nment car pulled up to the curb

k door

s Sab

it that I recognized from a recent runway show, a Birkin bag resting on her lap. H

ping with false sympathy. "I heard

woman my husband had installed in a luxury

her eyes scanning my simpl

ut you. He told me how y

her voice dropping to

e. You're just the wife. I

bled, crying out as if in pain and fal

a perfo

beside us. He leaped out, his face a stor

e you alrigh

me. The crowd of D.C. onlookers, the interns and aides and lobbyists, all stopped to wa

roared, his voice carr

," I said, my own v

her stomach. "She pushed me! She s

He unbuckled the thick leather

rn to respect

oss my back, the leather biting through th

moved. They saw a decorated Colonel disciplining his unh

anded, his voice

dn't

ead back, and forced me to my kn

e until you unders

na, who gave me one last, triumph

, some whispering, some looking away in shame. No one helped. I was the da

n. It burned away the last remnants of the woman I used to

eft was a cold