Chapter Twenty-Seven Elise #2
My luxury apartment, sold and gone. The money from it barely covered the payments on my credit cards and the recurring charges—my gym, my spa, my nail appointments, tanning, facials, and hair salon.
The maintenance of perfection that I had been accustomed to since I was a child suddenly became a luxury I could no longer afford.
My friends? I was poison. Toxic. It was social suicide to even interact with me. None of them returned any of my calls. Funny enough, I didn't blame them completely. I would have done the same if they were in my shoes. That was just the way it went.
And my family? The illusion shattered. With nothing more to lose, my father realized it was time to stop pretending. Financial consequences of a second divorce be damned. He was already forced to resign from the Treasurer's office, might as well detonate his entire personal life while he was at it.
My mother didn't even seem to care. Not about the divorce, not about the campaign ruin, not about me, not about anything.
The beautiful, powerful, and poised Bella Cabot just looked haggard and ugly.
Her clothes hung from her body, her skin was sallow and sagging, and her once-polished hair was limp and dull.
Her drinking had ramped up, and when I had shot the snarky comment of, "Guess who I learned that from," in regard to my drinking, my DUIs, she barely even reacted.
At one time, she would verbally spar with me, but now she just sipped from her martini glass and stared into space.
She had nothing anymore. My mother was wasting away in front of me, and one day she would be gone.
I didn't even think I would care.
After I sold my apartment, I moved back home, the only place I had to go, back to my childhood bedroom, where the walls were still painted that hot pink and lined with old boy band posters. A couple of my most prized pageant crowns were collecting dust on the shelves.
My father kept himself holed up in his office or his bedroom.
Finally, he acknowledged my presence. He called me into his office to speak to me, like I was fifteen years old again and about to be grounded for skipping class to go to the mall.
We hadn't spoken since that day at the precinct, and I still felt a little shaky around him, his words from that day echoing in my head.
I stopped dead in my tracks when I walked in, immediately taking note of the half-packed boxes around the room—moving boxes. All the family pictures that were hung on the walls, and the newspaper and magazine articles featuring The Cabots, were shoved into a box in the corner labeled JUNK.
My father sat behind his desk, reading glasses hanging loosely from his fingers. He pinched the bridge of his nose, taking deep breaths.
Like my mother, he looked like shit—days-old scruff on his jaw, rumpled Harvard T-Shirt hanging off him, gray streaking through his thinning blonde hair.
A bottle of Glenfiddich sat half-empty on his desk, the tumbler beside it filled to the brim.
He took a sip that sloshed over the rim, ignoring the spill on his shirt.
I gingerly sat down in the chair across his desk, peering at him. He looked exhausted. Defeated. Hollowed out.
You are my greatest failure.
He took a long swallow from his drink before he spoke, "The house is sold."
For a second, I thought I'd misheard him, then the words really sank in. It felt like the ground was falling away beneath me, and I gripped the arms of my chair to steady myself. "Where are we going?"
"Not we. Just me. I'll be going overseas—Ireland," his expression went almost slack, his gaze unfocused as he murmured. "Claire and I always talked about retiring there."
The reminder of her made me flinch, and the wistfulness in his voice made me sick.
"Dad, but—what about me—"
"I've bailed you out," he cut in sharply, shaking his head. "More times than I can count. To the detriment of everything. You're an adult, Elise. It's time to start acting like one."
I sat there, eyes wide as I stared at him. My brain wasn't moving as fast as I needed it to move. Floundering, I couldn't think of anything to say, of how to get this back under my control.
"I'm giving you the BMW," he told me, in a tone as if he were granting me mercy. "I'm selling the rest of the cars."
"What... what about us? Our family?"
He actually laughed, like I had said something truly hilarious. He tossed the rest of the liquid back, coughing slightly and trying to get himself under control.
"Family. We need to stop pretending that this was ever a family."
"Did you ever love me?" I asked him suddenly. I didn't know. It didn't mean anything to me personally; it was something I could use to understand why. I really don't know why I cared so much about his answer.
He looked down at the glass, grabbed the bottle, and refilled it once more. He studied it as if it were interesting, swirling it around. The silence stretched long and uncomfortable before he admitted softly, "I tried."
