6. Adriana #2
I cross the floor without stopping. My heels click against the marble, too loud, echoing in the emptiness. The front door looms ahead of me, heavy and dark, and I push through it without looking back.
The afternoon sun hits my face like an accusation.
I stop on the front steps, blinking in the brightness. The same manicured lawn, the same ornamental hedges, the same gravel driveway curving away toward the street. The world hasn’t shifted at all. Only I have.
What am I doing? Where am I going?
I don’t have a plan. I don’t have anywhere to go. I walked out of that house with nothing but my phone and my purse and the clothes on my back. The dress I put on this morning thinking I would seduce my husband. The shoes I chose because I thought he might like them.
Everything I own is in that house. My clothes, my jewelry, my piano. Seven months of building a life, and none of it was ever really mine.
I can’t go to my parents. The thought surfaces and I push it away immediately, but I know it’s true.
My father would send me back. He would tell me to be a good wife, to forgive my husband’s indiscretions, to stop making problems for the family.
He would care more about appearances and what people would say than about his daughter’s broken heart.
He’s always cared more about how things look than about me.
And my mother… my mother would wring her hands and look sad and pour herself another glass of wine and do absolutely nothing to help.
She’s never helped. She’s never stood up for me, never defended me against Viviana or Father or anyone.
She just floats through life in her own bubble, pretending everything is fine, pretending we’re a happy family, pretending she doesn’t see what’s right in front of her.
I keep walking. Down the driveway, past Rafael’s car, past the hedges trimmed into perfect shapes, past the fountain that I’ve never seen turned on.
The gravel crunches under my heels, too loud in the quiet afternoon.
Every step takes me further from that house, further from my marriage, further from everything I thought my life was going to be.
At the end of the driveway, I stop.
The street stretches out in front of me, unfamiliar territory. I’ve been driven down it dozens of times, but I’ve never walked it, never stood here alone with no car waiting, no driver, no one whose job is to handle the logistics of my life so I never have to. I don’t know how to do this.
Amelia. I need to call Amelia.
My hands shake as I pull out my phone. The screen is blurry, and I realize there are tears in my eyes. I blink them back, refusing to let them fall, refusing to break down here on the sidewalk where anyone could see.
It takes me three tries to find Amelia’s contact. My fingers won’t cooperate, clumsy and trembling on the screen. I press call and hold the phone to my ear, listening to it ring.
And ring. And ring. And ring.
Voicemail.
“Amelia, it’s me.” My voice cracks on the words, betraying me. “Something happened. I need… can you call me back? Please. I don’t know what to do. I don’t know where to go. Just… please call me.”
I hang up and stare at the phone. The screen stares back at me, blank and unhelpful.
What now?
I could call a taxi. Go somewhere. Anywhere.
But where? A hotel? I don’t have money of my own, not really.
Everything I have came from my father or from the Vitales.
My credit cards are probably tied to accounts that Rafael could cancel with a phone call.
The cash in my wallet might cover a taxi ride, maybe one night in a cheap hotel, but then what?
I have nothing. I am nothing.
The tears come without warning. They spill down my cheeks and I can’t stop them, can’t hold them back, can’t do anything but stand here at the end of this driveway crying like a child.
My mascara is running. My nose is dripping.
I probably look insane, a well-dressed woman sobbing on the sidewalk in one of the nicest neighborhoods in the city.
I don’t care. I can’t care. I don’t have room for anything except this grief, this rage, this terrible crushing weight of everything I’ve lost.
Not just Rafael. Not just my marriage. My family. My home. My whole sense of who I was supposed to be.
I was the good daughter. The obedient one. The one who did what she was told and never made problems and always, always put everyone else first.
And where did it get me? Standing on a sidewalk with mascara running down my face and nowhere to go.
Amelia’s building. I can go there. I can wait in the lobby until she gets home. It’s something. It’s a plan. It’s better than standing here crying until someone calls the police.
I pull up a taxi app on my phone and request a car, entering Amelia’s address with shaking fingers. The app tells me it will be seven minutes. Seven minutes of standing here, exposed and vulnerable and falling apart.
