3. Louella
— ? —
Louella
This was becoming routine. I’d wake in the dark, alone, my hand finding only cool sheets where my husband should be. The fifth night this week. The pattern had become so familiar that my body had started anticipating it, jolting me awake at the exact moment I should have been deepest in sleep.
I lay there for a long moment, staring at the ceiling, doing the math I’d been avoiding.
Six weeks since the vineyard. Six weeks since Hector had tied a silk scarf over my eyes and made me believe we might be okay.
Six weeks of whatever progress we’d made slowly unraveling until we were further apart than when we’d started.
The hallway was dark, but light spilled from under his study door like an accusation.
I pushed it open without knocking.
Hector was behind his desk, laptop glowing, papers scattered around him in the organized chaos that meant he’d been at it for hours. He looked up when I entered, and for a split second a flash of guilt crossed his face before he buried it.
“Did I wake you?” he asked. “I’m sorry. I tried to be quiet.”
“You didn’t wake me. The empty bed did.”
He sighed, rubbing his eyes. “I know. I’m sorry. This merger is killing me, and the timeline keeps…”
“Moving. Yes. You’ve said.” I walked closer, wrapping my arms around myself against the chill.
I was wearing one of his old t-shirts and nothing else, and I’d thought once upon a time that would have gotten a reaction from him.
Now he barely glanced at me. “Hector, it’s 2 a.m. Whatever it is can wait until morning. ”
“It really can’t.”
“It can. Come to bed.”
“Louella.” There was a warning in his voice, a weary frustration that landed like a slap. “I’m trying to work.”
I should have left. Should have turned around and gone back to our cold bed and pretended this was normal, that this was just a busy season and eventually it would end.
But the blue light of the laptop catching his face, the way he was hunched over those papers like they mattered more than anything, made me walk around the desk instead.
“What’s so urgent?”
“Contracts for the…” He tried to minimize the window, but he was too slow.
I saw Elizabeth’s name in his recent emails. Not just once. A whole thread, timestamped at midnight, 12:47, 1:15, 1:38.
“You’re emailing her. At 2 a.m. You’re sitting in your study in the middle of the night emailing Elizabeth Silva.”
“It’s work correspondence…”
“Seventeen emails, Hector. I can count from here. That’s not work correspondence. That’s a conversation.”
“She handles my scheduling. The overseas meeting moved and we had to coordinate…”
“At 2 a.m.?”
“Time zones.” He said it like I was being unreasonable. Like I was the problem here. “She’s incredibly dedicated. Some people take their jobs seriously.”
The implication landed exactly where he’d aimed it.
I didn’t have a job. Not a real one. I’d given up my studio three years ago when his travel schedule made it impossible to maintain, and now I existed in the Lauder orbit, planning charity events and attending functions and slowly forgetting I’d ever been a person with her own ambitions.
“Come to bed,” I said again, quieter this time. “Please.”
“I can’t. I have to get this done.”
I left without another word. What was there to say?
***
The gala came at the end of that same week. I stood in front of my closet in a hotel robe, trying to figure out how to dress for a battle I didn’t know how to fight.
The Harrison Foundation charity gala was the event of the season, and as Hector Lauder’s wife, I was expected to sparkle.
Smile for photographs. Make small talk with people who looked through me.
Pretend my marriage wasn’t crumbling in real time while my mother-in-law watched with barely concealed satisfaction.
I chose a black gown because it felt like armor. Simple, elegant, expensive enough to meet Lauder standards. I pinned my hair up and put on the diamond earrings Hector had given me for our first anniversary, back when he still noticed things like anniversaries without being reminded.
We drove to the hotel in silence.
He was on his phone the entire time, texting a name I didn’t have to ask about, while I watched the city lights blur past the window and thought about all the things we used to talk about in cars.
Art. Music. The future we were building together.
Now there was just the tap of his fingers on the screen and the growing distance between us.
“Ready?” he asked as we pulled up to the entrance.
“Always.”
Inside, the ballroom was a fever dream of crystal and candlelight, filled with people whose net worth exceeded the GDP of small countries. I plastered on my public smile and accepted a champagne flute I had no intention of drinking, scanning the crowd for anyone I could tolerate talking to.
Camille swept in like a gift from the universe.
“You look like you’re about to commit a crime,” she murmured. “Tell me what happened.”
“Nothing happened. I’m fine.”
“You’re using your fine voice. That means you’re the opposite of fine. Is it Hector?”
