Chapter 3
“Hello Annie? Hello, hello, are you here?” Marti cracked the door open a little further. It had been a while since she had been at Annie’s Ranch.
Definitely hadn’t been there after the remodel. “Annabelle Gibbons? Hello? Hello? Anybody here? Tommy?”
Annie came running down the stairs. “Oh My God!! Marti! You’re here, look at you! What are you doing here? Is your hubby with you?” She ran up and gave her a great big hug. Smiling, she took a step back. “Oh my goodness, girlfriend…look at you. You’re all dolled up like some high falutin’ socialite from the city. Dang! Being married to a gazillionaire sure looks good on you.”
Marti smiled and gave her friend another big hug, not wanting to let go. “Oh Honey, it’s so good to be home! I missed you,” It felt good to be back with her best friend. “God, I missed you!” At that moment, she started bawling. She was cold, wet, tired and hungry.
“Oh, honey, come here girl, what’s going on?” She hugged her again. Marti could feel the warmth of her embrace, a friends’ much needed touch. She needed more than anything to just know someone cared. Annie was that someone and she was good at it.
Marti took a deep breath, her words coming in spurts. “I left him....I can’t...I can’t stand me anymore. So I left...in the middle...middle of the night.” She sobbed, the tears flowing down her face. “I didn’t know where to go...so I came here.” She sniffled. “Is Tommy here?”
“What happened, Honey? Are you okay? Are you still married? Is that guy nice to you? Did he hurt you?” The questions came fast and furious. Annie was about to go ballistic if he had hurt her friend.
Marti cried, waving her hand in the air, “Oh Annie, no, he didn’t hurt me, he’s actually pretty wonderful, but I’m so fuckin’ stupid. I don’t know how to be some rich bitch who eats with the right fork and - and there are maids and butlers and people who wash my clothes. I even have a gal who buys my fucking clothes…” she shrieked, covering her face in her hands, the sobs shaking her whole body.
After a moment, the tears subsided and she reached for a tissue to blow her nose. Taking a deep breath, she looked up at her and stroked her long dark hair. Sniffling, she spoke. “Annie, I just wanna be normal, I don’t wanna be a diva. That’s not me. ”
Annie rubbed her back, trying to calm her. “Oh honey, come here.” She pulled her in close for another hug. “Tommy’s gone until tomorrow, he’s out fishing with his buddies. You want a drink or something?”
She sniffled, “Yeah, you got some whiskey...wine? Anything?”
“Sure hon, here.” She handed her more tissues. Annie got up and went to the liquor cabinet. It was a bit too early for drinking but with a friend in need…she poured two short glasses of Jack and went back to the couch. “Here. This’ll calm you down. Now tell me all about it.”
Marti took a swig of the hard liquor and felt the familiar burn, she shuddered and took another one. “I don’t even know where to start. When I left here, I went to Savannah. I was gonna grab a bus to L.A. then met this guy at the café by the bus station, but you already know all of that. Blah, blah, blah, we got married by accident ‘cause we were too freakin’ drunk to know what the fuck we were doing and then this fuckin huge scandal pops up ‘cause I guess he had a fiancé like twenty some years ago.”
She paused, took another drink, and shuddered. “His fiancé got in a really bad car wreck a couple of weeks before their wedding and she died. He kinda freaked out about it and went into hiding ‘cause his heart was broken.”
She finished the whiskey and stood up and walked across the room to pour another one. She turned to Annie, “Anyway, I guess I got caught up in the middle of that, but get this….he has an assistant, or so he calls her his assistant and I just think they are fuck buddies. But - ”
Annie sat there for a sec, frozen, then shook her head, “Woah, hold on a sec…fuck buddies? He has someone living over there with y’all? Are you sure, did you see them?”
“No, I’ve never seen them and he denies it,” she said, swallowing the whiskey and then filled her glass again. She walked back to Annie, “But I see the ways that bitch looks at him. Makes me wonder what she’s up to and they have an awful lot of,” she gestures her ‘quote’ fingers, “‘meetings’ in her office. I mean, she works at our house. Who the fuck works at their bosses’ house?
Sounds like a good old fashioned fuck buddy to me. Work, my ass. I’ll show that little bitch some work. Right about the time I take her out back and give her a little history lesson.”
Annie smiled, “Oh my God, Marti! Do you hear yourself? You’ve obviously lost your mind, talking about whoopin’ someone’s ass like a hood rat.”
The tears started to well up in her eyes again. “I’m not a ho - hood rat, but she’s some fancy schmancy Stanford bitch and she just makes me feel so stupid and he - he doesn’t do anything about it.” She grabbed another tissue and blew her nose again.
“Annie, what am I gonna do? My life is so fucked up. Y’all are so happy and I just fuck things up more and more as time goes by.” Sniffle.
“Honey, you’re home now. Go take a hot shower, put your feet up and we’ll figure something out. I’ll make us something to eat real quick. You hungry?”
Nodding her head yes, sniffling, “And you know what’s really fuckin’ ironic? He owns the fucking cab company that picked me up from the house and I didn’t even know it! Talk about stupid!”
“Oh honey…you’re not stupid, you just didn’t know. Doesn’t he tell you things like that?”
She looked down into her glass. “Yeah, he tells me things. Things like ‘suck this’ and ‘si, Princesa, that feels good’ but it’s all in Spanish. I feel like I don’t know anything about this guy and then I get a wild hair up my ass and fuckin’ marry him! I’ll probably be all over the fuckin’ news again. ‘Gold Digger Takes the Money and Runs!’ God. And to think I wanted to be paparazzi. I fuckin’ hate ‘em!”
“Well, honey bun, we’ll get this all squared away.” She leaned in and hugged her, rubbing her back. “Don’t worry about anything, now go on upstairs and get cleaned up. I’ll fix us something to eat.”
Marti grabbed her tote and walked across the room, starting up the stars. “Annie?”
“Yeah?”
“Thanks, you know I love you,” she sniffed. “And the house looks real nice.”
“Thanks, hon, I love you too, and don’t worry, we’ll get it all figured out.”