I head up to Sylvia’s apartment, quite eager to talk to her about what I have discovered. I don’t bother calling her because I’m fairly certain she’s home. When I knock on her apartment door and no one answers, I grab the key off of the top of the door hinge where I’ve seen her grab one before. I’ve told her she doesn’t need to keep a key there before because someone could break in, but right now I’m glad she does. I figure that I will just wait until she gets home because I know she’s not working today, so she will be here eventually.

After letting myself in, I head to the bathroom. Mother fucker… pink and silver everywhere! It’s like Éclair’s is her evil twin sometimes, I swear. Her bathroom is done up in the familiar pink and silver décor. I remind myself that Sylvia once modelled for Éclair’s company, so she probably got the design idea from being at the woman’s office headquarters a few times. Something about it irks me, so I leave the bathroom, unable to actually use it. It reminds me too much of Éclair. On the counter I spot some contact solution, and I start prying. I locate her contacts in the top drawer to the right of her sink, and I smile at the discovery. Colored contacts –I fucking knew it! She totally wears colored contacts! Those blue eyes were just too perfect. I have always said that she was just too perfect –her body had to have some sort of secret flaw I just had not found yet, so I’m now picturing Sylvia with two different colored eyes that she hides under colored contacts. Well, this is sort of fun –snooping around to learn more about my girlfriend… girlfriend, wow. Never thought I would say that word.

I’ve actually never been in Sylvia’s apartment before with the exception of a few quick drop in’s to pick her up kind of thing, so after waiting around for several minutes I start to get nosey. An idea strikes me to sneak into Sylvia’s bedroom and surprise her. I grin thinking about her coming home to me spread out on her bed. Geeze, I swear, sex is never too far from the forefront of my mind no matter what sort of emotional trauma I’m having.

I slip into her back bedroom. It’s a cozy little room –nothing too special. She has a few small weights scattered about and her laptop is sitting open up on her bed. I can’t believe we haven’t had sex back here yet. I smile and slip out of shoes and start to undo my tie. I go to jump on her bed like a dumbass and stub my toe on something. “Fuck!” I shout. That’s what I get for trying to act like a tool. I look down and see a small wooden box poking out from under her bed.

I tell myself not to snoop –that I shouldn’t go digging around through her things without her consent –but I am unable to resist the temptation. I pick up the little jewelry box, thinking that it is a weird place to put a jewelry box, and I open it up. Cute. There’s a bunch of childish things inside –old friendship bracelets, grade school drawings, and a small stack of pictures of a little blonde girl with missing teeth –a little Sylvia, cute! I smile, blushing slightly to see a picture of my girl from her childhood years. We would make cute kids… whoa, easy, big guy.

I shake the thought away and then I come across a picture of two little blonde girls with their arms over each other’s shoulders, smiling big at the camera. Both young girls’ have their eyes opened wide –their big, purple eyes. My heart jumps up into my throat. One is obviously a twelve-year-old Sylvia. The other one, and it’s quite undeniable, is a younger Éclair.

What the hell am I looking at? I rub my eyes and then stare at the picture again… colored contacts… Sylvia wears colored contacts….

My throat suddenly becomes dry. Something just tells me to look at her laptop. I click the mousepad, and I see her email is opened….

What. The. Fuck.

In a panic, I scramble to put the pictures back into the box and push it up underneath the bed. I frantically search for my shoes and my tie that I had thrown off, not bothering to actually put the tie back on before darting out of her bedroom. I don’t know how I missed it on my way in, but I spot her treadmill in the den area. As Sylvia had told me a thousand times before, the poster advertising my company Shattered INC. is in front of the treadmill. She had always told me that the poster was there for inspirational purposes during her workout, but there are fucking darts piercing the photograph of my chest. Holy shit! I feel like I’ve stepped into a damned war zone.

Sylvia? Sylvia is Suzette? That’s what my head is telling me at least. I got to get out of here. I dart out the door, not even thinking to lock it behind me, and I get out of her apartment building as fast as I can. I jump into my car and speed back to my penthouse to give myself a moment to process what has just happened.

I enter into my home and just take a few calming breaths. What is happening? I’m not even 100% sure, but I feel like half of the reason why I haven’t pieced it together entirely is because I’m in complete denial that Sylvia would ever do anything to hurt me. I have to call the police. I get out my cell phone to call Kathy, the police chief. The phone rings several times, but just as I hear the woman on the other line say, “Hello?” a blunt object makes contact with the back of my head.

“Sorry, wrong number,” I hear a familiar voice say into my phone and hang up.

I look up to see Sylvia staring down at me, a bloodied, wooden baseball bat rested on her shoulders as she tosses my cell phone to the side. The room is spinning. I can’t move. I just groan and stare up at Sylvia as she shakes her finger back and forth. “James, you really should ask someone before you go snooping through their belongings. And if you don’t want to get caught, next time, make sure you put all of the pictures back in the box. You left one on the floor.”

Shit. “Sylvia-” I start to speak.

“Goodnight,” she says and knocked me between the eyes with the handle of the bat, knocking me out cold.