Category: Short Story

She was the prettiest girl you ever loved, but she tortured you like the Inquisition. She’d bawl that she loved you one minute, flirt with your friends the next. Every few weeks you’d break it off, for good this time, until she scratched at your apartment door to toy with your heart like a cat with a captured mouse. She would disappear in the morning, and you limped off to work that day with your throat talked raw and your heart wrung dry and your stomach tied up in knots. And you’d count the minutes until you saw her again.

So you leave town, for a good job and a fresh start. You meet a better girl, a nicer one, who moves without complaint through your transfers and promotions.…

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How did she do it?

That was what Kristy Ambrose was thinking as she staggered into the bathroom that day. She ran her head under the cold tap and stepped into the shower. Somewhere, Betsy was climbing out of her bed and would soon start tearing around the house until it was time to leave. Kristy wondered if he-Steve, or Joe?-would wait around long enough to say goodbye or if he would run at the first sight of Bets. She thought of last night, the taste of cigarettes on his tongue as it entered her mouth, the booze that ran through both of them in their sweat. Behind her on the floor were last night’s clothes, none of them big enough to cover three tiles on the floor.…

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