Sensitive Content: domestic abuse

“You know you don’t have to keep doing this.” The officer says to me after they’ve searched the duplex for the man who’d threatened my life. Man. Subjective. What did I know about the definition of a man. Male body parts. Masculine features. Stronger than me.

I look at this officer, letting his words linger in the air. I want to grab them and apply them to me, but they seem to start floating away. As though, if I reached out to grab them, they’d simply be too far, and I was too tired to stand any taller to grasp them.

“Is his name on the lease?” the other officer asks me. I shake my head and lift my daughter higher onto my hips. She grabs my chin with her small, clammy hand. I nuzzle into her and a tear slips down one cheek.

“But he gets his mail here.” I say softly.

I feel the officers look at each other and hesitate before responding.

“Well, then he has rights onto the property, unfortunately.”

Another tear falls and another before I wipe them away. I already know this, because I researched it after the last time law enforcement was called here. That time, he’d punched a hole in the wall, and grabbed my wrist so hard, he left a bruise.

“So, there’s nothing you can do?” I already know the answer to this question as well.

“You can go file a protection order. Is there anyone you can stay with until he sobers up? We recommend waiting until then and meeting in a public space to talk.”

I scoff. Asking him to meet in a public space will piss him off, sober or not. And what is there to talk about?

He’ll tell me that he’s sorry, but what? This time I shouldn’t have worn that nice outfit to work, because it obviously meant I was cheating on him?

Besides, it doesn’t change the facts. I earn minimum wage. One check goes to rent. The other goes to daycare. I find food pantries and donate plasma to buy diapers. Leaving would take a miracle.

“The judge will grant you the protection order ma’am.” The officer has his hands on his hips, and he’s almost leaning in towards me, his eyes open wide as if to tell me that he’s letting me in on information he’s not allowed to share. “You have a child.”

My face gets hot and my throat swells up as I try to keep my tears inside. I feel ashamed and judged. Children, I think to myself. Abby was at pre-school still. I swallow to try and speak, to thank the officers, but I can’t get anywhere with it.

“Good luck ma’am, if you need anything else don’t hesitate to give us a call.” And they let themselves out the front door. I close it behind them, but I don’t lock it.

I made that mistake once. If he comes back and it’s locked, he’ll think I was letting someone out the back door in the time it took him to unlock the deadbolt.

I head to the pre-school uptown to pick up Abby. She tells me in her four-year-old voice that she had fun today and made a new friend. Her artwork has dried noodles glued to stock paper and her name is written in purple crayon at the bottom. I give her my best smile and tell her how great it looks and that we’ll hang it on the fridge when we get home.

The next morning, I wake up to the sun peeking in through the slit in the curtains. My heart lurches as I reach for my phone to check the time only to realize I hadn’t charged it. I plug it in quickly and look around the bedroom for any sign that he’d come back while I was sleeping. While I wait for my phone to power on, I peek into the girl’s room next to mine. I walk quietly over to Gracie’s crib and watch her chest rise and fall in a rhythmic sleep. Abby is in her toddler bed, sprawled out in a wild pose that makes me smile. The quiet, so still that I could hear the robin’s faint song outside, alarms me.

If he hadn’t come back yet, he would eventually. And the peaceful moment that this was, would vanish. I walk the stairs slowly, careful not to make any sounds in case he was already here, passed out on the couch. I grip the banister tightly as I peek my head around the corner into the living room. I feel my tense muscles relax and my chest untighten when I see the couch is empty.

I head back to my room to check my phone. 8:37am. I was almost two hours late for work. I sigh and my armpits start to sweat as I watch 22 missed calls, 7 voicemails and 26 texts bing through. My co-worker-Ashley, work itself, and…him.

I open his texts first. Text after text of name calling, accusations, and threats. My heart drops at the last one.

I’m coming back now, and if there’s ANY sign you had a guy over, you’re going to regret being a whore.

He sent that 7 minutes ago. I drop my phone and let my body respond to my brains fight or flight response.

We’re taking flight.

I zip into my work clothes and rush into the bathroom to throw my hair up and brush my teeth. I change Gracie’s diaper, waking her from her peaceful slumber and buckle her into her carrier with a bottle next to the back door in the kitchen. Then I wake Abby, helping her get dressed in her shorts and T-shirt.

“I need to go potty.” She says with a sleepy voice. I sigh, trying not to let her see my nerves. But I set her on her ladybug potty and wait. Then, the sound of the front door handle stiffens me into a full body freeze. The door opens and then slams and I jump. Abby stands up and I pull her shorts up for her before she’s even able to wipe and carry her down the stairs.

