Chapter 23
Shelly
People misunderstand grief. They think it’s loud. That it looks like screaming into pillows or collapsing in grocery store aisles. That it’s weeping and wailing.
Or begging God for answers.
That kind of grief burns itself out.
Mine calcified. Hardened to the point it can’t be undone.
I sit at the small desk by the window in my hotel room. Reflecting on the man I was supposed to have. The one taken from me. From his family.
That little bitch. Jolee Fern. She was always in the way. Getting between us.
She did this to all of us.
She took more than one life. Poor Sherry couldn’t handle the pain anymore and I didn’t want her to suffer any longer.
I helped her find her son again. I promised I’d finish my work and see them all soon.
I’m sure she thinks my letters are cruel. That I write them out of spite. That I am lashing out because I cannot bear my own pain.
That’s the story she prefers. It makes me smaller. Easier to dismiss.
But I don’t write in anger.
I write in clarity.
I smooth the last envelope flat on the desk, aligning it with the edge. It’s the last one I will ever write to her or anyone.
To whoever finds this, you will know my truth after I’m long gone.
I’ve spent eight years pretending that I have it together. Pretending to move on. Hopeful that I could’ve saved his mother. That somehow Andy would come back.
I replay the months before his death with careful attention to the details.
He said he was leaving her.
That he would be with me.
Marry me.
That night, he left my bed to go back to her. I lost it. Yelled and screamed at him. I realize now my error. I should’ve gotten rid of her. She was the problem.
I’d be a happily married wife with kids. His mother would still be alive. We’d be the family everyone wishes they had.
But he died that night. Fucking running back to her. Again. Like he promised he wouldn’t do. That accident wasn’t meant for him. It should’ve been for her.
I had made plans, or so I thought. Until I saw Jolee again and those… men. How dare she think she can be with two? She couldn’t even do right with the one she never really had.
I took over writing the letters for Sherry. She wasn’t getting the message across that was needed. Jo was getting too comfortable. Too happy.
And now, seeing for myself the company she keeps. I can’t let this continue. But my plan has changed. Morphed into what really needs to be done.
She needs to suffer as I have. As his family has.
They say adults make their own choices.
Of course they do.
But influence is quieter than choice. It seeps in unknowingly and unrelentingly.
I will not allow her to continue.
I will save her from herself.
If there is revenge in what I’m doing, then so be it. It ends with what needs to happen.
Revenge, when done properly, is curation.
I decide. I’m the one in charge for now. Then I will be no more, but she will always remember.
People will draw their own conclusions. They always do.
I’ve already begun the preparations. The parts are moving.
As for Jo, she will carry my words longer than she wants to. I know her type. She absorbs blame like a bruise, pretends it doesn’t hurt, but I know better.
This will burn… slowly. Painfully.
Eventually, years later, she will try to move on. She will tell herself she’s suffered enough. That she deserves happiness. That what happened wasn’t her fault. But it won’t work; she will fail.
That’s when my work will be finished, because doubt, once planted, does not need tending.
I don’t need her destroyed.
I need her unsettled. Forever.
It isn’t long enough, but it will have to do.
And they will be gone. I won’t let them suffer. They’re going to be my work. My message.
I fold my hands in my lap and look out the window, where the light is fading into the evening.
Her fantasy is ending.
It will be corrected.
And, now it’s almost time.
Patience, Shelly. Patience.