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The Wreckoning Chapter 1: Introduction
🕑 Added 2020-01-28 21:16:17 +0000 UTCI have no idea how this story will go over. It's something a bit different for me. I hope y'all like it or at least don't hate it. Please let me know if you find any typos. Thank you.
***
“Namaste.” I say as I slowly open my eyes.
“Namaste.” The flush faced sweaty class of 12 women and 1 man repeats back to me.
The quietude of the final few minutes breaks as people begin to bustle and chat as they roll up their sweat soaked mats and collect their gear. A couple of students approach and do the usual thing of telling me what a great class they had and how good they were feeling and what a skilled instructor I was. I take their compliments with my usual modesty but I knew it had been a terrible class.
My eyes flit over to the new student at the back of the room. The walk-in that joined the class just moments before we began. The woman who had thrown me entirely off my game. Her name was Robyn and I hadn’t seen her since we graduated high school. After all that happened between us back then I had hoped I’d never see her again and I assumed the feeling was mutual. I did my very best to ignore her throughout the class but as she was an absolute beginner she demanded a certain amount of attention from me. At no point did she reveal the fact that we knew each other, she simply followed instructions with the rest of them and struggled through the routine.
I grit my teeth as I watch her out of the corner of my eye gather her belongings and hover against the far wall clearly waiting to speak with me.
What in the hell did she want? I take in a calming breath and center myself. Actually her sticking around was for the best. Once the other students had left I could speak with her alone and politely ask her never to show her face here again.
Had things not ended the way they did between us I might have been begging for her forgiveness. I was not proud of it but all through school I was the worst kind of bully and the chunky and awkward Robyn had been one of my favorite targets. You wouldn’t have known it to look at me. Barely over 5 foot tall, barely over 100 pounds, big sky blue eyes, long bouncy brown hair, high melodic voice, I was the very poster child of a sweet innocent girl. But back then I was a right bitch to those below me in the high school pecking order. Cruelty for the sake of cruelty just for a cheap laugh or to make myself feel superior. Thinking back on those years bothered me to this day and I was thankful I had put the cruel person I once was behind me. I made peace with most of my victims from back then but Robyn…I wanted nothing to do with Robyn. She lost all sympathy from me for her actions leading up to Senior Prom.
The problem was…Robyn was fucking nuts!
Unbeknownst to myself the boy Robyn had asked to the Prom turned her down and ended up asking me go with him instead. I accepted, one thing lead to another and that boy was now the man I loved and my husband of four years. Robyn was convinced I had done this on purpose, one final wicked twist of the knife before our paths parted forever. When I found out I teased her, as was my way at the time, but things were different this time. Robyn would not be cowed. Something inside her snapped. I saw for the first and last time in my life true hatred in another person’s eyes. It scared the hell out of me and was one of the factors that caused me to turn a new leaf soon after.
The weeks that followed were a living hell as Robyn followed me, pestered me, and even assaulted me once. After so many years of overt bullying I found few sympathetic ears among the faculty of our high school. I tried to reason with her and make amends with her but she was having none of it. Nothing I did could stop her. For the first time Robyn had the upper hand and she relished it. She knifed my tires. She stole my clothes while I was in the gym shower. She cut off my ponytail. She locked me in a bathroom. She stole my homework. She put dog shit into my shoes. Everyday was something new. And on Prom Night came the piece de resistance. I’m not sure how she did it but somehow she had doused my beautiful powder blue prom dress with a big splash foul smelling liquid mixed with bright red ink. When I noticed I looked for her but she was nowhere to be seen though it couldn’t have been more than a few seconds. The dress, and the evening, was ruined. Nobody saw her do it but I knew it had to be her. Though I had put my past behind me there was still an ember of bitterness pertaining to that night. Prom Night was supposed to be special but mine was a nightmare thanks to Robyn.
