*Dumb bitch dumb bitch dumb bitch*.

 

I can hear him saying those words like a mantra, at some house for the elderly, clutching at his thigh with repressed anger that escapes him like air from a balloon that hasn't been tied properly. My twin brother does not hate women. My twin brother hates one specific woman, a woman he is now "in love" with, a woman he has a child with because, as he had told me, she impregnated herself with his semen. Finally, pregnancy is a one-person job. It only took a psychopathic madwoman to do that.

 

All the information that will never go into the record. For the rest of time, she will be the woman who published *Amazing*, the memoir about her contrived lies, the woman who was kidnapped and raped and then went on to have a happy-happy-happy family with her husband, who she had framed as abusive and a near-rapist once. It was all so easy for her. Rhonda, Nick and me knew, of course, but no one else cared. No one else would ever care. The case was closed, the trail burning hot.

 

A woman my twin brother hates, a woman he is "in love with", and a woman I am right now making out with at the dingy bathroom at The Bar.

 

My head is swimming. I can feel the bile in the back of my throat. The dots clouding my vision are here. But I can't stop. I want to scream my head off at her, I want to yell *you did this all to my brother because he cheated on you and now you're the one being the fucking slut* but I know it is not that simple.

 

Pretending Nick's only fault was being a cheater is reductionist. Nick's main fault was being himself, just like Amy's main fault was being herself. It is what ruined their marriage once, but now it was repairing it in a twisted way that affirmed my devotion to never, ever getting married. Not liking men was only a small piece of it.

 

"Amy," I hiss, hands clawing at her shoulders.

 

"Go," she drawls out, her perfect eyes staring down at me. She doesn't "look good for her age", "look good for all she has gone through". She just looks good, period. It's a little haunting, how a sociopath can be so alluring.

 

"Fuck you," I whisper, pulling her into another kiss.

 

I don't even quite remember what dragged us here. I remember getting drunk, but not enough to excuse *this*. Amy is tip-top sober, too, I know that part. There's some kids working at The Bar tonight; it's not all that full, anyway.

 

Amy had finally come over, made a place for herself at The Bar after she had come and ruined the few things that were still without ruining. It was like a sick joke, her avoiding the space Nick and me had made for ourselves like the plague until she had made a place for herself inside Nick's soul.

 

"I wish this could go on the record," I whisper, red in the face, as I help Amy pull her pants down. I can see the regret from tomorrow morning, throwing up into my toilet. That's for later. That's for later, I keep telling myself, like a mantra. "I wish everyone could know that Amy Dunne, rape and kidnapping survivor, is a lying bisexual *skank*."

 

Amy smiles at me like the Cheshire cat. Her manic grin is far too attractive; I don't want to be attracted to her. I really, genuinely, do not want to be attracted to her. But here I am, about to get down on my knees at our dingy women's bathroom stall for her, like we're in a awful porno with no budget at all.

 

"That would make the rounds a bit," she says, not even denying it. I almost wish she did, said something like *I'm not bisexual, this is just a power play, I just want to see both of the Dunne twins groveling for me*. But she doesn't. "But no one would believe it. So it'll stay off the record for now. Or forever, if you can keep a secret."

 

My head swims. I can taste bile in the back of my throat. I look up at her, my face cold, my lips twitching. "I hate you," I tell her.

 

"Good." That's her response. Just— *good*. "Now get on your knees for me, princess." There's a sarcastic tinge at that last word; it rings with Manhattan smugness.

 

But I do. I do get on my knees for her. My stomach lurches, but I lean in.

 

She puts a hand on my hair, threads her fingers through it.

 

"Nick has never done this for me," she says casually.

 

"Do not bring up my twin brother during this," I hiss. But, in my head, I can't help but think that's such a Nick thing. To not ever eat his wife out. Is it even true? Is she lying? Why would she lie about her sex life with her husband, her stupid, woman-fearing husband?

 

"Okay," she acquiesces, a grin on her lips still.

 

I can hear women talk outside the stalls. Fixing their makeup, mumbling drunken nonsense.

 

I attempt to block all the noise out. I suck in a breath, and I lean into her cunt.