I find a low stone wall at the edge of the property and sit down, pulling my knees together, trying to make myself small. The stone is cold through my dress. I wrap my arms around myself and wait.
My phone buzzes. I grab it, hoping it’s Amelia, but it’s a text from Rafael.
Adriana please let me explain
I stare at the words. They blur and swim in front of my eyes.
Another text comes through.
I’m sorry you had to see that
Not sorry for what he did. Sorry that I saw it. Like the problem is that I walked in, not that he was in bed with my sister.
Another text.
Can we please just talk about this
And another.
I know you’re upset but we can work this out
And another.
Where are you? Come back and let’s discuss this like adults
Like adults. Like I’m the one being childish. Like walking out on my cheating husband is some kind of tantrum that I’ll get over if I just calm down.
I turn the phone face down on my lap. I can’t look at his words anymore. Every message is another knife, another reminder of how stupid I was to believe him, to trust him, to think I might actually be worth something to someone.
The taxi arrives. I climb in and give the driver Amelia’s address, my voice steady despite everything.
He glances at me in the rearview mirror, taking in my tear-streaked face, my smeared makeup, the way I’m huddled in the back seat like I’m trying to disappear.
But he doesn’t say anything. He just drives.
Small mercies.
The city slides past the windows. Buildings and people and cars and life, all of it continuing like nothing has happened, like my whole world hasn’t just collapsed around me. A woman walks a dog. A man talks on his phone. Two children chase each other down the sidewalk, laughing.
I used to be one of them. One of the people going about their lives, not thinking about how fragile it all is, how quickly everything can fall apart.
This morning I was having brunch with my best friend, planning how to seduce my husband, thinking about faithfulness and real marriage and happy endings.
That was a different person. A different life. A different world.
The taxi stops in front of Amelia’s building. I pay the driver with the cash from my wallet, counting out the bills carefully. Sixty-three dollars left. That’s all I have in the world.
Sixty-three dollars and a phone full of messages from a man I never want to see again.
The lobby is cool and quiet when I walk in, all clean lines and expensive furniture.
Neutral colors, abstract art, a carefully curated aesthetic meant to convey wealth without being ostentatious.
The doorman glances at me from his desk but doesn’t stop me.
I must look like I belong here, even with mascara running down my face.
Or maybe he just doesn’t care. Maybe that’s a skill you develop, working in a building like this. Learning not to see the messy parts of rich people’s lives.
I find a chair in the corner, away from the windows, away from the door. Somewhere I can curl up and hide and pretend I don’t exist. I sink into it and pull out my phone, trying Amelia again.
Still no answer.
I send a text. I’m in your lobby. Please call me when you get this.
Then another. Something happened with Rafael. I need to talk to you.
Then a voicemail, my voice cracking as I explain where I am, that I’m waiting, that I need her.
Nothing. No response. Just silence.
I sit there in the quiet lobby, watching the light change through the tall windows, watching afternoon slide toward evening, watching my phone for a response that doesn’t come.
My phone buzzes again. Rafael.
Don’t do anything crazy
Just come home and we’ll figure this out
Adriana please
I turn the phone face down again. I can’t. I can’t read any more of his words, can’t let him into my head, can’t give him any more space in my thoughts.
The lobby is nearly empty now. Just me and the doorman, who’s reading something on his computer screen. The silence presses in around me, heavy and suffocating. I pull my knees up to my chest, making myself as small as possible, and I wait.
For Amelia. For an answer. For something, anything, to tell me what I’m supposed to do now.
Minutes pass. Maybe hours. I lose track of time, lose track of everything except the weight of my phone in my hand and the hollow ache in my chest.
The elevator chimes across the lobby.
I don’t look up at first. People have been coming and going all afternoon, residents returning from work or errands or whatever it is that people with normal lives do. None of them are Amelia. None of them matter.
But something makes me raise my head. Some instinct, some awareness of being watched.
And I find myself looking directly at Enzo Vitale.
He’s standing just outside the elevator doors, dressed in dark clothes that probably cost more than everything I’m wearing combined. His hair is slightly disheveled, like he’s been running his hands through it. His dark eyes are fixed on me with an expression I can’t read.
For a long moment, neither of us moves.
Then he starts walking toward me.