Because when one person speaks their truth, it opens the door for all of us to do the same, and if we listen with an open heart and mind the pain becomes lighter for all of us.

What I’ve learned from this is, you can’t let the haters win. You have to speak out, even if you’re nervous about saying the wrong thing, because really the only wrong thing to say is to say nothing, you know? It’s not enough to just survive something, right? Like, that’s not the point of life.

I know what it’s like to have someone let you down and trample on your dreams. People make promises and they say they’ll do something and then they let you down. They think they can walk away but you have to hold them to account. You can’t let them get away with treating you like you don’t matter!

At a certain point you have to stand up for yourself because no one else can do that for you. You have to take back control.

And if that comes with risk, well, there’s a lot that’s been lost already.

chapter 29

millie

The window is unlocked just as Stacey said it would be.

I glance up at the properties overlooking the pool to the rear of the Glass House. Once I’m certain I’m not being watched, I slide my credit card beneath the window catch and open it an inch.

Tensing, I wait for the scream of the alarm. Stacey said she wouldn’t set it, but there’s always the possibility Felix did it himself.

The light on the sensor stays green.

I push the window fully open, and climb inside. The inverted layout of the Glass House means the bedrooms are all downstairs; judging from the dirty boxers puddled on the floor and the rats’ nest of cables trailing across the desk, I’m in their son’s room. I step over a sweaty trainer with its heel ground down, and go out into the hall. Felix’s study is at the far end of the corridor. According to Stacey, he keeps it locked twenty-four/seven.

Privacy is one thing: every healthy marriage has its secrets. I’ve never bought into the notion that husbands and wives should be open books to one another. Who wants to read a novel when you know every twist before it happens and how the story will end? But Stacey says Felix guards his study as if he has a body hidden in there. He locks it even when he goes to the loo.