Authors: Stacey Grice
I am running.
Sprinting down a dark, impossibly long hallway.
Family pictures passing me by as I stride harder and faster toward the room at the end of the hall.
Their wedding photo.
My Mother holding me as an infant.
My third grade school photo with my denim shirt and flat top spiked hair.
Each image jumps out at me from the wall, impeding my progress.
I hear the screams.
Her voice is straining to reach my ears in between sobs.
I hear the deep rumble of his voice yelling expletives and insults.
I flinch at his sick, twisted laughter.
I hear her cries for help, interrupted by smacking sounds.
I feel her struggling and her pain.
I hear glass objects breaking against walls.
I feel my resolve shattering as the fear consumes me.
I will my legs to move faster.
I pump my arms harder.
I try to fill my lungs fuller.
I am sweating.
I am scared.
I see his face in front of me, laughing at me, taunting me.
He yells at me, “You’re a piece of SHIT!”
“You’ll never be anything!”
“All you do is fuck up!”
“You’re worthless!”
“You’re a dumb ass oaf!”
Then he smiles.
“You’ll never save her.”
“Nooooooooooooooooooooo!!!”
I jolted up to a sitting position, panting for air, my body in a cold sweat. I looked left and right and didn’t recognize where I was. It was just another dream, just another horrible nightmare that fill my nights on a daily basis. I wondered how just how long I’d have to relive the horror of that night. Just how long would he haunt me?
Trying to slowly calm my frantic breathing down, I heard a soft knock on the door. When I saw a sweet, middle-aged woman wearing a floor-length plaid Mumu creep in the room, I recalled that I was in Mick and Joan’s guest bedroom.
Shit.
I kicked down the thick handmade quilt and lowered my feet to the floor, sitting and facing away from her. Joan came over and sat beside me on the bed, stretching her arm out and around me to slowly rub my back. I couldn’t stop the shaking that overtook my body and hung my head lower as the wave of shame hit me like a brick wall.
“Shh. Shh now,” she said, soothing me with her soft, whispery voice. “It’s okay. You’re okay. You’re safe here. It was just a dream.”
I felt awful for waking her up. I was so appreciative of Mick’s help and would hate to have disturbed them any more than my presence here already did. Last night was amazing. It felt normal, and warm, and homey, filled with friendship and love. I’d known them for less than twenty-four hours but I’d felt more a part of a family last night, eating and conversing at their kitchen table, than I had ever felt as a child. My mother tried her best, but one can only do so much. I was doomed all along.
My father owned an Irish pub that I basically grew up in. As I grew older and larger, my dishwashing and table bussing turned into bar backing and eventually bouncing. I was the muscle of the bar, working the door and often security inside. The pub and its regulars basically raised me, so I was exposed to much more than a little boy should’ve been.
My mother was a nurse who worked the night shift. She actually worked two jobs to supplement the income lulls of the bar business and to make up for my father’s horrible gambling problem. When she wasn’t working at the hospital, she was working at the pub, cooking, cleaning, socializing, and constantly trying to keep my father semi-sober. Completely sober was a prayer that would never be answered.
Unfortunately, she failed in her attempts more often than not. He was a raging alcoholic and an angry drunk. He loved the sauce, loved to gamble, and couldn’t keep his hands to himself when it came to loose women or a good fight. The first time my nose was ever broken wasn’t in the cage or even on a mat, but in the back of the bar, inflicted by my father when I dropped and shattered a rack of pint glasses at the age of sixteen. I hated him that night, but I never broke another pint glass again. My mother was furious and told him so.
That was the first night I heard him beat her. It had apparently been going on all along, but I was unaware of it before that night.
There was nothing I could do. I felt horrible and helpless. I knew that my clumsiness was the cause of her suffering. The very next day, I took myself to the local martial arts gym a few streets over from the bar. I wanted to enroll in Taekwondo, karate, or kickboxing classes, but had no money for tuition. I begged the owners of the gym to allow me to take classes in exchange for working there. They were intrigued enough; maybe since I was a big guy who might have a talent for fighting, or maybe it was just the idea of cheap labor, but they agreed to let me. I did grunt work before and after school and in exchange, joined in on every class I could be there for.
I was going to learn how to defend my mother.
And how to defend myself.
My sweet mother is the only reason that I even know what love is. She would’ve laid down in traffic for me. They tried to have more children, but she had multiple miscarriages after giving birth to me, probably because working such long hours on her feet and the stress of dealing with an abusive husband took their toll. She made due with a husband who constantly reeked of whiskey, raising one hyper little boy essentially alone. My father damn sure didn’t contribute anything positive to molding me into a man. He taught me what not to be.