I bid the last regular a good night and turn to face the unwelcome interloper. She looked much the same as she did 6 years ago when I last saw her. 50 pounds overweight and plain looking to a fault. She was half a foot taller than me and after watching her in class I knew she pretty strong despite her doughy appearance. She intimidated me, the quicker I got her out of here the better I would feel.
“Robyn.” I say cautiously. “Long time.”
“Natalie.” Her smile makes my skin crawl. “Thanks for the class.”
“Erm, thanks.” I say. “It will be your last. Listen, after what happened between us I just think it would be better if…”
She chuckles.
“What’s so funny?” I ask.
“Nothing.” She shrugs. “I just…I thought little Miss Perfect would amount to something more than a Yoga instructor.”
“Riiiight.”
“I guess with a man like Dylan supporting you…”
“Supporting me?” I bristle.
“I’m assuming rich Daddy didn’t leave Dylan wanting. You surely can’t afford that house and this studio on what you make…”
“Okay, I think that’s enough.” I interrupt her there. Did she actually know what my house looked like or was she bluffing? Either way I was done with her. I turn toward the studio entrance about to call for my assistant to help me get her out of here.
“You’re probably missing him already, yeah?” She studies me closely, amused by my confusion.
“Excuse me?”
“I mean, he’s gone a whole year. That’s gotta be rough on a marriage.”
“How do you…?”
“Although he only left this morning. Probably not long enough for you to be missing him yet.”
“Okay, how the fuck do you know that?” I square back up with her. What she said was true. Dylan had indeed left for a one year research posting at the South Pole Station in Antarctica. While his year away wasn’t a exactly a secret it wasn’t common knowledge either outside of our close friends and family. The whole thing only came together last month when another researcher had to pull out last minute. Dylan asked those that knew to keep it on the low as he wanted to surprise his Twitter followers with a surprise photo of himself on the Southern Continent.
“You poor souls. A whole year sleeping alone, no one there beside you when you wake up.”
“Okay, this is just crazy.” I take in a breath to call for my assistant.
Robyn tilts her head to the side with a widening smile. “I suppose I could send him that movie you made. I’m sure that would help him through those lonely Antarctic nights.”
My heart nearly stops in my chest. “What?” I gasp in a hushed voice.
“You know. That movie you made. The one with you and Jordan and Luis and Deshawn and…and…who was it? Oh yeah! Dylan’s brother Bobby. Surely you remember. It certainly looked like a night to remember. Hot stuff.” The tone of her voice is sweet and friendly though the intention behind it was anything but. Pulling her phone from her gym bag she taps it and swipes it a few times then turns the screen toward me. On the small screen was a still picture from the sex tape she was referring to. It was blurry but the faces were unmistakable. “Don’t you remember?”
The girl I bullied, my foolish night of drunken infidelity, my sex tape, all of my greatest sins were being resurrected before my eyes.
I am frozen. My breath is trapped in my lungs. This couldn’t be happening. They deleted that file. I watched them delete the file. How did Robyn get this?
Reading my mind Robyn snickers. “Clever sneaky boys, they made a backup when you weren’t looking. One of them did anyway.” The growing devious grin on her face told me she was savoring my frightened reaction.
“What do you want?” I gasp, breathing again at last. “Why are you here?” I am already assuming this is a blackmail situation and my racing mind begins running numbers of just how much money I could get my hands on to buy her silence.
The sex tape had been made not that long after Dylan and I were engaged, I remember distinctly that you could even see my engagement ring in the video. Dylan was away on one of his trips and I had been invited to a party at Dylan’s brother’s house. Luis was an ex of mine whom I still had a cordial friendship with and our flirtations that night combined with pot and booze lead me to make the greatest mistake of my life. I swore it would be the only time I ever cheated on Dylan. I made the others vow to keep it a secret. As two of them were also in committed relationships at the time and Bobby had no interest in hurting his brother they all agreed wholeheartedly. When we were done we watched the video Jordan took of the orgy one time, erased it, and promised never to speak of it again.
Yet here it was, my shame resurfaced. And by the look in Robyn’s eyes and by what I knew about her I knew she wasn’t bluffing.
