"Here I am." Elle gave a poor excuse for a smile.

"Don't frown so much, you'll get lines." Melinda strolled over as Elle sat down at the dining table. "Now, do I have some good news for you." Her voice was all sing-song like. "I just spoke to my friend, Regina, you know the one who owns the florist?"

"Mmm hmm."

"Well, she said she's looking for someone to join the team." Melinda smiled proudly as she glanced her hand on her hip. "What do you think about that?"

Elle shrugged. "Sounds good, I guess."

"Sounds good, you guess?" Melinda echoed. "Sounds excellent more like it. Pfft."

Elle shrugged again. It did sound good. She needed a job. No, she needed some money. But her mind was preoccupied with other things at the moment - namely Tiffany's perfectly long legs.

"A little gratitude wouldn't go astray." Melinda said as she made her way behind Elle and began brushing her hair with a brush that had seemingly appeared from nowhere.

"Thank you." Elle clenched her eyes as Melinda tugged at there hair. "Ouch, what are you doing? Trying to tear my hair out?"

Melinda chuckled. "I'm curling your hair."

"What?" Elle tried to turn her head to see what her mother was up to, but a firm hand grasped the top of her scalp and forced her to remain looking straight ahead.

"I want you to look your best tomorrow. Don't forget, you're not only representing yourself, you're representing our entire family." Melinda continued to brush, tug, and place Elle's hair into rollers. There'd been a time when Elle was just a girl that she'd loved when her mother had put rollers in her hair, but now she hated it.

"Oh, you should wear that green pant suit tomorrow," Melinda said. "No! The pink one. That's much softer." She continued to rattle on, and Elle let her. She wasn't listening anyway. All she was thinking about was what she was going to say when Brandon finally came to his senses and called her.