I felt nauseous, I worried I would throw up right on his desk. I realized this was the most authentic I had ever seen my father. We were a family, all playing our parts—father, mother, daughter. But we never allowed each other to see our true selves.
This was my father, and I felt as if I were meeting him for the first time.
"I tried so hard to look at you and feel proud, to feel that joy that people talk about when speaking of their children.
.. but all I could see when I looked at you was the look on Claire's face.
How she looked at me when I told her about your mother, about you.
How she cried, how she collapsed, how she screamed at me to get out.
Looking at you is like sticking my hand on a hot stove. "
All the air leaves my lungs at once, and I'm gripping the chair so hard my fingers ache.
"I know it wasn't your fault, I know you didn't ask to exist. I know that it's my fault you do in the first place," he said, his voice a little more gentle now, as if the tone would take away the sting. "I know that. And yet..."
"And yet I'm still your greatest failure," I finished for him, spitting the words out through gritted teeth, my throat burning. I was screaming at myself not to cry. I hadn't cried in years, and I wasn't about to start now—not in front of him.
"We went on too long pretending to be something we're not. So, I'm done pretending," he sighed.
He reached into his desk drawer, pulled out a large envelope, and slid it across the desk. I snatched it from him, hoping the sharp edge would cut his fingers. Peeking into it, I see it's all my personal documents—my birth certificate, my Social Security card, some bank documents, and the car keys.
"I'm wiring money to your account. An amount to get your started. For all the bad you took from your mother and me, you're still smart, Elise. You're determined. You're strong. Forge your own path."
He took another sip of whisky. Then he raised it to me, in tribute, in farewell.
"This is goodbye."
◆◆◆
The money didn't last.
I was never really taught how to save or stretch it. It was always there: my bank account was always refilled, and my card never declined. So how the hell was I supposed to learn these lessons when no one taught me? I grew up with opulence and without limits, and now I have no idea what my own are.
But, my father was right—I was determined, I was smart, I was Elise fucking Cabot.
I would make it work.
For days, I holed up in a hotel and applied to essentially every PR position in the state, until I finally heard back from Starling Cove.
Relatively close to Boston, a smaller coastal town that looks quaint in the pictures on the city's website.
It was the first place to respond, and my bank account was spiraling downward fast enough to make my breath short.
So I went in for the interview, and I charmed the fuck out of them.
My record still remained spotless, and the media firestorm from the exposé had long since fizzled out. I knew how to handle the background check, how to present myself. I could always find a way to sell the story, reframe the narrative.
"You know how dirty politics can get," I would say with a solemn shake of my head and a practiced shake in my voice. "The defamation of my family was devastating..."
If needed, pull out a couple of crocodile tears and the Oscar goes to...
They loved me—of course they did.
I was hired on the spot and brought in to do the PR at City Hall. I could admit that the town was... cute. Quiet. Farmer's markets and little shops with obnoxious closing times and a boardwalk filled with shrieking children and annoying seagulls.
The people in this town were different from what I was used to. In Boston, you go places, keep your head down, and move with a sense of urgency. In this town, people talk to each other, and everyone seems to know everyone's business.
I was a shiny new toy, so I attracted some attention, and when it was one me, I did what I do best—I performed.
Lies by omission or skewing the truth. I'm the daughter of a politician and a beauty queen.
It's practically in my blood. I portrayed the role of a hotshot PR woman from Boston looking to settle down in a smaller town, leaving behind the hustle and bustle of the city. Practically a fucking Hallmark movie.
"Oh, my father was in sales, and my mother did some pageants when she was younger. They met and fell madly in love. They're the best parents in the world, I'm so lucky to have them. Yes, I went to Columbia. Ivy League. Yes, it was so wonderful."
I played the part of the humble-but-confident woman, and they all fucking bought it.
Unfortunately, the pay was meager. Far from what I had been used to making, and my beauty routine was non-negotiable—my lash lifts, my facials, my Pilates classes, my skincare routine. I chose to prioritize them as I made the minimum payments on my maxed-out cards.