Sure I could go to the police. Blackmail was a crime. They might get Robyn but would they get her in time? Before the damage could be done. I felt sure in my heart that if Dylan ever saw the tape our marriage would be over. Dylan was a prideful man. An orgy, with his brother, with my engagement ring on? Fuck. No amount of couples counseling or appeals for forgiveness would save us. It would also throw his relationship with his family into disarray as well with this thing hanging over him and his brother. The pain this tape could cause was incalculable. It would be a special kind of torture for him to have to stew on this knowledge while trapped so far from home for a whole year.
At last dropping her facade of civility Robyn puts her phone away and says in a flat matter of fact voice. “You’re mine now bitch. For one year. Until your precious Dylan returns. I don’t want money. I don’t want anything from you but your obedience.”
“Obedience?” My already rattled nerves were quaking. What the fuck was this?
“Don’t worry, I won’t make you do anything where others could notice. This is just between you and I. We won’t meet in person until one year from today though we’ll be seeing plenty of each other.” Reaching forward she pats me on the cheek, I cringe at her touch but do not move. “You’re about to become my must see TV Little Miss Perfect.”
“Don’t…call me that.”
“I’ll call you whatever the fuck I want.” She states.
Just then my assistant Melanie pops her head into the studio. “Everything okay in here?”
I swallow hard and nod. “We-we’re good. Robyn’s an old…friend. You can go home Mel, I’ll lock up.” It killed me to say that. The last thing I wanted was to be alone with Robyn. I was far more fit than her but, slip of a woman that I was, she was nearly twice my size. But I saw little choice.
“See you tomorrow.” She says as she disappears again. Only moments later I hear the front door close.
Robyn’s smile returns. “Good girl. Keep it up and everything will go fine.”
“This isn’t fair. You’re no saint either. You ruined my prom night…”
“You ruined my LIFE!” She screams the last word as she momentarily loses control. I am silent as she collects herself again. She lets out a humorless laugh and waves her finger at me. “Ha! Nope, you’re not getting to me. You’re never going to hurt me again.”
I rub my fingers nervously into my sweaty palms. “How…how can I believe you? How do I know you won’t just do it even if I listen to you?”
Her features soften, just for a moment. “Natalie, believe it or not I want this to be behind us as much as you do. I want to move on. I need to move on.”
“Then move on!”
She shakes her head. “I can’t. Not yet.” Her eyes glare down at me. “You don’t know, do you? You don’t know what you did to me. You don’t know how it affected me. You can’t know how much it took for me to gather my courage to ask Dylan out…only for you to steal him away from me. You didn’t see me crying myself to sleep every single night for years. You didn’t see me in those darkest hours.” Her voice trembles and fades into silence.
“Oh, Robyn. I’m so sorry.” I reach for her but she slaps my hand away.
“Sorry is not going to cut it Nat, it’s not going to be that easy. Call me petty but I’m an old fashioned woman. Pain for pain, humiliation for humiliation, an eye for an eye. I need my revenge before I can put you behind me. I owe it to that scared lonely girl that I was.”
“Robyn, please, I was just a silly girl back then. Can’t we talk about this like rational…”
“Shut up. You’ll take your medicine whether you want to or not, or else Dylan gets the video.” She slings her gym bag higher onto her shoulder and picks up her rolled up yoga mat as she gets ready to leave. “There will be a package waiting for you at home. Follow the instructions to the letter.”
“Robyn, don’t do this. Please!”
She turns and starts to walk from the studio.
“Robyn.”
She continues.
“ROBYN!” I plead.
She pauses and glances back over her shoulder with cold piercing eyes. I would find no mercy here.
“Just tell me…the dress…prom…how did you do it?”
The side of her mouth curls up into a devilish grin. “Super Soaker from under the drink table.”
I nod. At least that mystery was solved.
“See you soon.” She says as if we were old friends and just like that she was gone.
I stand in the empty studio staring at myself in a wall mirror and wonder what the price of my sins would be.
