Names including my own have been switched in these stories.A Routine Morning that Changed Everything
It was a Monday morning in late September. I dozed peacefully and unexpectedly, never knowing that this particular morning’s routine would change everything. My stepchildren, John age five and Jenny age three, were with their mother’s, K.C. that weekend. So, with great effort, I pushed away my nagging worries about K.C.’s new husband, Rodney, out of my mind. Jenny had been acting strange around him and throwing fits inappropriate to her age and circumstances. But there was nothing I could do, so I ignored that badgering disquiet.
My best friend, Sarah, from my far away dorm life had come up for the weekend. Since I had been back to my small hometown from the hustle and bustle of university life and married a man with two children, I yearned for intelligent adult conversations. Not that I didn’t love trying to decipher three year old begging at the refrigerator. (There are a million ways to ask for strawberries in three year old lingo.) And I had spent two whole weeks at this point trying to figure out what a Bakugan Ball was from five year old John. So a weekend with an actual adult had been refreshing. We had spent all of Sunday night and most of the early morning discussing the Republican influence on the Michigan mental health system and reminiscing about drunken Saturday nights dodging campus police, who were always ready to hand out an MIP.
So, my husband B.J.’s alarm went off at nine Monday morning as usual. Its doorbell chime woke me enough to roll over pulling my 800 thread count, overly flowered sheets over my head. Blocking out the trickle of rare September sunshine that was fluttering through my cat-clawed ripped shades, I fell quickly back to sleep.
I had been married long enough to block out the noises of my husband getting ready for work. He flitted in and out of the room. Sarah was sleeping on our old battered pull out couch in the living room. So, the news remained off and he tiptoed, trying to be respectful of the sleeping night owls.
Even in my semi-conscious slumber, I was expecting the bedroom door to creak open one more time and to smell the thick hospital antiseptic that permeated his light blue hospital scrubs, no matter the amount of Tide I attacked them with. That last creak and whiff of antiseptic meant that he was going to gently remove the sheets from my head, kiss me gently on the forehead and return to the sheets to their original position. Then for the next 16 hours, I would be husbandless as he helped the unfortunates of Northern Michigan who were unlucky enough to spend the day in the ER. I always muttered thanks when he left that he worked there, as if his job somehow protected us from our own emergencies.
That morning, I heard the door creak, smelled the antiseptic and had my kiss. I settled back in completely, shifting Eleanor, my gray and orange cat off my chest so I could roll to my other side.
But several minutes later the door creaked one more time. I automatically turned over, sending Eleanor flying. I was suddenly and totally awake, as if I had been shocked from the inside out. He was standing at the foot of our wooden four poster bed, one hand gripped tightly on the decorative wooden ball. His already blond complexion was white, except a pink flush to his high cheeks. His full lips were plumped out, like they always were when he was serious. Usually, I found his lip-plumping enduring and lovingly teased him about them, but not this time. I found it terrifying.
He took a shaky breath and said, “K.C. just called….” Immediately, I covered my ears, knowing that any news from the kids’ mother wasn’t good. B.J. made no move towards me but said in the same, over calculated voice, “Rodney beat Jenny.”
Then there was nothing. No cat begging to be pet after forced exodus from my bed, no sunshine, just an annoying high pitched wail coming from inside my head. Suddenly, my hands were pulled from my ears. Tears already flowing, like I had been crying for hours not seconds, I looked up at B.J. I didn’t have to say “really?” or “what?” We had been expecting the news for a long time, trying to prove it ourselves with doctors and therapists to no avail. B.J. looked back at me helpless, silent. “She’s a baby.” They were the only words I could think of to say. But those three little words were just a small burp before constant, irrational regurgitations of “I knew it!”’s and “Who could hit a baby?”’s.
Sarah was there immediately, shocked out of her own heavy sleep. She leaned against the wooden door frame of my room, just looking. B.J. had moved to the side of the bed, gripping my head hard into his chest. He sat down and moved me so he could look directly into my eyes. His blue eyes were stoic, strong but liars. They were trying to hide his own terror for my protection. He took another breath, his hands in my own shaky hands, pulling gently so I remained in a sitting. He started to say something but I interrupted. I was hit by an overwhelming need to hold the tiny hazel eyed, bright smiled child I had been raising for the past two years as my own. “Go get her and bring her to me!” I commanded through gritted teeth.
“I will,” he promised. “She’s not hurt badly. K.C. just got the police report and is picking her up from preschool. I am going to meet them in the E.R..”
“GO!” I yelled suddenly, surprised at my own voice that had been almost incapacitated by screams and sobs. I didn’t want him with me until he had Jenny and John with him. B.J. looked over at Sarah, silently. They seamlessly switched places, turning me from one pair of comforting arms to the other. Sarah, after several minutes of just holding me, letting me sob into her Joan Jett t-shirt, pulled me to my feet. My devastation was already creating images of my sweet little girl cowering as a big faceless man swung at her petite body. I could see John’s huge brown eyes watching the situation, unmoving in terror as his sister was being hit. He was so protective of her; I couldn’t imagine his own helplessness.
Sarah guided me to the front door. I couldn’t find my own way; I was blinded by the horrible but true fantasies my mind was showing me, prematurely, void of any tangible details. She opened the door and sat me on the cheap black computer chair, now grayish with its thick layer of cat hair. Dubbed the smoking chair, it was what we used on cold days to sit by the window to smoke through the storm door’s screen. She took one of her cigarettes, lit it herself and handed it to me. She knew that there was nothing to say or do besides the simple act of lighting the cigarette for me. As I sat there, sucking in the cool menthol smoke as if it was air rather than carcinogens, the sun poured down on me as if nothing had happened. In its ignorant bliss, it made the day look cheerful despite the black cloud suddenly hanging over me.
I could vaguely sense Sarah rummaging through my war zone of a back hall closet. I wanted to tell her that finding anything was futile but my lips were paralyzed against anything but sobs. But by the time the orange ember had almost burned out on my Camel, she came back triumphant. She handed me two small white tablets, and brought my hand to my mouth. She handed me her own newly opened Diet Mt. Dew, the sweet liquid went down hard but the pills were swallowed. “Ativan,” she explained, but I didn’t care. They wouldn’t make my baby unbeaten, wouldn’t make my little boy un-horrified. But it was the only calm I would have until B.J. made good on his promise and brought my children back to me. Battered but safe in my arms.
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