“I need to wash my hands.” she whines at me. My heart is slamming against my chest, but I manage to say,

“It’s okay sweetie, we’ll wash our hands at daycare.”

“Where do you think you’re going?” his voice stops me in my tracks, and I turn to face him. The alcohol on his breath is potent even from the three feet away that he’s standing.

I swallow. “Work.”

He snorts. “You’re late then.”

“I overslept.” I say and turn to walk away.

“Yeah, right. Probably were too busy being a whore.”

No matter what I say, it will be the wrong answer. So, I said nothing and continued walking to the kitchen, grateful that he’d come in through the front. That meant he wasn’t parked behind me in the back drive. I set Abby down and opened the door. When I bend over to pick Gracie’s carrier up, he’s made his way to us and leans over me and pushes the back door closed.

“Let me see your phone.” He demands. I know if I refuse, he’ll explode. But as I reached for it in my back pocket, I remembered that I’d left it upstairs on the charger.

“It’s upstairs.”

“You were gonna leave without your phone?” he accuses stepping towards me. I wince bracing impact as he shoves his chest into mine and tightens his arms around my shoulders and reaches his own hands into my back pockets. He jolts his chest against mine to shove me away.

“Come on, let’s go get it.” He motions to me like I’m a child. I want to leave and I need him out of my way. I take a deep breath and push myself to feign bravery.

“You go get it; I’m late for work.” I pull the back door open again, but then he reaches over and slams it shut, shaking its blinds against the small window and sending a gust of air that blows Abby’s artwork from the fridge.

“I’ll stay here while you go get your phone.”

I pause, and glance at Abby. She’s staring up at him, and my chest tightens with guilt. Just then Gracie’s bottle is empty and she starts whimpering sending my guilt showering over me like acid rain and I want more than anything to be anywhere but here. I want to be able to take care of my children without this. Whatever this was.

I maneuver around him quickly as he purposely stands still. His power-move to let me know that he’s in charge. But once I reach the bottom of the stairs, he yells at me,

“Wait!”

I stop; fury starts to rise in me. What now?

He’s unbuckling Gracie and puts her up to his chest and starts burping her. “Abby, come on. Let’s go with mommy.”

I look at him, wondering what he’s getting at, and my stomach begins to feel sick with the realization that I may not make it out of here at all today. “Wouldn’t want you to delete all your messages before I can look at them.”

“I have nothing to hide. You’re the one that’s been gone all night.”

He shoves Gracie into my chest as he pushes past me up the stairs. I watch him stomp dramatically as he murmurs his usual profanities about me. When he’s turned the corner, I grab Abby’s hand and walk us quickly to the back door again. I strap Gracie in her carrier and open the door as quietly as I can.

“Mommy my picture.” Abby picks up her artwork from the floor. She tries taking a magnet from the fridge to hang it back up.

“No, no bring it with hun, we can hang it back up later.” I whisper to her, grabbing her hand and walking her out the threshold. I don’t close the door behind us.

I get Abby buckled in first, and then I lock Gracie’s car seat into its base. The car door slams against my leg, a force stronger than the wind. I limp backwards enough to close Gracie’s door and as I do so, back into him.

“I knew it, you fucking whore.” He pushes me forward and I take the momentum to round the front of the car to the driver door. “You’re still in love with your fucking ex.” He screams at me.

My entire body is shaking. I need to get out of here. And I am so close.

And then I feel something hard smash against the side of my head and the sound of clatter on the pavement. He’d chucked my phone at me. I pick it up quickly and get in the car and lock the doors. He yanks on the passenger door handle a few times and then slaps the window. A muffled “Bitch!” fogs it up momentarily and then he whips around and walks back to the duplex. I reverse quickly out of the parking stall, gripping the wheel so hard my knuckles are white. My breath is ragged and I can feel a trail of blood running down the side of my face. At a stop sign I take a few long breaths to calm my heart rate.

“Mommy?” Abby says in her small voice from behind me.

“Yeah Hunny?” I do my best to sound okay, but I know my breath shook.

“Does he hurt you?”

I squeeze my eyes shut and clench the wheel harder. Then I release everything, let out a long audible breath and turn my body around to look at her. My chest burned with the resentment I had for myself. Because at this moment I knew I’d failed her by making excuses for myself.

“Yes. He does. But I’m okay now. Are you okay?”

“I’m okay Mommy.” She looks out her window and points with an excited look on her face. “Look! A bird!”

I look. A robin balancing a wire, swoops down into a grassy lawn, pecks at the ground a few times, and then just like, that it flies away.