When I Ran Away, Ilona Bannister [read 50 shades of grey TXT] 📗

man falls asleep, holding his grandson’s foot in his wrinkled hand.

3 coffee, lipstick A Wednesday in August 2016, 10 a.m. London, Grand Euro Star Lodge Hotel, Room 506

When the receptionist said “half bathtub” I thought she meant a half-bath, like a bathroom with no shower, and that was weird for a hotel but, I figured, this place was more like some Euro hostel thing with a shared one in the hall or something. I didn’t mind. Showering wasn’t my priority. But when I open the door to the bathroom there it is, an actual half of a bathtub shoved into the corner. In case you want to relax while kneeling in water or just stand and soak your calves for a while. Europe is so weird sometimes.

A text from Harry dings in:

Gigi where are you? What are you doing? I’m worried. I’ve taken Johnny to camp but I don’t know what to do with Rocky. Where are you? Please call me

What should I say? OK, so he’s pissed, that’s fair. But I don’t like his tone.

Me:

I need to take a shit and then there’s a Real Housewives marathon. Then I’ll come home

Harry:

This isn’t funny. What do I do with Rocky? Who do I call? What are you doing!

An exclamation point. An actual exclamation point. He should know better than to exclamation-point at me.

Me:

Take Rocky to work with you. He’s been following the markets so he’ll be good in a meeting

Harry:

Please just tell me where you are. I don’t understand what’s happening

Me:

I’m fine. I’ll let you know when I get there

I set the phone to vibrate and block Harry’s number. It’s easier than telling him the truth.

For a second I push my thumb down to shut it off but that would be a mistake. Johnny’s at a soccer day camp at his school. I’ve managed to cover well enough in front of every authority figure—the midwives, the GP—but if the school catches on to how fucked-up I am then we’ll have a problem. If school calls then I need to answer. They never call the dads. Even when the moms work full-time. Even when they make more money than their husbands.

Two weeks ago Johnny was doing Forest Explorers camp. He fell out of a tree and his head ricocheted off the trunk of the tree next to it. I had to take a taxi to Wimbledon Common and run into the woods with the baby to find them because they didn’t want to move Johnny until I got there. So I’m sweating, panting, dragging the baby in the car seat through the bushes—and there he is, his whole forehead a purple bruise. He’s holding out his Yankees cap to me full of berries. “Look, Jeej, it’s all blackberries. I picked them.” We spend the next four hours in the emergency room, Rocky crying, Johnny hungry and hurting but holding that hat like it was filled with gold, the three of us covered in blackberry juice by the time we saw the doctor.

So, anyway, if the school calls I need to answer it.

I look at my watch. Rocky’s naptime. I’m sure he’s not asleep. I’m sure he’s screaming with tiredness because Harry’s misread his signs or forgot the sleeping bag he likes or couldn’t find his lamb. His face is red, his diaper needs changing, his onesie is soaked with saliva and tears and urine and I’m waiting for a feeling but I don’t have any. Someone else’s turn to have feelings today.

I flick on the TV. The Real Housewives of New Jersey marathon is on. I exhale, relieved, happy to see the ladies totter across the screen. And here are the enormous houses like you can get only in America; the massive cars; the walk-in closets; the constant bickering; the betrayal; the big hair; the alcohol; the spoiled children; the wealthy husbands; the stream of high-pitched, nonsensical, impassioned chatter that is about nothing and everything all at once—I wrap it around me like a blanket.

I love the vacant beauty of the Housewives of Beverly Hills: their plastic faces and Birkin bags, their house swans and private jets. I love the hilarious, vivacious Housewives of Atlanta: unapologetically fierce, fabulous, defined. I love the Housewives of New York City: their aging glamour and cabaret dreams, wearing diamonds to drink champagne alone with their tiny dogs. If I could trade lives with any one of these women for a day, I would do it in a heartbeat.

But the Housewives of New Jersey are not aspirational like the others. No one ever wakes up and says, “I hope one day that I’ll make it in New Jersey.” That’s no one’s life goal. I only say that, though, because I’m from Staten Island, just across the water, and Jersey, like Brooklyn and Long Island, is a cousin, just your least favorite one. The one you end up moving to anyway because it’s actually really nice there and they have great schools and you can get a house with a driveway. But still, it’s fucking Jersey.

Teresa appears on the screen, her black hair cascading in glossy extensions over the dark-blue dyed fur of her collar. Her eyeshadow matches the hue of her coat. She’s at a liquor store signing bottles of Fabellini, her own line of flavored sparkling wine. She’s gracious with her fans who ask her about Melissa, her sister-in-law, and who are concerned for her because they know about the federal fraud charges she and her husband, Joe, are facing. Oh my God, Victoria Gotti just walked into the store, all fur and black leather and ice-blond hair to her waist. “Excuse me, Miss, do I have to wait on line, with all these people?” she rasps, one finger waving in the air, dismissing the mere mortals around her, sending chills down my spine.

I wish I could say I was classy and sophisticated, a housewife of Beverly Hills in the making, but these Jersey girls are really my people—dropping f-bombs every