Chapter 2- DIAMONDS TO DISHES.

Scarlett stared at her reflection in the motel’s bathroom cracked mirror. Her once glossy hair now sat in uneven clusters. Her face was white and her skin was pale. She could barely recognize herself, she looked like a ghost

She took the scissors again and cut her hair shorter, one snip after another. Never again will she look like Grant Ashbourne’s wife and if she was to bury the memories, she had to look nothing like who she was.

She thought of Grant sometimes, more than she wished she would. She wondered if she thought of him too.

It had been three weeks since she disappeared after her divorce and the motel she now worked at was a rotting contrast to the Ashbourne penthouse with its floor to ceiling windows and silent air conditioning. Here reeked of cheap alcohol and mould and something sour buried deep  in the carpets. The peeling walls were a musty shade of yellow and the bulbs  flickered above her, indecisive of whether to live or die. Same as her.

She squeezed a packet of drug store dye into a dirty plastic bowl she had found there in the bathroom and rubbed it in her hair. It was black. Permanent.

The acrid smell of dye stung her nose as she smeared it through her hair and she gagged for the third time that morning.

She turned on the tap as she threw up. Again and again. She had been gagging for days now.

Scarlet hurriedly re entered her room and tied her apron on her waist which had several frays at the hem and dashed out of room 20-the cheapest room her manager let her stay in, in exchange for morning and night shifts. She was only allowed to keep tips from customers-if any was given.

The weak wooden floor boards creaked under her feet and the coffee machine in the lobby sputtered and hissed like it was coughing up its last breath.

“You’re late again!” Monica, her new boss snapped at her.

“I’m sorry,I was-” Scarlett started as she clenched her stomach, another nausea rising.

“Young girl, I don’t care how pretty you are or whatever in Neptune’s moons you were doing. You want to work here, you show up early!” Monica stared at her dead in the eye.

“I’m sorry”, Scarlett whispered as she turned to the counter and grabbed a pencil and notepad. She had just slipped behind the booths when a large rat ran past her and into the kitchen. Nobody flinched, they were all used to it. That is, except Scarlett who felt another vomit rising and ran to the bathroom.

“That’s it!” Monica shouted angrily when Scarlett returned “I’ll let you off today. Go fix whatever is wrong with you” she dismissed Scarlett immediately.

“Don’t let her get to you”, a voice called out to Scarlett when Monica was out of sight.

Scarlett turned to see a blonde head in pigtails and heavy eyeliner approach her. She stretched out a hand with chipped nail polish all over her finger nails “ The name’s Roxy “

But Scarlett had already gotten her name from her cracked name tag, she received the handshake “Scarlett”

“You’re new?”

“Yeah. I started here last week”

“No, you’re new. Steel Hollow is not exactly a big town. Boy, it’s the smallest mining town in the world. If you ask me” she gave a careless laughter “ everyone knows everyone. So if I don’t know you, you’re not from here.”

Scarlett avoided the question “And you are?”

“No one is really from here, only the ones with the worst fates end up here. I moved from Jersey when I was 18 to Boston, got into a scandal with a married politician who I did NOT know was married and ended up here.” She shrugged.

Scarlett tried to study Roxy’s face. She looked like she had easily survived 9 lives and had a slight permanent look on her face  that made it seem she was always smirking.

“So what’s your story?”

“I don’t have one”, Scarlett said dryly , rounding the corner and heading for her room.

Roxy followed “come on, everyone has a story”

“Well, I don’t “

“That’s alright”, Roxy walked into Scarlett’s room with her and bounced on the bed.

Scarlett looked at her from the tiny mirror she faced, she was fluffing the bed “ your back would be sore from this in a few days” Roxy said “I bought a new bed some time back, you can join me on it when you want “

Scarlett turned to face her “What do you want?”

“Huh?”

“Why are you being nice to me?”

“Now, us girls have to stick together don’t we? Especially in Steel hollow- really dangerous place”

Scarlett only stared back at her.

“So, when do I give you the pregnancy test?”

Scarlett furrowed her brows in confusion “Excuse me?”

“Gagging, crying-“

“Crying?”

“Yep. I hear you almost every time. I’m in room 18, just opposite yours “

“It doesn’t mean I’m pregnant “

“You won’t know until you take the test”

“Trust me, I am NOT pregnant “

“Then just take the test, prove me wrong”

“Fine. Bring it “

The test didn’t take long.

Two red lines.

Pregnant.

Scarlett staggered back as covered her mouth with one hand as if trying to silence the loud scream forming in her throat. Her other hand trembled with the test strip between her fingers.

How could she be pregnant?  it was impossible! The doctor had confirmed the IVF failed, hadn’t he? With the fertility medications and processes she had been on and off with she had completely lost track of her cycle and didn’t know she had missed her period.

It was because she couldn’t conceive that Christine and Grant had thrown her out wasn’t it? So how was this possible?

She asked Roxy for another test and another. They all read the same thing. Two lines. Positive. Pregnant.

Alone. Divorced.Barley making a living .

A choked sob escaped her throat. The sound was wild and ugly. Her chest heaved as her new truth sank in:  pregnant and alone.

“You alright?”Roxy  called back from the room.

Poor Scarlett was dumbfounded. She sat staring at the tests, her eyes bulging out of their sockets.

She was carrying the heir that she was thrown out for not producing.

The irony would have been delicious if it didn’t taste like vinegar.

She slid down the wall and curled up on the bathroom floor, her hand on her abdomen. She didn’t know what future held or how she was going to survive but she decided then and  on the spot to keep her baby and raise him/her far away from the Ashbournes.

The heater kept clanking loudly.

But her heartbeat clanked louder-deafening.