Christopher's Disdain

It was a photo.

Christopher's hand was wrapped around Rachel's as they sliced the cake open. His tenderness was something I'd never seen in our marriage.

Rachel's caption read, 'Justice runs late because it has a surprise for me: Christopher. I'm such a spoiled girl!'

Christopher bought out the time slots for all the screens in the city just to celebrate Rachel's victory in a rights to reputation case, or so that was how they called it. All I did was mention Rachel being the financial director for the project that ended up framing my father.

To defend her, Christopher mobilized his whole legal team and painted me as a deranged woman who loved to slander everyone around her.

I tapped the like button under the photo. Moments later, my phone exploded with messages from Christopher.

"I know that's sarcasm, Natalie! Go change and get here right now! If you're even one second late, I'm never taking that case, you hear me?'

Though separated by screens, I could imagine the disgust on Christopher's face, yet I didn't argue. 'Sure,' I texted back, but I approached the floor-standing aquarium and dropped my phone into the water.

The device sank and sank until it hit the bottom. Bubbles rose to the surface. The screen flickered once, twice, then went dark.

At last, silence.

I went into the bedroom and pulled out a red-and-blue woven bag from underneath the bed. That bag held the items I brought along after the wedding. Old, bleached T-shirts I got from a dollar store and a grayscale photo of my late father.

I carefully wrapped the photo with my clothes and cradled it in my arms.

This mansion was worth millions, yet only these were the things I could truly call mine. I changed into an old T-shirt with a stretched collar and a pair of jeans.

My reflection showed a pale woman with dark circles under her eyes, but her gaze had never looked clearer.

As I walked out of the mansion, the guard shot me a weird look. "Where are you going, ma'am?"

I ignored his question. With nothing but the clothes on my back and the woven bag, I walked into the heavy darkness of the night.

Christopher waited at the hotel, and the clock struck nine. The champagne tower was having its third refill.

Rachel had both hands looped around his arm as she complained softly, "Maybe she's angry, Christopher. Perhaps I should apologize too. I share some of the blame. I can understand why she misunderstood."

"You don't need to apologize to her," Christopher cut in, his expression icy. "She wanted you to apologize in public. She deserves a taste of her own medicine."

Yet I never came.

The obedient, submissive Natalie, who had always done as she was told, had stood him up.

This was a hit to Christopher's authority, and that was enough firewood for his fury. "Very well, then."

Christopher gritted his teeth and called me. "The number you have dialed is unavailable," a cold, mechanical voice replied.

Christopher let out a humorless laugh. 'She's going to use every trick under the sun just to make me bow, isn't she?'

In the end, he flung Rachel's hands away and stormed out of the venue.

"I'll need to see what she's up to this time."

What greeted him was a pitch-black mansion. Christopher turned on the lights, but the graveyard silence that lingered in the air made him panic, though only for a moment. Fury took over soon after.

"Get out here, Natalie!" There was no response.

Christopher charged into the bedroom, but not a single luxury item had gone missing. The closet was untouched, and so was the safe that housed the jewelry.

"I knew it. It's an act." Cold laughter slithered out of Christopher's lips. "Nothing's taken. That means she's crying in a convenience store."

Christopher came back down, and, from the corner of his eye, noticed something shining in the aquarium. He came closer only to find out it was my phone. At the same time, he received a transaction message from the bank.

"Your supplementary card ending in 8888 has been charged 1 dollar at Family Mart."

The message filled Christopher with so much disdain that it was oozing out of his eyes. "Is this your resolve? You left the house and used my card for instant ramen?"

Christopher tossed his phone onto the couch. He was confident my little escape act would never last the night.

The relentless ringing of the doorbell the next morning was what woke him. Still half-asleep, he called out without thinking.

Natalie's Message

"Get the door, Natalie."

Christopher was met with nothing but silence. That was a reminder that I'd never come home.

Frustrated, he got out of bed to answer the door himself.

It was a courier, and he handed Christopher a hefty package. "Wedding anniversary package from a Ms. Shayman."

Christopher frowned upon hearing that.

He hauled the package into the house and sliced the tapes open with a box cutter. He expected scarves or handmade figurines, but none came out. Only the scent of mildew hit him.

The package housed piles of receipts, all neatly tied up.

Christopher scooped up the uppermost receipt. It had details about my blood extraction and dated back five years ago, on the 12th of October. I had 400ccs taken and was paid 30 dollars.

He froze for a moment, but he broke out of his reverie and went on reading. The receipts showed letters of consent that came from pharmaceutical companies regarding drug testing, underground blood selling, and more.

There were hundreds of them. Five full years' worth. Every single one of them was proof that I had risked my life over and over.

At the very bottom of the box lay a wrinkled letter. The handwriting was mine, albeit scrawling and hideous.

It read, 'You once told me, Christopher, that I married you just so I could live well. But during our entire marriage, I never received a single cent from you. You said room and board were more than enough, but my father was in prison. He needed toiletries. Clean clothes. Basic necessities. This was how I earned that money.'

Christopher's hands trembled. He'd seen the bruises on my arms when we were in bed once. "Did you catch some disease messing around out there? Don't come near me. I don't want to get infected."

Back then, I had said nothing. I had only lowered my head and silently pulled my sleeve down over the marks.

…

Christopher slammed the box closed as a storm brewed within him. "Very well, Natalie," he hissed and called his assistant right away.

"Freeze all of Natalie's cards right now! And make sure the whole city knows they'll be making an enemy out of me if they try to take Natalie's case!" He hung up right away, but something in his chest was aching to get out, yet it was stuck like glue.

His eyes drifted around the room, but they stopped at the porch. A pair of men's slippers sat on the ground. It was the pair he wore all the time.

There were holes where the soles once were, but someone had patched it up with soft rubber pads. They were soft on the soles and comfortable to wear.

Though the house had a dozen new slippers, this pair was the one he loved to wear. Christopher stared at them, irritation rising in his chest for reasons he refused to name.

Just then, Rachel called.

The moment he answered, her voice came through, shaky and upset. "I tried to apologize, but Natalie has deleted all her socials. It's impossible to reach her phone either. She's still angry at me!"

Christopher's heart sank. He quickly checked his socials, but my account was already deleted, and there was no profile picture at all. There was no trace of me on social media.

"Ignore her," he replied, but something in his throat felt tight. "She's trying to make me bow, but I assure you, she'll be at my firm in three days, begging for my help!"

Christopher hung up and scanned the empty mansion. His eyes returned to the patched slippers, and he sneered.

"I still hold your biggest weakness, Natalie. As long as your father is still in prison, you'll never escape me." Then, he straightened his tie and walked out of the house like a man convinced he still held all the power.

Unbeknownst to him, I was in a 50-square-foot basement hiding somewhere in the slums. Rainwater dripped from the ceiling. I sat by the tiny basement window, an urn of ashes resting in my arms—cold, solid, silent.

In one hand, I held half a piece of stale bread. I chewed mechanically, like a machine forcing itself to keep running.

I had no tears trailing down my face, nor did I have any emotions to show.

"Breakfast, Dad," I said softly to the urn.

…

Three days after leaving Christopher, I found work at a small company that handled specialized cleaning jobs.

New Job

My new job was cleaning up places where people had died alone, taken their own lives, or been left undiscovered for days until their bodies began to rot.

The owner was blind in one eye. One look at my hands, and he knew they were built for writing. The household chores had roughened them up, but not rough enough to look like those who'd gone through manual labor.

"This job's filthy. It reeks, and you'll be dealing with the dead. Sure, you can do this, girl?"

I said nothing.

I put on my gloves, stepped into the room where a body had been lying, and without hesitation shoved a comforter crawling with maggots into a disposal bag.

The owner hired me on the spot.

It was a buried history, but I was the law school's most brilliant student five years ago. My mentor once told me, "You're born to uphold justice, Natalie. You'll be the best judge we've ever seen!"

And now I was cleaning up the mess the dead had left behind. Still, the stench of rotting corpses felt more tangible than the resplendent but ultimately cold mansion Christopher called home.

…

Five days had gone by.

That afternoon, my coworkers and I were cleaning up after a suicide in a rundown apartment when a familiar voice drifted down the corridor.

"My God, the stench is unbearable! How can anyone live here, Christopher?"

I would have recognized that sugary, cloying voice anywhere. I was carrying a bucket of blackened wastewater out of the apartment when I ran straight into Rachel.

She was pinching her nose in disgust, and Christopher stood behind her.

He was dressed in a perfectly tailored tuxedo, so polished and expensive that he looked completely out of place in that broken-down apartment building.

The moment he saw me, shock flashed across his face. Rage replaced it soon enough. I was in a white and bloated protective suit covered in brown stains. The dead's bathwater was in my hands.

"Natalie!" Christopher strode up to me and grabbed my wrist. "Have you lost your mind? You'd rather throw away your place as my wife and come work in this filthy dump? How much lower are you planning to sink? Do you have any idea how embarrassing this is for me?"

The waste water sloshed around in the bucket, and droplets splashed onto his leather shoes.

Rachel let out a yelp and jumped away. "This is revolting! I can't believe this is your job now! Are you doing this on purpose? For Christopher?"

I looked at Christopher calmly and pulled back my arm with all my strength. "Don't get too comfortable with me, Mr. Lutherson. I'm working."

"What?" Christopher pointed at the reeking room, his whole body trembling with rage. "You call this work? Even if your cards are frozen, this isn't decent work! It's filthy and vile! You're coming home with me!"

"You think it's vile?" I took my mask off. There was no makeup on my face. "The smell isn't the best, Christopher, but it's miles better than the stench scum like you give off! I'd call this heaven!"

That stunned him.

The old Natalie had only ever loved him and doubted herself. Even when I was hurt, there had never been much hatred in me. But now, whatever he saw in my eyes made him falter.

"Very well." Christopher laughed mirthlessly. He called the warden of the west side's prison right away and turned on speakerphone, but before he spoke to the warden, he warned me coldly, "You have a lot of pride, Natalie, but let's see how it holds up when your father's very life is on the line! I'll move him into high-security and have the residents… give him a good welcome."

The call went through. "Mr. Lutherson, what is it?"

Christopher never took his eyes off me. He was waiting—waiting for fear, for panic, for pleading.

In a calm, icy voice, he said, "Mr. Westfield, I need your assistance. You have an inmate named Harold Shayman—"

The warden interrupted Christopher, "But Mr. Lutherson…"

"What is it?" Christopher frowned.

When the warden spoke again, his voice trembled, as though he could not understand how Christopher had not already heard. "Has no one informed you, Mr. Lutherson?"

"Informed me of what?"

"Hector Shayman took his own life seven days ago."