Monday 16 December 2013

November 25, 2012

There was knocking-- my heart pounded with each tap at my door. Police I thought.  Images of my husband in handcuffs darted through my head.

I covered my half naked body with a blanket. My clothes had been torn off hours before; his hand had grasped around the collar of my shirt as I tried to get away, tearing it clean off my body. I was thankful it wasn't my hair. Eventually it would be that too.

My pants came off as he dragged me backwards towards the bedroom by the leg of my pajamas. Later he would use them to shove into my face. Nearly suffocating me; the smell of that laundry detergent still prompts flashbacks.

The knocking continued. Four or five more times.  He answered.

I lied there wearing some scraps of clothing and fresh, swollen bruises. Hand prints stained my skin--it looked like dye. Fake.

I heard my mother. "Where is she"  she entered without needing a response. I pulled my cover tighter around me. The light wisp of the blanket against my skin stung.

I saw K. Parka and boots were all I seem to remember now. My head spun and buzzed and I realized how disoriented I was. Before this moment it felt like a wild dream. My imagination. But here I was.

As I sat upright my knee shot with pain. Tight like an elastic stretched too far.

I remember little. A last scared glance at his face.  He was scared too.  Grabbing my blue bag. The one I kept for emergencies.  K hugging me as she put me in the front seat of her Pontiac.  The ice. The bandaids.  The cover up...

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