Sophia’s Point Of View
The taxi pulled up at the gates of the Baxter mansion and I paid him with the last cash I had on me.
Looking up at the massive intricately designed gates and the sprawling mansion that lay beyond, I realized just how out of place I had been living in a place like this.
How could someone like me have ever thought that I belonged here? That I could belong here.
Pain bloomed in the depths of my chest as the memories of last night tortured me. Memories of hopes and dreams of a better life and a happier marriage only to be publicly humiliated.
I had run out of those gates certain that after the humiliation I had endured, I would never come back here but here I was.
Wiping at the tears that had somehow fallen without my permission, I steeled myself.
It was just a few minutes to nine. Usually, by this time the morning after a party, Jerry would be at work with Anastasia and Jerry’s younger sisters sleeping off their hangovers while the help cleaned up.
I couldn’t have timed it better if I’d tried. I just had to sneak in and grab my money and maybe a few clothes before anyone realized I was there.
Thankfully the security at the gate let me through without a fuss. From there it only took a few minutes to sneak in through the side entrance of the house to my room. Correction my former room.
My box was right next to the door of the room and I knew if I had come a little bit later, my things would have been thrown out.
Opening the box, I checked if my savings were untouched. They were.
Heaving a sigh of relief, I began to remove the clothes the Baxters had gotten me from my box.
Even if I knew selling those designer outfits would get me more than enough money to get by, I wanted nothing more to do with the Baxter family. I would rather starve.
“You are so shameless that I knew you would scurry back here, the first chance you got.”
I froze at the sound of that familiar callous mocking voice.
I straightened from my crouch meeting the light blue eyes of my once best friend.
“Kate.”
Kate and I had been classmates in our public high school. She was a new student without friends and we had ended up bonding over the craziest thing. Abusive fathers.
The day we fell out, had started like every other day with classes and at lunch, she’d spun to face me with a hesitant look on her face.
“He wants to come back into my life.” Kate said.
I paused. I didn’t need to ask who it was. I knew it was her Dad. The man who had hit her mom so hard she had a concussion.
“You need to convince your mom otherwise, he’ll never change!”
Kate’s gaze slid away from mine as she picked at the brown gravy on her plate.
“Dad doesn’t want Mom back. Just me.”
Dad. She was calling him Dad again. I felt a chill come over me as realization set in.
“You want to go back.”
Kate’s lips turned up in the poor mimicry of a smile. “I guess I’m tired of living in a house with mold on the walls.”
Kate’s father was from old money. He had put Kate through private schools and lessons preparing her to be the perfect trophy wife to secure a marriage alliance that would boost their dwindling fortune.
I felt fear settle up in my chest at the inevitable fate of my friend.
“Kate, you can’t. You know he only wants you back to use you.”
“I don’t care, Sophia!” Kate yelled and the entire cafeteria fell silent as people glanced at us.
Flushing, Kate dropped her voice a notch but the fire in her eyes remained.
“I miss being rich. He can use me if he wants to.”
Looking at her, it felt like I was looking at a different person. Where did the quiet sensitive girl I had befriended gone?
“And your mom?” I asked still reluctant to believe Kate meant what she was saying. “How is she going to fare without you? She broke up with him for you.”
Her mom didn’t want Kate growing up thinking that it was okay to stay with a man who hit her because of money.
So she burned her bridges and asked for a divorce giving up her life of luxury for Kate.
Kate’s jaw clenched and for a moment I caught a glimpse of my friend who would never hurt her mom like that. Then it was gone.
Kate shrugged nonchalantly.
“Everyone has to fight for themselves in this world, she made her choice. Now I’m making mine.”
“Kate.” I didn’t know what else to say.
Kate gathered her bag and her lunch tray before standing up.
“I can’t have lunch with you anymore, Sophia. We are no longer in the same social class.”
Then she upended her entire tray of food on my head before walking away to go and sit at the popular girls’ table.
And that was the end of our friendship. Less than two years later, I’d married Jerry and here we were.
She had kept her word and fought for herself. Now she was pregnant for Jerry Baxter, a richer and more prominent family than her abusive father’s.
“Kate?” She echoed my word back at me incredulously before throwing her head back in a laugh.
Then faster than I could blink, she reached out and yanked on my hair pulling me close enough so that I could see the fury in her eyes.
“If you think because I made the mistake of befriending an outcast like you once, you have the right to call me anything other than Ma’am, you are mistaken!” Kate spat out resentfully.