Marquessa’s Friday Fiction Challenge – “Sorry Not Sorry”

I, unfortunately, realized I totally missed the first week of this awesome fiction challenge based on song lyrics. It was a song that I love; however, it was our anniversary and a million other things were going on as well. I will still write on that one but let’s get caught up with today’s lyric.

The challenge is to take the snippet of lyric and write based on it. Today it is “Payback’s a bad bitch” from “Sorry Not Sorry” by Demi Lovato.

I haven’t written fiction in a long time! So, let’s get right into it.

Lydia!

---

Annalee looked around at the empty house one last time. She figured she should feel some guilt or regret but she didn’t. She didn’t feel relief either. What she did feel was a sense of independence and, what was that other thing? Ah, yes, revenge!

She remembered the day six years before when she and Curtis moved into the little bungalow with the lace cafe curtains in the kitchen and the white picket fence. They had just eloped, against everyone’s advice, and bought the house even though it was a real stretch on their finances.

But the honeymoon was over almost before it got started. Curtis started showing his true colors by draining their bank account as quickly as money came in and then beating her up every time she tried to confront him. He couldn’t hold down a job so Annalee ended up keeping a secret account with their mortgage and other bill payments hidden away in it. She was working two jobs and was barely making ends meet.

She grew to hate being around family and friends because they would shower her with “I told you so’s” and advice she didn’t need or want.

But that was six years ago and now she had the last laugh on everyone.

Not only was she able to pay out the mortgage just days before foreclosure, she gave away every piece of furniture, clothing, etc. to charities and turned over the title to the house and car to a homeless shelter. There was nothing left of a life she grew to hate.

Oh, and Curtis was on his way to prison.

In her hand was a one-way ticket to a private retreat where no one would even think to look for her. There was no man waiting for her there, no family to put her down, no friends trying to set her up with the latest jerk. Just peace and quiet and all the comforts she had never known.

As she heard the Uber pull up she looked at the two pieces of paper left in the middle of the empty floor. The first was a newspaper article with the headline, “The total in the Lottery rip-off mystery now exceeds $28 million over 5 years.” The second was a note saying “Payback’s a bad bitch…”