Zombie Pink (16 page)

This, of course, was total B.S. since Daniella only went to Point Pleasant with her parents, and Point Pleasant was about as tame as you could get.
She never even went to Seaside Heights as a teenager.

Besides, Tommy was a skinny geek
who looked like he wasn’t a day over twenty one. But if Byron wanted to act all jealous, Daniella couldn't do anything about that
...except be secretly pleased. Especially since she'd gotten an eyeful of one particular girl who worked the front desk of the golf club house where Byron scooted off to all the damn time.

On a whim, Daniella had accompanied Byron to the golf course that evening
. Brooklyn was at Byron’s sister’s
house to visit her cousins
, and Daniella was feeling at loose ends.
Daniella's husband didn't seem all that pleased about this wife accompanying him
. He reminded
Daniella how she always complained about the mosquitos on the golf course, which backed up to a swamp.

“It’s okay,” Daniella said, wishing her husband could act a little happier about them spending some time together. “Maybe I could try playing.”

“No, no, no, babe,” Byron quickly replied. “You need to practice your swing first.
I can help you.
You should practice in the back yard. You start without a ball
to get the feel of the club
. After that, you can
graduate to those plastic practice balls. I have
a whole bunch
.
Also, you should start watching School of Golf on The Golf Channel.”

“I’ve seen Caddy Shack,” Daniella reminded him, attempting to make a joke.

“Oh...ha-ha!” Bryon smirked. “There isn’t a damn thing you can learn from
Caddy Shack
except that Rodney Dangerfield doesn’t belong anywhere near a golf course. No, what you need to do is watch some
PGA videos online."

Daniella knew what sort of golf videos Byron
watched online. Goficity's 10 Hottest Women in Golf. She'd seen the site left open on her husband's computer on
e time when he left to answer the phone.

"But you have to make sure the person knows what he – or she – is doing," Byron continued on in his overly preppy, know-it-all tone. "
If you learn from a bad golfer, you’ll pick up bad habits. After that, you go to a driving range... maybe a pitch n’ putt. There are a lot of steps you have to take before you just waltz
out onto the golf course.”

“If I go with you, I can watch you play!” Daniella pointed out. “You’re an expert, right?”

Byron, always a sucker for flattery, could not argue that point
. So Daniella
accompanied her husband to the golf course. When t
hey walked into the bar area, a young girl in a skin-tight lemon yellow polo shirt unbuttoned down to
there
, greeted Byron profusely.

"Oh, hi Mr. Blackwell! How are you? Ready for another round of golf?" she
gushed, completely ignoring Daniella.

It wasn't so much the girl's looks...she was actually a little buck-toothed and trashy looking in Daniella's opinion, her oversized boobs literally oozing out of her unbuttoned
top.

Daniella had no idea a sporty polo shirt could look so slutty.

What really bugged Daniella, was the way the girl batted her eyes at Byron with this dreamy over-the-moon expression stuck on her stupid face
. It was just
so infuriating!
She reminded Daniella of a student mooning over her
much older English teacher in middle school.

What also really cooked Daniella's goose was the irritating way the girl responded to Byron's mega-watt charm, knowing full well that he had a wife - and that wife happened to be standing right beside him!

Unfortunately, Daniella witnessed her handsome charming husband have this effect on women all the time
, from cashiers to waitresses to their damn real estate agent. They all acted like her husband was "fair game" for flirtation, despite the fact they knew he was married.
Naturally, it didn't help that Byron flirted right back.

Of course he always denied flirting, claiming that he couldn't help it if women found him charming. But Daniella wasn't dumb. She could tell her husband got off on the whole “ladies' man” game.

Sometimes, Daniella
wished she was married to someone a little less attractive. A little more paunchy. Not so charming. Definitely not so tall. Maybe a short balding guy with a good bank account. That wouldn't be the worst thing.

Never trust a handsome charming husband.
I
f only she had been privy to that little kernel of wisdom back in her "man-hunting" days....would she have believed it though?

"
Honey! Did you hear me
?" her handsome charming husband was asking.

Now Byron was starting to sound annoyed.

"Oh! I'
m sorry!" Daniella said. S
he made a big show out of rubbing her temples. "Just that darn migraine."

"Well take some pills and come back to the world, sweetie!" Byron exclaimed, his default "charm setting" firmly back in place
. "We miss you!"

"Sorry..." Daniella said again. "I took pills already, but they don't seem to be working..."

Byron didn't say anything back
.
The man hated anything to do with sickness.

Daniella swatted
another mosquito. This time she nabbed it, which seemed like a hollow victory
, considering she smeared blood all over her leg.

Whose blood was it, after all? Somebody with Tuberculosis? HIV? Ebola
?
Hepatitis C...was that the one with no cure
?

Daniella shook her head.

Stop being so paranoid! she scolded herself.

Daniella wiped the blood onto the bottom of the brand new deck chair.

Byron blew some bubbles for Brooklyn and the toddler laughed delightedly. Their cat, Tippy, watched jealously from the other side of the sliding glass doors. The rosy suburban scene made Daniella feel even worse.

She would ruin this perfect ideal life if she was diagnosed with an
inoperable brain tumor. The whole mood in their beautiful ho
me
would instantly change. Her husband wouldn't have that big happy smile plastered on his face any more. He would become grim and tight mouthed
and irritated because his perfect wife was flawed.

