Rachel leaned back in her sofa while smoking her cigarette. She sighed while she dropped the remains into the ashtray on the table in front t of her. Rachel felt as though she had been sitting on that sofa for what seemed like years, while it had only been a couple of hours. She tried to drown herself in the plush red leather that surrounded her, but nothing could bring her comfort.

As she leaned against the arm of the chair, Rachel closed her hazel eyes, temporarily shutting herself off from the rest of the world. She rubbed her slender fingers across her temples, trying to rid herself of the swirling headache she had. It almost made her sick to her stomach to simply think. ‘I need another cigarette’ Rachel thought to herself. She sat up and flipped her long red hair over her shoulder as she reached for the relief of nicotine. She wanted to feel it pumping through her veins.

Rachel’s eyes lingered ever so slightly on the phone that she had placed on the antique cherry table in front of her. She had wanted it to ring for a while now. Two hours and thirty eight minutes to be precise. Rachel needed to talk to her husband. The voice screaming inside of her was begging to be set free. To seer her husband with those bitter words she had been holding inside for so long.

Aaron had been cheating on her, and she knew it. He got home late every night, claiming to have ‘been busy’ and ‘having an overload of work’. But Rachel knew better than to believe those lies that escaped her husband’s perfect lips. She knew better than to get sucked into the twisted game he was playing. Rachel wasn’t playing any games. Rachel couldn’t believe that Aaron said how she was the woman he would always love and cherish, when he was messing around with some floozy.

The suspicions started with the business Christmas party Aaron’s law firm, Brown and McKarnen, had about 3 months ago. That’s when Rachel saw her. She worked as a publicist for the law firm. Rachel couldn’t remember her name, she had since forgotten. Instead, Rachel often referred to her as the Blonde Bimbo, or B.B. for short. Rachel remembered exactly what B.B. looked like. The image was permanently seared into Rachel’s mind. B.B. was a tall, leggy, blonde that might as well had ‘home wrecker’ written across her forehead. Oh, how Rachel had envied her looks. She scowled at the thought.

It wasn’t the mere fact of how B.B. was utterly gorgeous, but it was the look that she gave Rachel’s husband. The tramp’s eyes radiated desire that was easy to ready if you happened to be looking at her during that exact moment.

Rachel tried to clear her mind of those thoughts. They only made her more frustrated than she already was. She reached for a lighter so she could light her cigarette, but in her haste and fury, she couldn’t even produce a spark. Rachel cursed in frustration, as she hurled the lighter across the room.

Rachel watch as the lighter flew across the room, colliding into a picture that was lying on a desk. Glass shattered in all directions as the frame hit the ground. Rachel’s eyes widened, as she realized she had almost hit on of her most valued possessions. It was the music box that Aaron had given her on their first anniversary. When she felt that she was still in love with them. Now she felt that their love was a black hole, forced and inescapable.

Rachel go out of the comfortable sofa, going to clean up the mess she had made. As she picked up the now broken picture frame, she stared at the people in it. Within seconds, Rachel collapse to the ground in tears. In the picture were two people she had rarely ever saw smiling. It was her mother and father, on their wedding day. Rachel sat cross legged on the floor, tears streaming down her face as she was reminded of her past. It was one of those things she had always wanted to forget.

Rachel’s past was full of many things. Happiness was never one of them. During her childhood, her parents were drunk half the time, and the other half the time they were gambling so they could get more money, to buy more liquor. When Rachel’s parents were actually sober enough to make coherent sentences, they constantly ridiculed her. They told her that she could never find a decent manta ht would marry her. Rachel’s parents told her that she would never become anyone in life, or make any money. They told her how ridiculous her dream of becoming a pharmacist was. That’s what Rachel’s only goal was. To succeed at something, and escape the way of life that she had been living.

Rachel dumped the remains of the picture frame into the trashcan, along with the memory of her parents. She never wanted to think of the again. Her parents were wrong. She did succeed. Rachel now owned and ran her own pharmacy, one of the best ones in Chicago.

As Rachel swept up the last remains of the glass shards from the frame, she heard the phone ring from across the room. The dust pan and glass shards were dropped immediately to the floor as Rachel rushed across the room to check the caller I.D. It was, in fact, the person she had been waiting for.

