[ Theodore ] News of his wife’s drunken stupor had reached Theo’s ears quickly, as well as everyone else in attendance, he made his way over to the brunette. Grabbing her arm in a less than gentle manner, Theodore dragged her from the room, making it look as though he was actually helping her. “I asked one thing of you tonight,” he hissed into her ear. “One.” A car was waiting for them at the side of the building and he shoved her in before barking at the driver to take her home. He couldn’t even say anything to her right now, the anger coursing through his veins making him boil and fume to the point that the politician couldn’t form words.
[ Meredith ] Meredith wanted to bite back, to argue that he’d asked much more than her of the night than to keep her alcohol consumption at such small levels. The Champagne had not only burned her throat on the way down but also ignited a raging fire within her, similar to that she felt in high school as she fought desperately for her father’s attention. But she /had/ Theodore’s attention… and it wasn’t something she was awfully fond of in this moment. “I don’t know what happened!” Meredith slurred insistently, just as she had been as he led her out of the ball. There would be no grand and gracious exit for her tonight. “Theo!”
[ Theodore ] ”You don’t know?” He turned to give her a stony glare as he repeated her words back at her, astounded that she couldn’t figure it out. “I have an inkling of how you got so plastered.” Theodore double checked that the partition was up between them and the driver before continuing. “You had more than two drinks. I talked to a bartender and he told me you had five drinks. Five.” That was three more than she’d been allowed.
[ Meredith ] “Only five, Theo. Only five!” Her voice was pleading and desperate. Meredith hated it when he was angry at her, for it felt like he momentarily redirected any anger he reserved for what could only loosely be called his enemies.
[ Theodore ] ”Tell me Meredith, is five more or less than two?” He was speaking to her like she was an idiot, which in his mind she was. Five drinks in the span of three hours still could be enough to get one plastered, clearly.
[ Meredith ] “Stop snapping at me!” She demanded, though her troubled tongue made it a far more effective whine. Her hand held onto his knee in a natural attempt to keep his attention — not that that was something that she needed to fight in this moment. “It’s not that many more… I’m not that much of a lightweight, Theo, please don’t be mad.”
[ Theodore ] ”Don’t take that tone with me. Not after the spectacle you just made, embarrassing me, my father, and our entire family.” He couldn’t even look at his wife, the urge to strangle her growing with every word out of her mouth. “It’s too late Meredith, I am mad.” His phone was lighting up with texts from “concerned” acquaintances wondering after his wife. “I cannot believe you defied my request. Betrayed by my own wife.” Right now he was just trying to lay the guilt on thick.
[ Meredith ] Meredith shook her head trying to gather he thoughts, but she was starting to feel now that she’d stopped moving. She could have insisted that she was fine and sober until she actually sat down. “I just… I drank too many. But I didn’t do this.” Meredith insisted, it made sense to her — kind of. She knew what she had drunk and she knew her limits and she knew that she would not have been able to surpass them on five flutes of expensive champagne alone: it would ruin the taste, after all. But she could barely make sense of the situation herself, let alone help Theodore /see/ her side. “Why don’t you trust me? Believe me?”
[ Theodore ] ”Maybe the fact that you were stumbling around like a fucking sorority girl who hasn’t eaten all day but had a bunch on wine coolers.” He gnashed his teeth and stuffed his phone back in his pocket. “I don’t believe you because I can see the evidence right in front of me that you’re drunk. That wouldn’t have happened had you taken my advice.” Meredith needed to be punished for her misbehavior but he had yet to come up with what it would be.
[ Meredith ] “I would never drink wine coolers!” Meredith barked at him. She may only just be politely considered ‘old money’, but she was certainly no drunken stumbling sorority girl in Forever 21. “No.” Meredith repeated, putting her head in her hands. She had since stopped caring that her hands would turn grubby with “No, someone else did this, please, Theo, it’s surely…” But she petered out into silence. It sounded like nonsense, she could hear that. Theodore didn’t care how it happened, he cared that it happened ands he had long since stopped embarrassing Theodore to the best of her abilities — or so she thought. “No…”
[ Theodore ] God, she was so drunk he couldn’t even properly fight with her. Mainly because she was fighting back which she usually didn’t do. “It was a metaphor,” he explained with a roll of his eyes. “Someone else opened up your mouth and forcibly poured drinks down your throat? Please don’t insult my intelligence.” Theodore was sitting as far away from her as possible until they pulled up to their building and he could storm out and up to their floor. He owned the whole thing and didn’t have to worry about anyone hearing how hard he slammed doors as he walked in the front door.
[ Meredith ] ”That’s not what I meant!” It all made technicolor sense in her mind, but she couldn’t put it into words, it would have sounded foolish if she had managed and her husband was already angry enough. “I’m not trying to insult you, please just… I didn’t do this!” She managed out, pressing her head against the cold glass. This was not what five flutes of champagne usually felt like.
[ Theodore ] She wasn’t making any sense and Theodore didn’t care enough to see her side. “Take some God damn responsibility for once in your life Meredith.” He hated that she was trying to find some way out of this when there wasn’t any. The damage had been done and it couldn’t be taken but.
[ Meredith ] Meredith pouted slightly, hearing his heavy feet move around their home. He was mad, and though he was right to be angry, Meredith was insistent his anger was directed at the wrong person. Funnily enough, knew little about her. She did take responsibility for the things she did — when she had upended her classmate down a flight of stairs she had owned up to her actions, revelled in the attention. It was negative, yes, far more negative than what Theodore was laying on her in this moment, and reflected poorly on her. “This wasn’t me.” She insisted feebly.
[ Theodore ] ”I’m getting real fucking sick of you saying that,” he said as he pinched the bridge of his nose. If it wasn’t her then who was it? Clearly it was the liquor speaking. “You’re drunk Meredith, you aren’t thinking straight.”
[ Meredith ] “I’m not that drunk! I only had five champagnes!” Meredith insisted, leaning somewhat on a nearby ottoman and putting her head in her hands with a audible moan of annoyance. “Theo I wouldn’t do this… not after you played for me.” She promised him lightly, a surge of tears welling behind her eyes and making her chest heavy. She wasn’t emotional enough to cry, but the feeling was swelling.
[ Theodore ] He rolled his eyes at the mention of how he played for her. What a mistake that had been. “God, don’t start crying. Don’t you fucking start crying.” The last thing he needd right now was for his drunk wife to turn into an emotional, crying drunk on him. “You need to sober up. Now. Get yourself some coffee, some aspirin, water, whatever.”
[ Meredith ] “I’m not!” Meredith exclaimed, though she may as well he been. She was just as hard to understand when she was crying as when she was drunk — and Meredith made a point to avoid both states of mind. She looked athim, he was so cold towards her and she felt a bit foolish that she’d expected him to bring her aspirin and water before suggesting she go to bed kindly. Meredith stood a bit shakily and, though she were still drunk, expertly made her way upstairs. Right now, she just really wanted to wash her face.
