There, on the tender, pale skin of her inner wrist, were the marks. Three distinct, yellowing ovals, perfectly spaced. Fingerprints. The ghost of a grip that had been too hard, for too long.
My heart hammered a frantic, terrified rhythm against my ribs. Olivia.
She saw me looking. She saw the horror dawn on my face. She yanked the sleeve down with a convulsive jerk, her eyes wide with a desperate, panicked plea that screamed across the table: Don’t. Please, Mom. Don’t say anything. Don’t make it worse.
And like a coward, like a good, peace-keeping woman, I stayed quiet.
The dinner continued, a grotesque charade of civility. But then, the dessert arrived. The waiter, a different one this time, placed a slice of pecan pie in front of Olivia instead of the cheesecake she had quietly requested.
“Excuse me,” Robert snapped his fingers, a sound as sharp and ugly as a whip crack. “Is this how you run this establishment? Incompetence seems to be the theme of the evening.”
“Honey, it’s fine,” Olivia whispered, her eyes darting around, her face flushed with humiliation. “Please. I’ll eat the pecan pie. I like pecan pie.”
“It’s not about the pie, Olivia!” Robert’s voice rose, cutting through the ambient, civilized chatter of the restaurant. “It’s about standards. It’s about expecting and receiving what you ask for. Are you always going to be such a conformist? So weak? So willing to accept less than you deserve?”
The irony was so thick, so suffocating, I felt like I was choking on it.*
“Robert, please. You’re embarrassing me.”