“Well, hello honey,” Rachel said in a sickly sweet voice. “Who have you been shacking up with this afternoon?” If Rachel could’ve seen Aaron right then, she would have been beating every inch of him she could reach.

“Rachel,” Aaron started, “what is it with you always being so paranoid? Is it so hard to believe-”

“That you’ve been in the office this whole time?” Rachel interrupted, scoffing. “Yeah, sure, a likely story. You may have been in your office, but I highly doubt-”

“Rachel,” Aaron said as he sighed. “You really need to gain some trust, or this marriage will never work out.”

“You’re telling me to help this marriage work out!?” Rachel practically screamed into the receiver. She was crying now. “You are such a hypocrite!!!”

“Rachel, I’ve never cheated on you.” Aaron sounded like he was breaking down on the other end. “I love you, I’ve always lo-” Then it sounded like the line went dead. ‘How dare he hang up on me!!!’ Rachel thought to herself. ‘The nerve!’ It was one thing to be a lying hypocrite, but just to hang up on her was completely rude. Rachel stood in shock for about 15 minutes straight, staring at the phone in her hand, wondering whether it would be a bad idea to smash it on the ground. Aaron was dead in her book. Dead. Then the phone rang again. Rachel looked at the caller I.D. to see that once again it was Aaron’s number.

“You have a lot of nerve, calling back again,” Rachel hissed into the phone.

“Um, hello, ma’am,” Rachel heard a woman on the other side say. “ I am at Highview Hospital , and I am calling the home number on this cell phone, because I knew it would be the easiest way to get a hold of any relati-”

“Hospital? What do you mean? What’s wrong, what happened?” Rachel said frantically into the phone.

“Well first I need to know yours status for knowing Aaron Brown,” said the woman on the other side.

“I’m his wife” Rachel said quickly.

“Well,” said the woman on the other end, “It seems that he was in a car crash. Witnesses say he was distracted while talking on his cell phone. As of the moment, he’s in critical condition. You know, they should outlaw cell phones on the road,” the woman continued to ramble on. But Rachel had already dropped the phone. The last thing she heard was ‘critical condition’. She hurried as she grabbed her coat and keys near the front door.

Rachel jumped into the S.U.V. and drove as fast as humanly possible to Highview. Aaron could not die. This couldn’t be happening, not now. Rachel spun her way into the parking log, almost creaming an old lady in a wheelchair that was exiting the hospital. Once she got parked, Rachel got out of her S.U.V. and ran as fast as she could through the doors of the hospital and straight to the reception desk.

“Hello, I’m Rachel Brown, I’m here to see my husband, Aaron brown. I understand he was just in a car wreck and is now in critical condition.” Rachel said to the brunette teenage receptionist, speaking a mile a minute. The receptionist looked up at Rachel before she slowly began to search through the files.

“A little bit of speed would be nice!” Rachel barked at the receptionist. The receptionist’s eyes widened to the size of saucers as she began tearing through the files in panic. The receptionist began to panic more and more as she couldn’t find the file that she was looking for. ‘Incompetent workers’ Rachel thought to herself. As Rachel was about to blow up on whoever the ditz was, a doctor walked into the room

“Did you say you were looking for an Aaron Brown?” The Doctor asked calmly. He spoke very slowly, as if he were trying to teach a small child addition. Rachel nodded.

I’m his wife” she said weakly, dreading the news that was to come afterwards. The Doctor looked down at his shoes and sighed.

“I’m very sorry to tell you this, but your husband died of severe blood loss shortly before you got here,” the doctor said. “I’m very sorry for your loss.” The doctor walked away, back into the emergency room.

Rachel broke on the spot. The world seemed to be on pause. As soon as she had heard the doctor’s words, it seemed that she watched herself walk back to her vehicle and drive back to the apartment. As soon as Rachel stepped into the apartment, she knocked over the lamp that was right beside the door. Then she broke a vase. After that she broke some dishes. She continued to smash every single fragile object in the house until there was nothing left but the music box sitting on the desk. Rachel then strode across the room, picked up the box, and let it fall to the floor. Her house was now just like her life. Broke into pieces that could never be mended.

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