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Carol
A woman’s face is her work of fiction.
~Oscar Wilde
There is nothing sweeter than excitement properly staged: slow at first, then tightening, then impossible to contain. It started with La Jolla Cliffs’ ocean breeze, the kind of air that knew exactly who it was meant to touch. Cool, curated, ever-so-exclusive. I stepped onto the patio just as George Michael’s “Careless Whisper” slid around me.
Andrea was finally home. It had been three long months. I adjusted my gold bracelet, heavy for its size, the way only expensive guilt felt, and reminded myself what was at stake.
Something in me had shifted over the summer. Fine. I missed him. There. A truth offered briefly. Everyone should appreciate it before it expires. Good thing no one was there to hear it.
My summer had suffered without him. Music swelled, couples moved, girls laughed too loudly near men they wanted to impress, and I remained tragically grounded. Not because no one asked me to dance, but with Andrea I felt weightless.
More importantly, his family name opened every locked door in the room. Andrea’s name was a skeleton key. Mine only became one when attached to his. Without him, invitations had been sparse.
That was the part people liked to pretend didn’t matter. Position required strategy. Love, if we were being honest, required a good jeweler.
Naturally, he would make the summer’s inconvenience up to me. His family had raised him to know an apology required form. The champagne flute waiting on the balustrade was the beginning. I took a small sip, chilled, perfect, and apologetic. The rest would follow. Men like Andrea understood that champagne was only the opening gesture. The real apology came after the glass.
I had asked for nothing. Asking cheapened the mood. Some women begged for attention. I preferred to create an environment where generosity could discover itself.
Besides, he knew disappointment looked terrible on me. That alone gave him direction. Nothing that needed explaining.
I almost quickened my step because, yes, I needed him to look at me as if I was the most beautiful woman in the world. Not because it was true, though it was, but because he was mine. He would remember his place in the scene. Some men only needed to be shown the script once.
The real gift? A ring, the one that mattered. I could never be the one to suggest it. His parents were doing all the work. The promise ring they had insisted I wear was not the point. That ring was for them. My summer didn’t require one.
More annoyingly, his body chose the hospital before it chose me. I mean, who gets sick after a long flight? Apparently, Andrea’s body considered altitude a personal attack. Honestly? I wasn’t about to rearrange my entire week to sit in a hospital, no matter how upscale his room. Even sick boys needed to return to the story properly. Romantic dramas had rules. I didn’t do behind-the-scenes.
Then again, it took little for him to fall apart. The semester before Spain, he’d relapsed and gone back on medication. The side effects were corrosive and constant, but they only enhanced his ethereal look.
We had agreed to meet at his parents’ mansion, the type of house that made restraint look like bad breeding. The place had rooms no one needed and still made need look embarrassing. God had probably stopped counting. Even the grounds seemed designed to punish modesty.
And yet, he preferred his little bungalow in La Jolla Shores. I had to agree with his parents. He was being ridiculous. The estate was better because it understood what he kept pretending not to need. When we got married, we’d move back to the family home. It was what his parents wanted. Conveniently, what they wanted and what I wanted looked identical.
Andrea had once said he’d never move back home. Too bad. I’d already returned him to that bedroom and arranged the curtains around his surrender. His poor health gave me the perfect excuse to call control concern.
The loss of muscle, the fading tan, and the quiet drain of strength should’ve dulled his beauty. But somehow, it didn’t. Quite the opposite.
Illness had only revealed his luminous alabaster skin. He was my Botticelli angel, golden hair, high cheekbones, and those melancholic blue eyes. Delicate, divine, with beauty wearing him like a mask.
After a summer in Spain and a week in the hospital, he was finally standing beneath a gold-hushed sky of early evening, cloaked in an ivory tunic I decided was Middle Eastern. The fabric hung loose, catching the light as it painted him out of shadow.
When my presence touched him, he looked up. What the fuck? The scene I’d so carefully crafted stuttered. A half-second too long. This was not my Botticelli angel. This was some shorter-haired boy the sun had gotten to first.
I had to revise my script. Fast.
I ran to him, expecting him to sweep me up like the last shot of An Officer and a Gentleman. Grand. Cinematic. Andrea caught me, but he didn’t whirl me around. He had forgotten his part.
His face held the detached stillness of an old portrait. Lips parted in thought, eyes distant. No spin. No lift. Nothing moving the way it should.
