CHAPTER NINE

The file took a moment to load. I watched the progress bar move slowly across the screen, my thumb hovering over the play button like I wasn't sure I actually wanted to press it. Part of me wanted to close the app and pretend I hadn't seen the message at all. Part of me — the part that had been awake at midnight typing angry words into an anonymous account — pressed play.

It was a voice note. Thirty-eight seconds long.

The first thing I heard was background noise. It was the kind of noise heard in a hallway or a dressing room, muffled voices and the faint sound of music from somewhere further away. Then Henry's voice came through clearly, and my whole body went still.

“I don't care what she thinks. I don't care what any of them think.” His voice was low and tight, like he was trying not to raise it. "Do what I said and stop bringing her name into things that have nothing to do with her."

There was a pause before I heard someone else's voice too. It was muffled to make out the words. Then Henry again, sharper this time. “Who the hell does she think she is? She is so ugly and useless at the same time. Please look for a way to remove her from this production.”

The recording ended.

I sat there with my phone in my hand and the screen going dark and the sound of his voice still sitting in my chest. I didn't know who he was talking about. I didn't know the context, the room, the conversation that had happened before whoever recorded this pressed record. I didn't know any of it. But it looked very scandalous.

I knew his voice, and the particular coldness it carried. I had heard that voice directed at me enough times to recognise it anywhere. Just as I was trying to process what I had just heard by putting puzzles together in my head, another message from pinkpen0 came in. It was another view once message; I opened it. It turned out to be a video, so I quickly pressed play. The video had no sound; I only saw Henry’s hands raised. He looked quite angry at the person, or rather, quite disgusted with the look on his face. He raised his hand high, as if to land a slap at the person, but the person flinched; then he put his hands down and lashed out as he pointed his fingers towards the person.  

I exited the video quickly. This looks so out of hand. It looked like bullying and I wasn't ready to see Henry in that light. 

@henrybhater: What is this?

@pinkpen0: Proof that what you see on camera is not what he is like behind closed doors. There's more where that came from.

I stared at her message for a long time. There's more? I thought about the thirty-eight seconds I had just listened to, the way his voice had sounded so unbothered. I didn't know who ‘she’ was referring to. I wasn't sure I wanted to know.

@henrybhater: Who was he talking about in that recording?

@pinkpen0: Me.

I felt something shift in my chest.

@henrybhater: What happened?

@pinkpen0: I told you. Long story. What matters is that I have more recordings, more screenshots, more things that the people who love him don't know about. And I think you know exactly what to do with them.

I put my phone face down on the desk and looked at the ceiling for a moment. The apartment was quiet around me. The kitchen light was still on from when I had come home and dropped my bag without bothering to switch it off. Outside, I could hear the faint sound of rain starting against the window.

I thought about Henry's voice in the recording. It was so cold. I picked up my phone again.

@henrybhater: Send me all you have. I'm ready.

I put my phone down after that and didn't look at it again for the rest of the night. I made myself a cup of tea I didn't finish drinking, turned off the kitchen light, and sat in the dark living room for a long time thinking about the kind of person I was becoming and whether I had always been capable of this or whether loneliness had turned me into someone different.

By the time I finally went to bed, it was past midnight, and I still didn't have an answer. It made me feel nervous and unsettled. I constantly refreshed everything I could, but nothing.

After a few hours, I decided to message again. “Hi. Are you still there?” I stared at the message I had sent until the screen dimmed on its own. I was still sitting in a dark apartment waiting on a stranger to decide how much of my husband's life she was willing to hand me in pieces.

The three dots appeared so suddenly that I flinched.

@pinkpen0: I'm here. 

@pinkpen0: I'll send what I have, but not all at once. You should have enough time to decide what to do with each one, and I don't want you panicking and posting everything before you're ready.

@henrybhater: Why does it matter to you how I use it?

@pinkpen0: Because I want it done right. Not just fast.

I didn't know what ‘done right’ meant to a woman I had never met, and some part of me wanted to close the laptop and never open this account again. But then I thought of Chris asking me to carry a bag to the awards like I was an hired help in my own marriage, and the wanting to close the laptop passed.

@henrybhater: Send them when you're ready. I'll be ready too.