the ordinary rules bent. And I hated it, a little. I wanted, more than anything, to be loved for myself, not for the power standing behind me. So when I met Gabriel — charming, ambitious, from a family obsessed with the appearance of success — I made a decision that my father, wise as he is, warned me about.
I told Gabriel my father was a retired government employee. Quiet. Ordinary. A pension and a modest house.
I wanted to see if Gabriel would love the ordinary version of me. And for a while, I thought he did.
But here’s what I learned, married to Gabriel and his family: a person who treats you well only because they might get something from you is a different creature than a person who treats you well because that’s who they are. Gabriel and his mother Penelope treated me with a slowly curdling contempt over