Byron hated flaws of any sort. The fact she was from New Jersey was already a flaw in her husband’s book.
And then she'd be too sick to have sex... sick and weak from endless chemo treatments....and Byron would start thinking that he shouldn't have married her because he can’t handle it.
No,
wouldn't
want
to handle it – that’s more like it.

Maybe he would start seeing that trashy girl at the
club house in a whole new light. After all, she
looked really healthy and was
obviously infatuated.
In other words,
easy
.

This last thought made Daniella feel physically sick to her stomach. To Daniella, the fear of abandonment was almost as strong as the fear of losing her health.

"Anyway, if you remove those potatoes from your ears," Byron was saying, "I was thinking we could have your friend and her husband and their kid over tomorrow night for that barbeque. We bought all those chicken breasts
at Woodman's, and you can pick up some more corn on the cob... maybe make your scrumptious macaroni salad..."

"And we have that watermelon," Daniella added, forcing herself to put on a happy face.

"That's right!" Byron boomed, as though Daniella had just answered a question correctly on a game show. "Well...what do you think?"

Byron blew a huge bubble for Brooklyn out of one of those giant bubble blowers.

Brooklyn shrieked with delight, trying to catch the monstrous bubble, which floated just out of her reach.

"Sure, I think it's a great idea!' Daniella exclaimed, trying desperately to sound enthusiastic.

"I wonder if Martin plays golf..." Byron was saying.

Daniella shrugged, recalling
Sandy’s husband. The guy was so obese, he
looked like he needed
a forklift to haul him off the couch. Byron, who was obsessed with perfection, would not be pleased
with the physical state of Sandy's husband.

However, if Martin had some good investments and possibly a vacation home or a boat (even though Sandy had never mentioned any of these things) and perhaps played golf on top of it all, Byron might be willing to let the man's formidable girth slide.

"You never know!" Daniella said, forcing a smile.

Daniella could not think of anything worse than entertaining right now
.

What if she actually got a doctor's appointment for tomorrow and the ensuing news was not
good? It was hard enough putting on a brave face for her immediate family. But for a whole other family, as well?

Hosting a dinner, even if it was simply a "casual barbeque," still involved a ton of physical as well as mental work
. She would be required to act the
part of the charming hostess, and Daniella didn’t know if she
could pull that off.

But she would have to try! Her image of the perfect wife with the perfect life was at stake.

After Byron informed Daniella that he had gotten reservations for two whole weeks at their favorite hotel, the Hyatt Regency in Key West, Daniella excused herself to do the dishes.
She couldn't think about vacations right now...
even though enjoying the sunset at the Blue Mojito Bar was usually one of her favorite things to think about.

As Daniella washed the dishes, she tried to talk herself out of her increasingly agitated state. Nothing weird had happened since this afternoon, after all.

Maybe it truly was just "one of those things," like a dip in blood sugar?

I mean, if something was seriously wrong with me
,
would it just go away like that
? Daniella wondered.

She was just on the verge of convincing herself that it was all
a "big fat nothing" when the porcelain frog that held the scrubby pad on the sink winked at her.

Daniella shook her head and blinked hard, adrenaline surging through her body.

I just imagined that, right
?

She was in such a nervous state, anything was possible
. After all, she
wasn't thinking clearly...

"Dream on, sister!" the frog informed her, in a deep baritone voice.

Holy hell
!

Daniella turned off the water and poured herself a huge glass of
wine. She didn't normally drink. But none of what was happening was normal!

Thankfully, after two full glasses of the wine, which hit her really hard since she'd hardly eaten anything, Daniella collapsed in bed on top of the covers blaming
that darn migraine
again.

Byron acted cool about it, taking care of Brooklyn's bedtime story before tucking the toddler into bed for the night. After that, he visited one of his favorite porn sites
. Then he
jacked off to a beautiful creamy skinned Asian girl dressed as a maid who kept telling Byron how much she wanted to lick his feet.

CHAPTER FOURTEEN

Daniella had no clue that she was about to abandon her perfect home and her perfect life and morph into the disease-ridden homeless woman
behind Maybelline’s. But at around two in the morning, she woke up feeling
as though
she was on the verge of death.

Daniella's first thought was
, Ebola!
The blood from the mosquito...I knew it
!

"Stop being so paranoid," she muttered to herself.

Her voice came out sounding like a croak.

Like a
croaking
frog
!

She was shaking violently with chills which she knew from experience meant she had a really
high fever. She didn't want to wake Byron, who was blissfully snoring away on
his back with a slight smile on his face
. No doubt he was
dreaming about some golf hottie he'd seen online
.

She quietly crawled out of bed, plucking the decorative cream and brown afghan that was folded neatly at
the foot of the bed. Daniella wrapped the afghan around her shoulders. Then she stumbled
into the bathroom, flicking on the light
switch.

"Ahhh!" she groaned, when the bright fluorescent beam
hit her eyes.

She was surprised how much the
light physically hurt her. Daniella's headache was so bad now, it felt like the lining of her brain was inflamed.

Was it meningitis
?
Oh God, meningitis is bad! Although if it's bacterial meningitis, it can be cured with antibiotics. That's
probably better than a brain tumor, right
?
But you need to get treatment right away for meningitis, or you'll die
!