Under Control.

24. Everything graceful

The more they spent time together, the more curiosity got the best of her. Hunter never said much about his wife or marriage. Karishma was itching to know to find out anything. He always changed the subject or found a way to go around it. At any given time when Hunter had left his phone unattended, whenever his wife would call him out of concern. Karishma would press decline call and not inform Hunter anything about it. She also noticed that Hunter would be quick to want to cut their time short after speaking to his wife on the phone. As if he had been threatened to return immediately. Karishma would put Hunter's phone on silent without his knowledge. Yes, she was jealous. She wanted Hunter all to herself, it bothered her that he was still residing in the same house with the woman he frequently badmouthed so often. Karishma was selfish but she fed into the lies Hunter fed her about Rachel.

He always poised how horrible of a person Rachel was. Karishma had a sudden obsession and curiosity struck her. What did Hunter's wife look like? Was she better than her? Karishma would stalk Rachel's Instagram, it was cute. It was mostly Rachel and their daughter, hardly ever with Hunter. Karishma had scrolled down Rachel's timeline not liking anything because that would be incriminating. Scrolling until she reached their honeymoon pictures, wedding pictures, engagement... from years back. It seemed they had married young, immediately after college. Further down were their pictures from their college days. One picture was in black and white, it was Hunter and Rachel at a festival called Lollapalooza in Chicago. The caption was 'He finally made it out of the friendzone.'

They looked so happy. Even Karishma could not deny that. Instagram had a link in bio for the latest article for that week on her site. It was much more interesting. Things weren't making sense, on Rachel's blog... she acted as if all was well. As if she wasn't going through a divorce. As if her marriage was A-OK. As if everything was pitch perfect. She updated on topics such as 'trying new things in the bedroom' 'bouncing back from postpartum depression' 'natural birth vs c-section' 'my experience with toddlers' 'the Karen phenomenal' 'postpartum haul' 'sex after baby is here' 'have a cheap wedding and invest instead' 'redecorating the house' 'how to feel productive as a housewife' 'Why do feminists hate housewives' ' dealing with yo-yo diets' 'weight gain after baby comes' 'preparing for our first child' 'baby welcome or baby shower: what's better?' 'why you should adopt?' 'my adoption story' 'How to help the homeless'

Their life was perfect from the looks of it. Karishma felt envious. Rachel had such a wonderful life. Her life was practically put upfront on the Internet. Karishma's jealousy and curiosity got the best of her. She spend her study breaks reading each and every article on Rachel's blog. There was no need to dig because Rachel told everything about her life on her blog. Rachel seemed very nice from the way she responded to comments and so on. She was also beautiful, she seemed decent. She had grown up in a middle class family from San Francisco. Her American parents had adopted her at the age of three from the city Vladivostok in Russia. Rachel's biological parents had passed away in a tragic car accident, luckily she survived. Her adoptive parents always said she was God-sent. Her given name was Ludmila but upon adopting her. Her parents found Rachel more fitting. They kept Ludmila as a second name, not wanting to take away from her; her Russian heritage and the only thing she might ever have from her birth parents.

Being the only child of middle aged parents, she was spoiled rotten. She had married her college sweetheart, she had her dream wedding, a honeymoon in her birth country to find her roots, had a beautiful baby girl, her blog was thriving. People loved her enthusiasm and the way she thought and expressed herself. Rachel didn't seem to mind telling her life story on the internet and including her day to day routines. Karishma felt she was competing in an unfair game. His wife was everything graceful. Naive Karishma could only assume, Rachel did not want to speak about her divorce until it was settled. Perhaps she wanted to be private about it instead which was odd considering she shared every single thing on her site. Karishma questioned a lot of things but ignorance was bliss. She would never be ready to face the true reality of the mess she had entered herself into.

10 votes + 15 comments