The Victim | Previous Challenge Entry

how it works

TITLE: The Victim | Previous Challenge Entry
By C D Swanson
09/12/17
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Lately, I have been doing quite a bit of life review day-dreaming, probably a result of the universal affliction known to millions of women: the empty-nest syndrome. This morning, for instance, I was reliving the facts surrounding my first job.

Like a self-punishing flagellant, I was 18 again, miserable at my secretarial position at a Wall Street brokerage, plodding along at the Dictaphone with the voice of my boss droning on and on in my ears at a maddening pace. After a grueling eight hour day, relieved only by a lunch hour that always went by too fast, I would sit in the subway going back to Brooklyn, still hearing his voice in my ears. I was thoroughly fed up after only six months of this misery, wondering what I was going to do with my life, and knowing only that there had to be something better. And so I quit.

Thanks to my father's successful business, I could afford to be idle and live happily under the family roof. Conversations at home usually went something like this:
Dad: Go back to school.
Me: I hate school and I hate all those sarcastic teachers.
Dad: Get married.
Me: What! And cook and clean all day?
Dad: So you just want to stay home and read and do nothing all day?
Me: I'd like nothing better.

About two weeks after my self-imposed strike, I was sitting on the "stoop" in front of my house when Ida-next-door came up to me. "Hi, how have you been feeling," she asked, a strange note of pity in her voice.

"Fine. just fine, thanks."

"Better, I hope."

"What do you mean, better. I haven't been sick..."

"Right, right. Well, that's good. That's very, very good."

Now there was no mistaking her tone, which can only be described as what you would use to placate a rabid dog. Slowly, I said, "Have you heard something about my being sick or something?"

The woman, known by everyone as being maniacally devoted to gossip, suddenly blurted out, "Oh, no, no! Not sick! No, of course not! Gosh, anyone can have a nervous breakdown!"

"A what?" I could barely contain my disbelief.

"It's okay, honey. Carmela-across-the-street told us all about it."

"Carmela? Carmela? Told you what?"

"Your low-paying job and traveling on the subway every day to Manhattan and your slave driving boss, and everything. We all understand how it could happen and..."

Furious and on the point of tears, I ran to the house of my best friend, Angie-up-the-block. When she came to the door, I almost burst out crying, happy to see a normal, friendly face. "Can you believe it. Carmela-across-the-street told Ida-next-door that I'm not working because I had a nervous breakdown!" It took her a while to calm me down, but soon we had a counter-attack planned.

"Crazy nut," Ida said, "she's had it in for you ever since you stole Vinny-around-the-corner from her. Don't worry, we'll fix her good." And we certainly did. In a couple of days, Ida had told everyone on the block that I was the cousin of a notorious hit man who was going to make Carmela pay for her slanderous lies about me.

And to this day, I'll never forget the real nervous breakdown that our little plan caused her to have.

[Based on a true story the MC shared with me]

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