I remember looking up to him long ago. He was a fun guy, always the life of the party. He loved to be in the center of the crowd by telling a joke or story. Everyone loved him, but no one really knew him. He hated me, or at least made me feel as though my coming along ruined his life and his plans. Now I had no respect for him, not even respect for his memory. He was gone now, hopefully burning in the deepest, darkest pits of hell.
“Are you going to be okay?” Joan asked softly as I tried to slow my breathing and bring myself back to the present moment.
“Yes, ma’am. I’m sorry I woke you up. Please go back to sleep. I’ll be fine.”
Chapter Five
BREE
I heard the whistling sound repeating as if a bird was right in my room, perched next to my face, but didn’t open my eyes yet. A few moments passed and there it was again, a sweet little bird whistle, greeting my ears with a question, as if the bird was saying, “Yoo-hoo!” but didn’t have the words, so it just whistled. It reached my ears again and registered in my brain. It was my text message alert. With slow and sluggish half-asleep movements, I reached over to my bedside table for my cell phone. Sure enough, I had 27 new text messages waiting for me.
What the hell?
I jolted up into a sitting position and read the notification again. Yep, twenty seven. A feeling of dread immediately consumed me and my heart was soon beating out of my chest. My fat, still-asleep thumbs couldn’t type my password in fast enough to unlock the phone. Scary images and awful scenarios were flashing in my brain, my anxiety taking over. There had to be something horribly wrong with someone or something for me to have 27 text messages. But no missed calls?
And then I got pissed. All 27 text messages were from Sue.
Bree?!
Bree, r u awake?
I need to talk to you.
Please wake up.
I know it is 3am
But I need to talk to you
Please wake up now!!! =)
I feel bad.
Please don’t be mad at me
Are you mad at me?
And that’s why you aren’t responding?
Or are you just sleeping?
Please wake up.
I feel awful for our fight yesterday.
I was a giant mega-bitch
And I am sorry.
Why aren’t you waking up?
What if this was an emergency?
This IS an emergency!!!
Okay, so I’m not laying in a ditch somewhere
But I need to talk to you.
I can’t sleep.
I can’t sleep thinking that you’re mad at me.
Please just call me when you wake up
I am so so sorry Bree.
I need to know you forgive me
I need to know we r ok.
Sitting there, staring at my phone in the middle of the night, I thought to myself,
this bitch is crazy!
My phone’s home screen said 3:17 (AM!). Exhausted, I lay back down and closed my eyes, shaking my head back and forth at my friend and her drama. Then the chirping whistle sounded again. And kept whistling. One after another after another
. Jesus Lord, help her. I’m going to wring her neck for this shit!
Seriously Bree
You’ve got to wake up now.
I am DYING over here!!!
W
A
K
E
U
P
Jellyfish!
Oh HELL no!
I couldn’t even believe that she dared text “jellyfish” to me, knowing damn well and good that this was
not
a situation worthy of using that word. That word was our sacred and secret code for the ultimate crisis, earth-shattering, crucial circumstance,
not
“it’s three am and I feel guilty.”
One summer day when we were kids, Sue had invited me to come to the beach with her family and my parents had actually given me permission to go. I was only eight years old and my father didn’t want to let me, but I distinctly remember throwing a raging tantrum fit. Shortly after, I overheard my mother pleading with him to allow me to go. She assured him that she knew Sue’s mother well enough and that she felt like Sue was my only girlfriend. He eventually caved.
While Sue’s mother was sunbathing and reading her novel, we wandered further down than we should have on my mission to teach Sue how to spot shark teeth. Over time, we walked far enough that we couldn’t even see her mother’s chair. Deciding that finding shark teeth wasn’t Sue’s bag, we approached the water’s edge to cool off. We were only up to our mid-thighs when I suddenly felt the worst, most excruciatingly awful pain on the side of my leg. I ran out of that water like it was on fire. My leg
was
on fire. I had a jellyfish the size of a grapefruit stuck to my left shin, its tentacles wrapped around my calf muscle. It felt like a billion and one needles were stabbing me with poison all at once and I felt like I was going to die. Sue ran after me and used the plastic sand bucket that we were carrying to collect shells and shark teeth to scrape the murderous creature off of my skin. Crying hysterically and unable to do anything but shake with agony, Sue, without hesitation, pulled down her bathing suit bottom and peed all over my leg. I didn’t even have time to be grossed out before the instant relief hit me. It was helping. The burning sensation was still there, but lessened, and I was able to catch my breath.
“I swear to God, if you ever tell anyone that I did that, I will kill you!” she warned.
“How did you know that would help?” I asked, looking to my best friend in awe.