I know what you're thinking...but surprise surprise, I'm back! Just a random gift because I had some time. 

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“You look ing ridiculous.” Kai scowls at you over the rim of his bourbon glass. The firelight dances across his face, drawing patterns over his dark features. You look down at the red pantsuit you’re wearing. It was one of your favorites—something Kai certainly didn’t deserve to see you in—but you had wanted to wear it for yourself, to give yourself the confidence you needed for tonight’s charity gala. Kai sniffs and turns his back toward you. You watch as his shadow lifts the glass to his mouth, his Adam’s apple bobbing as he swallows the last of his drink. He sets the tumbler down, hard, on one of the side tables.

“Go put on a dress,” he snarls without looking at you.

Your mouth sets into a hard line and you cross your arms before you say, “no.”

You don’t even see it coming.

One moment Kai’s standing next to the fire, the next moment, a silver flash streaks through the air, and suddenly you’re flat on your back, the broken pieces of the tumbler scattered on the floor around your face.

“!” Kai’s bending over you now and you see the veins popping out on his forehead. They remind you of worms in the dirt. “!” he screams, his spit flying in flecks and landing on your skin.

You slowly crawl your fingers over your face and feel the rapidly forming bump on the side of your head. Thank goodness he threw the cup when you weren’t facing him head on. The bump is under your hair and you don’t even think you’re bleeding. Perhaps this was a good omen that things tonight weren’t totally ruined.

“Look at what you made me do!” he bellows at you. He kicks away the fragments of glass. You feel the wind as his shoe whistles past your face. “It’s all your ing fault! You made me lose control! And now we’re going to be late!”

Once upon a time, you might have felt scared. But you had two months to get used to this routine. He’d lose control over something small. You’d let him have his way with you. You always told yourself that next time, you wouldn’t talk back. But somehow that never worked. At least he got better at hitting you where no one else could see.

“Get the up! Go ing change you !” he shouts as he yanks you to your feet. You let him push you toward your dressing room. The room is spinning but gradually slows. Once you pass through your closet doors and close them behind you, his old housekeeper rushes to your side. She doesn’t say anything, and you don’t either. She helps you out of your suit and into a simple black dress.

“At least your hair was loose today,” the matron whispers as she readjusts the delicate waves she had spent hours perfecting.

“Yes, there’s that,” you reply.

She pats the final strand in place before stepping back and giving you a quick nod. You turn and find that your legs are quite steady. It’s amazing how much shock the body can learn to adapt to. You turn and sweep back out of the dressing room. On the way, you pass by the full-length mirror leaning against the wall.

Who’s that skeleton in the glass?

You yank your gaze away and march back out the doors. 

You look like you’re going to your own funeral.

--

An hour later, you’re clutching Kai’s arm and trying your hardest to laugh at a joke a balding man with a protruding paunch had fumbled through.

“And then do you want to know what I said, Mrs. Kim?” he leers at you, showing most of his rotting teeth.

“Yes, please, do go on, Mr. Kennedy!” you murmur demur