With masterful and villainous pretence, Mona had succeeded in turning the tides. She had made me what she painted me out to be. A rude spoilt jealous housewife.
"We all know Mona is just a secretary but she wasn't as privileged as us so you need to stop making her feel bad about it," Denise, who was the mistress of looking down on less fortunate people, chastised.
"Did you do all these because you were jealous Mona is such a good friend to James? James is already your husband, what else do you want?"
"Buying fake Sapphires just to embarrass James. If you wanted them so bad, all you had to do was ask. Ugh."
"If you are capable of doing this that means it's true then that you are stopping James from inheriting the family business from his father."
"That means it's also true that you never wanted to come to the reunion. You only came because James asked Mona after you turned him down."
The wrongful slander overwhelmed me so much that I felt the back of my eyes burn with unshed tears. Added to the fact that I was now drenched in red wine courtesy of Mona. The reunion was a massive failure. I should not have come.
"This was a mistake," I announced. "I'm leaving."
"It's for the best," Sandra said coldly. "I think it's also for the best that you never attend any other reunion."
"You know, for the top student in our set, I actually used to think you'd make something of yourself but you left even your career behind," Clara said haughtily.
"You haven't heard yet Clara? About the concert she means to host?" Asked James softly but I understood the shaded cruel look in his eyes. If he somehow go his hands on me after this, I would be kissing my concert goodbye.
"Of course I heard about it. Ronica, you can't possibly pull that off. You've been out of the game for eight years." Clara cackled at my expense.
"She fancies herself a naturale. Except nobody is a naturale when it comes to music," Sandra's husband mused.
"You haven't realized it yet, have you?" Mona asked me with a smirk, a glint of evil mischief in her eyes. "The people who attend your concert aren't coming to see you play. They are coming to see you fail. I even got a ticket for myself."
"Oh goody, we must get tickets for ourselves as well," Clara moaned with glee.
"Then by all means, you are all invited to my concert," I said with stiff resolve.
"Oh, I don't know Ronica. I really shouldn't let you do it. What kind of image would it cast on me?" James spoke up.
"Maybe the image of a supporting husband. But of course, you are selfish and only think about yourself."
"Look around and see what everybody else thinks," hissed Mona. "You're the one making us buy tickets for a concert that's bound to fail. The only selfish person in this hall today is you, and you are an embarrassment to our class."
"Says the one who's just a secretary and couldn't find any other plus one to bring but my husband."
"It's not my fault he didn't want to go with you given what a bad and boring company you are. Anyway, I don't care much for your jealousy. Give me the Sapphires already."
"Why? So you can swap them with your fake ones? I'd sooner throw them in the trash."
Mona's eyes darkened sinisterly. "Are you making me ask twice? Jimmy, make her give them to me. I can't have her flaunting them so everyone would think I'm wearing a fake. She has to give them to me so I would appropriately dispose off them."
"She has a point." Our classmates implored.
"Just take them off already. You are embarrassing all of us by still wearing them," Clara complained sassily.
"Ronica, so that peace might reign, I will reimburse your friend despite his flimsy effort to undermine my providence as your husband. A few hundred thousand dollars should do it. Now take the damned jewelry off already."
I looked at James now. The full head of dark hair that I once used to run my hands through with affection. The green eyes like swirls of cornfields that I could get lost in. The empirical point of his nose. His lips. His tallness and pearl bronzed skin. To think there was a time when he really used to be mine. Or was that all a lie too?
He hadn't changed. Instead, he had always been this way. I had been the one who willed myself to be stubbornly blind to his most apparent flaws. But now as I stared at him. All that masculine beauty wasted on a cruel man like him, I realized I could not let him be my downfall. All those times when he had treated me with the barest minimum. Choosing his mistresses over me. Financially abusing me. Stealing everything that was mine and giving them to Mona. James thought he owned me. It was high time I took a stand against him even as he glowered, daring me to go against his wishes. Warning me with serpentine eyes.
"No," I drawled out slowly. My voice did not come out as a strangled gasp or a whisper. My no was firm and loud and entirely defiant. The whole hall went silent you could hear a pin drop. The atmosphere was raw with tension. Were all my former classmates and their dates going to bear witness to an unexpected lovers' spat? A vein popped in James' neck as his hands balled into fists. The destructive anger was tearing through him because I had disrespected him in public. I could see the repercussions in my mind's eye. He would slap me down right now and rip the earrings right off my earlobes and yank the necklace off my neck and leave me bleeding if that was what it took. He would forget about the public. Everyone would finally see that I had brought in a monster.
"What did you say? Repeat it if you dare." He growled as he sizzled with fury. I nearly took a step back, daunted as I was, but I restrained myself. This may be my only chance to expose the violent part of him to the public. I opened my mouth.
"You better think twice before you answer so we won't all suspect that you have no brain in that skull of yours," Mona goaded, feigning a yawn, happy with my apparent fall out of favour. I could not lie to myself that I wasn't frightened. Should I just give in and fight another day?
A deviant one sided smirk flashed across James' features as he took my hesitation for victory. He stretched a demanding palm towards me. "Now, give."
"She said No!" A new but familiar voice boomed through the hall as the doors pulled open to let in a new contender. My latest and most fervent defender, exhuming a powerful aura in a tuxedo to die for, silver eyes hardening. Eric Strauss strode into the hall with refined purpose.
"And just who do you think you are to barge in like you own the place?" Mona snapped.
He lifted an amused eyebrow. "As a matter of fact, I do own the place."