Too Late For Regret: My Dead Heart

The morning sun pushed through the heavy curtains. Aidan sat up slowly. He did not wake Cecile. An HR report on his phone had just confirmed a stinging truth: his "missing" wife had been hiding in his own design department for years. He buttoned his shirt, his face cold and focused. He walked out of the room. Hallie's transparent body followed him. The invisible chain pulled her along. Aidan got into his Maybach. The driver took him into Manhattan. The car stopped in front of the massive glass tower of the Monroe Group headquarters. Aidan walked into the lobby. A group of executives immediately surrounded him. He stepped into the private executive elevator. The doors closed. The elevator shot upward. Suddenly, the invisible chain around Hallie's neck snapped. As the elevator shot upward, the tension became unbearable, the distance stretching the link to its breaking point. A stronger pull emerged from below—a desperate, residual attachment to her own life's work, her sketchbook, which was still on the third floor. The new force yanked her down. She fell through the concrete floors. She landed hard on the third floor. The design department. It was a cramped, loud room filled with small desks. Hallie had spent three years working here under the name Valerie, hiding her identity from the staff. She looked at her old desk in the corner. Gladys Tierney, the head of cleaning, stood there. She was a large woman with a mean face. She held a black trash bag. Gladys used her thick arm to sweep Valerie's pens and reference books into the bag. They hit the plastic with a loud thud. A young intern stepped forward. She grabbed Gladys's sleeve. "Wait! Valerie's status was updated to sick leave. She might come back." Gladys laughed loudly. She yanked her arm away. "Come back? Upper management gave the order to clear her out. She pissed off the wrong person." Hallie floated near the desk. She knew exactly who gave that order. Aidan. Gladys pulled open the bottom drawer. She dumped everything onto the floor. A photograph fluttered down. It was Hallie's graduation picture from design school in Paris. Gladys stepped right on it. Her dirty shoe left a black mark on Hallie's smiling face. Hallie dropped to the floor. She tried to push the shoe away. Her hands passed through the leather. Gladys bent down. She reached into the back of the empty drawer. She pulled out a sealed white envelope. It was Hallie's final paycheck. She had worked eighty hours a week for that money. Gladys looked left and right. No one was watching. She quickly shoved the envelope deep into her apron pocket. "Consider this my cleaning fee," Gladys muttered to herself. Hallie watched, a cold numbness spreading through her. Of course. In the world of the Monroes, even the scraps left for her were destined to be stolen by vultures. It was just another layer of the filth she was determined to burn to the ground. But the bright morning sun shining through the windows drained her energy. She could not move physical objects in the light. Gladys grabbed the top of the black trash bag. She dragged it across the floor. The sharp corner of the metal desk caught the thin plastic. The bag ripped slightly. Inside the bag, a thick, black leather sketchbook shifted toward the hole. It held three years of Hallie's best haute couture designs. Gladys did not notice. She dragged the bag toward the service elevator. The young intern knelt down. She picked up the dirty photograph and hid it in her pocket. Hallie felt a tiny drop of warmth for the girl. But she had to follow her sketchbook. She floated behind Gladys down the long hallway.