Best Kept Secret

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Book: Best Kept Secret by Amy Hatvany Read Free Book Online
Authors: Amy Hatvany
Tags: Fiction, Literary, General, Family Life, Contemporary Women
that way. I was more just wondering out loud, you know? Philosophizing.”
    I took a deep breath, then released it, trying to erase the tensionthat had invaded each cell of my skin, pulling it tight across my flesh. “Why, exactly?”
    “Why what?”
    “Why are you philosophizing?”
    “I’m thinking about leaving Brad,” she said.
    “Oh.” I finished the last swallow in my glass, then set it next to Susanne’s on the table. “I thought I picked up on some tension the last time you talked about him.” I chose my words carefully here, knowing full well how dangerous the territory can become around saying anything negative about a friend’s spouse. They end up staying together, and you’re suddenly the bitch who talked shit about her husband.
    Susanne laughed, a harsh, dry sound. “ ‘Some tension’? We’re strung tighter than a goddamn violin.”
    “I’m sorry to hear that,” I said. “How’s Anya doing?”
    “She’s lovely. Daddy’s little girl. I think she loves him more than she loves me.”
    “Oh, I doubt that,” I said. “I don’t think kids make those kinds of distinctions. He just spends more time with her. That’s all.”
    “Ever since I went back to work, she doesn’t want me to help give her a bath. She doesn’t want me to read with her or cook her breakfast, or any of it. She doesn’t want
me
.” Her eyes welled with tears, but she tried to hide it by looking away and reaching for her empty glass.
    “I’m sure it’s just a phase,” I reassured her.
    “Yeah,” she said. “I hope so.” She sighed. “Can I have another drink?”
    “Of course,” I said. I stood up, but felt woozy and ended up falling backward onto the couch.
    “Uh-oh,” Susanne said, laughing. “Time for rehab, Lindsay Lohan.”
    I laughed, too, a short, staccato sound. “Yeah, I could use the vacation,” I said, then stumbled to the kitchen and grabbed us another bottle of wine.

Four
     
    S ome say there is a prescription written for a person in childhood determining whether or not they’ll develop a drinking problem. A family history of others who drink, a violent home environment, an angry father, or sexual abuse. One of these circumstances in your childhood? A good chance you’ll look to a substance as a way to numb it all out. Two circumstances or more? Pretty much guaranteed. I mean, really, who could blame you?
    Serena, a woman in my treatment group, was raped by two of her cousins when she was nine. Her parents didn’t believe her when she told them; in fact, they beat her for lying. Those cousins raped her over and over again until her thirteenth birthday, when she shot one of them with her father’s gun. He lived and the police ended up ruling the shooting an accident. She snuck a bottle of rum from her parents’ liquor cabinet and got drunk that night. She pretty much stayed that way for thirty years until she landed in treatment on a court-ordered deferral after her fourth DUI. Now here’s a woman who has a reason to drink. Here’s a woman who people feel sympathy for. She was abused, of course she needed to find a way to cope. I’m disgusted with myself, really, how my story lacks the frightening qualifications that the other women in my group seem to share.
    Looking back, I can’t find a reason for me to be in this nightmare. It doesn’t make any sense. This is not who I am. I made amistake. I overdid it just like I overdo everything else in my life. I’m not an alcoholic. Alcoholics live under bridges and swig from bottles tucked in brown paper bags. They beg for change on street corners and make offers to wash windshields while you’re stopped at a traffic light. That’s not me. That’s not my life. I graduated from college. I own a home. I shower on a regular basis. I still have all my teeth. I had a problem with drinking for a little while there, but it was just the wrong way to deal with the stress of being on my own with a toddler. I’ll do my time in the treatment

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