Maybe he still wasn’t feeling well. He’d left the hospital only two days before. When I pressed my lips to his, he let me in but didn’t kiss me back. He shifted, pulling away just a little. Not tired. Distant. Like part of him hadn’t returned from Spain.
“Hi.” His voice was soft, hesitant. A beat too late, as if he’d had to find me first. Then he adjusted. “Carol.”
I decided it was tenderness and kissed him. He didn’t say I missed you. Not even the flicker of a smile. I leaned in a little more, feeding him the cue. But the soundtrack didn’t kick in. Just silence.
What the hell? I looked amazing. Hair blown out to perfection. The dress? Cinched at the waist, breasts framed, not flaunted. But maybe effortless wasn’t what he needed today. “I missed you so much.”
“I have presents for you.” Not like him to jump right into the gifts. He was skipping steps, and Andrea never skipped steps.
He built moments like rooms and waited for me to step inside. He knew how to make a reveal feel earned.
He set me down gently, eyes averted, as if I had entered a scene already moving without me.
“I couldn’t wait to see you.” Hospitals always had the wrong lighting. So not enough to make me overlook the setting. He couldn’t possibly be upset about that. I mean, what could I do? Sit there while illness ruined the shape of him.
Now I was being punished for making the wrong choice. Not every man offered what Andrea had. He was leverage. Access. An investment in my future. I still had time to rewrite the scene.
“Not yet.” I pulled him toward the pool house. His mother had made it clear: his bedroom was off-limits. But we had managed just fine in the pool house before. “I’ve missed you too much to wait.”
His hand didn’t move. And for a second, neither did he. The scene had slipped. That’s when the star enters. Takes control.
I caught my reflection in the window. Natural cinnamon-blonde hair, curled into cascades. Emerald eyes, lined just enough to dazzle. Skin porcelain, glowing, unblemished. That used to be enough to bring him to his knees. Now he looked puzzled.
His fingers moved over me by habit, not hunger, as if he were replaying a scene he didn’t want to relive. I pressed my mouth to his neck, but he didn’t lean in. When he finally closed his eyes, he kept them shut longer than the moment needed. Like he was putting something away before he could look at me again. I took it as surrender.
Sex with Andrea was easy because it never felt like dominance. He had always been generous. Eager to please. He used to go down on me and take his time. Enjoyed the feel, the taste, as if his wanting only became useful once it served me. But his mouth was the only one ever fed. Like a gentleman, he never asked for mine in return. He also waited, patiently, for me to allow his body inside mine. And I felt safe. Adored. Powerful.
This time he didn’t give me that wicked little smile that told me just how much he wanted me. I pretended not to notice and smiled for us both. A missed beat, nothing more.
I could fix that. Silence only stayed silent when no one knew where to press.
Author’s note
Mean girls have excellent public relations.
Experts and storytellers often describe them as wounded people whose insecurity curdled into cruelty. Faced with the right consequences, they will supposedly become decent. This explanation comforts everyone except the people they hurt. It converts cruelty into a symptom, then leaves someone else holding the bill.
I wanted to write one of those women without softening her for public consumption. Carol has almost nothing in common with me, yet her nerve impresses me. She works hard to secure her position, reads social power quickly, and refuses to beg for access.
What she does with those qualities is another matter.
Carol uses cruelty when it serves her. At other times, another person’s pain barely registers. She also hurts people simply because she can, which may be the most honest reason of all. Her beauty buys patience, while charm postpones judgment.
She rarely needs to threaten anyone directly. People tolerate her behavior because exclusion from her orbit feels worse than watching her wound someone else. Fear handles most of the labor. Let’s be honest: people prefer comfortable cowardice.
We are also told that consequences will humble her and love will uncover the frightened child beneath the expensive confidence. Then one sincere apology will supposedly place the universe back in order.
That fantasy belongs to the people still trying to cover for her.
The reality for some mean girls is that healing holds no appeal. A few understand themselves quite well. They may resent consequences without regretting the choices that caused them. Forgiveness offers little value to someone who has never granted the injured person moral authority.
Self-knowledge does not guarantee compassion. Sometimes it gives cruelty better aim. A character can recognize the exit and keep driving. Not every story is about change.
Oscar Wilde wrote, “Every saint has a past, and every sinner has a future.” Carol has a future, and she intends to shape it herself. She may live rent-free in the minds of people she touches. They will replay what she said, what she took, and the moment they realized she understood the damage perfectly.
By then, she will already have moved on.
Be honest: did Carol win you over, or did she make you want to hide the good silver?
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Copyright © 2026 Angelica Thorne
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