“It’s always Hector.”
She followed my gaze across the room to where my husband stood surrounded by investors and board members, commanding attention the way he always did at these things.
He was good at this, the charm, the presence, the easy confidence that made people want to give him things.
I used to love watching him work a room.
Then I saw Elizabeth.
She was right beside him, perfectly positioned just inside his personal space. Her dress was burgundy silk that probably cost as much as my car, and her hand rested on his arm with the casual intimacy of long ownership. She leaned in to whisper, and he smiled.
He smiled at her.
I couldn’t remember the last time he’d smiled at me like that.
“Is that…” Camille started.
“His assistant. Yes.”
“That’s not how an assistant stands.”
“No. It’s not.”
Across the room, Genevieve caught my eye. She was watching me watch them, and her expression was close to triumph. She raised her champagne glass in a tiny toast, and the message was clear: This is what you get. This is what happens when you fail to give my son what he needs.
“I need some air,” I said.
“Louella, wait…”
But I was already moving, slipping through the crowd toward the terrace doors, desperate for a moment where I didn’t have to perform.
The night air hit my face like cold water, and I gripped the railing until my knuckles went white, breathing in the smell of the city and trying to remember who I’d been before I became this.
Before I became a woman who watched her husband light up for someone else and couldn’t even name the feeling anymore because it had become so constant.
“You can’t let them see you break.”
I turned. Camille had followed me, of course she had, because she was the only person left who still saw me as a person instead of a position.
“I’m not breaking.”
“Honey, you’re shaking.”
I looked down. My hands were trembling against the railing. I hadn’t noticed.
“She’s winning,” I said quietly. “Whatever game she’s playing, she’s winning. And I don’t know how to fight back because I don’t even understand the rules.”
“Then change the game.” Camille took my hands, steadied them with her own. “Go in there and claim your husband. Make him remember who he married. Don’t give her the satisfaction of your absence.”
She was right. I knew she was right. Running away only proved I was already beaten.
I went back inside.
***
The silent auction was set up along the east wall, and I intercepted Hector there, materializing at his side with a smile that felt like a blade.
“Dance with me.” I didn’t make it a question. “Your wife.”
A flicker crossed his eyes, surprise, maybe, or guilt. “The next round of bidding starts in…”
“Dance. With. Me.”
He handed his champagne to a passing waiter and let me lead him to the dance floor. The orchestra was playing something soft and classical, and I stepped into his arms like I still belonged there. Maybe I did. Maybe I didn’t. I couldn’t tell anymore.
“People are watching,” he murmured.
“Let them watch. I’m your wife. This is what married people do at parties.”
We moved through the steps, his hand warm at my waist, and for a moment I let myself pretend this was normal. That we were happy. That the distance between us was just physical, easily crossed with a touch.
“Hector.” I kept my voice low, my expression pleasant for the watching crowd. “Are you sleeping with her?”
His hand tightened on my waist. “God, Louella. No. How can you even…”
“Then why does she look at you like she owns you? Why does your mother look at her like she’s already family? Why are you emailing her at 2 a.m. instead of coming to bed with your wife?”
“It’s work. I told you, it’s just work.”
“Do you want to sleep with her?”
“No.” But his eyes had already slid past me, scanning the room. Looking for her. “I would never. You’re my wife.”
“Am I?” The question came out broken. “Because I don’t feel like your wife anymore, Hector. I feel like a piece of furniture you forgot to get rid of. I feel like an obligation you’re too polite to escape. I feel like…”
“Hector.” The voice cut through like silk over steel. “I’m so sorry to interrupt, but the Harrison Foundation director needs a word before the next auction round. It’s urgent.”
Elizabeth stood at his shoulder, close enough to touch, not looking at me at all. Her smile was apologetic but her eyes weren’t.
Hector hesitated. For one second, I saw the man from the vineyard fighting to surface, the one who’d said she doesn’t get to ruin this. I held my breath, waiting.
“I’ll be right there,” he said.
Then he let go of me.
“I’m sorry,” he said, already turning. “I’ll find you later. We’ll talk.”
“Hector…”
But he was gone, Elizabeth’s hand light on his elbow as she guided him away, and he never once looked back.
I stood alone in the middle of the dance floor, surrounded by people who didn’t see me at all. The music swelled around me, couples swirling past, and I thought about all the ways a person could disappear without ever leaving the room.
Invisible. That’s what I was.
Elizabeth had made me invisible, and my husband had let her.