Allan Burda's Wife

I am Allan Burda’s wife.

And honestly, it is a sweet gig. It’s the life of the glitterati. I wake up in the towering penthouse and look out over the city, I watch the sun rise in the mirror-glass windows, and the roads start flowing with traffic. I imagine them like veins, carrying oxygen around this pulsing, smoking organism.

And then I slip into silk, slide down the stairs, sit at the table for the housekeeper to lay a plate of pancakes in front of me. A smile; a smile returned.

And then Allan comes downstairs. A smile. A kiss on the cheek. A cheek that crawls and tingles and shrinks a little with the touch of his lips. But I return the kiss.

“Product launch tonight.”

“I remember.”

“Gotta go. I’ll change at the office. Meet you there?”

“Okay.”

And then I can go to the gym. Or walk in the park. Maybe I’ll head into town and find the ideal dress for the occasion. Get my hair done. Or my nails.

Milk and honey flow through this world when you’re Allan Burda’s wife.

#

Some days I look in the mirror. I try to see myself. But I really feel as if she’s gone.

The hair, dyed a different shade of blonde, the make-up, the designer lace. It feels like nothing I know about myself. I want to see behind her, see that girl I used to be, to see that woman I still am.

I want to take that face out of its jar and put it back on.

“Mrs Burda,” says the housekeeper.

It doesn’t ring true. “Yes, Sandy?”

“You want to check the shopping list this week?”

“No. You get it.”

Two doors away, she presses send. Gets up and starts to work on the windows.

#

There are cameras flashing for tonight’s party. The product launch is big news. I smile over my shoulder with my bag clutched in one hand. Perfectly matching my dress.

Inside, I find Allan. I step into a sideways embrace. I allow myself to be introduced to a stranger with a salt-and-pepper beard and hard eyes.

“This Jolene Burda, my wife.”

A kiss on my knuckles. The lips feel empty.

“So nice to meet you.”

Finger food flows.

Allan steps up to make his announcement. And I do have to marvel at the way he dominates the room. There really is a silence that covers us all like a blanket as he starts to speak. He has the voice for it, all echoes and melody. He wows the room. It’s what he does.

A few of the women glance my way. What must it be like to be Allan Burda’s wife? What kind of a fairytale must it be? They wonder about secret drinking habits and drug-fueled rages, strange perversions. But I see them. I see inside them. Thinking that it would all be worth it. Some with their men standing right beside them.

A girl in a tuxedo jacket offers a tray of champagne.

I take one. I raise my glass when everybody else does.

#

We arrive home at midnight.

“I think that went well,” he says.

“Yes, it seemed to.”

I go into my bathroom. We have these. His and Hers ensuites.

But it is: Hers. The colours aren’t mine. I would have gone for a dreamy, mushy citrus, a kind of muted, diluted paint-pour effect. But the walls are more of a burgundy, streaked through with a deep pink, patterned classic wallpaper-lace.

I blink out my contacts – turn from blue to greenish – unhitch the padded bra. Scrape away the makeup to let the freckles and the small, circular birthmark show through.

There… is that me…? I lock eyes with her, trying to decide how much of that girl is left, and how much of her has been caught up in this deception.

I wonder, sometimes, about the people who should know better. The ones who have met the Burdas, talked to them, up close. Heard their voices. Learnt their mannerisms. Have all these people just been superficial contacts, glances and glimpses? Nothing more real than that? Doesn’t anybody remember a young woman, a different person, who they actually, genuinely knew?

I am Allan Burda’s sister-in-law. And I can count on my fingers the number of people who know it.

I’m not sure I even know for sure what happened to my sister, Jolene. Allan tells me that she left him. That she met a Spanish man and took off with him, leaving everything behind. And sure, Mum and Dad get emails sometimes. Postcards. It looks like her writing. I mostly believe it.

And when Allan made his offer, cash in hand, penthouse and beautiful lifestyle behind him, I didn’t take more than a couple of minutes to accept.

What remains of a woman named Lorna berates me from the mirror with just her grey-green eyes. I stare her down. You’d have done the same. You did the same. And I turn the light out on her silent accusations, walking over to the grand, king-sized bed, the silk sheets, the butter-soft quilt. To what I signed up for: