"Why are you so quiet?" He slurred half drunkenly, ten minutes into the twenty minute drive that would take us to our temporary home. My nerves were already in a state of panic from him refusing to give me the keys despite his drunken state.
"After what you did, do you really think I have anything to say to you?" I asked through clenched teeth. I'd decided earlier in the evening to keep my mouth shut to avoid an argument, like I usually did. Plus the guilt of what I'd done weighed heavily on my heart as well, but the callousness he exhibited by even bringing himself to ask that question, triggered my immediate and confrontational response.
"What?" he asked innocently. Out the corner of my eye, I caught his indifferent shrug in the light of the glowing dash board.
"You know John." I bit coldly, "I've known since the day we were married that you run around on me. That doesn't surprise me. I knew you were a fucking dog when I married you. But to do it in front of me... To think it's okay to make me watch... That's a level of cold, heartless, thoughtless, wrong that I don't deserve and won't live with." I said honestly, staring at the road ahead of me, not trusting myself to look at him.
"Oh you won't live with it? Really?" He replied in that cold superior tone I'd come to both dread and hate over the years. It didn't surprise me a bit when he pulled the truck off onto the side of the road, pulled it into neutral and stomped the emergency brake.
I wasn't stupid, I knew that an apology would probably smooth things over but in that moment, I was so sick and tired of apologizing. I was so tired of being a door mat to him. I was exhausted with doing everything he asked and demanded in an attempt to be 'the prefect woman'. As he staggered slowly around the front of the truck, I knew that things would not end nicely.
I found myself tensing as he easily pulled the door open and grabbed my arm so hard that I thought the bones would break under his fingertips. He spun me to face him once he'd dragged me from the truck. I didn't bother putting up even a token protest as I felt his back hand come down hard across the side of my face, cutting the corner of my lower lip. I'd been so prepared for the strike, that my face didn't budge at all. I think that probably inflamed the situation a little more.
"Bitch..." he growled as his free hand wrapped its fingers ineptly around my neck. "I will tell you what you will and won't live with." I remember thinking how his slur was far less noticeable when he was angry.
I couldn't have stopped the smile that crossed my lips any more that I could have stopped the sun from rising. "Bitch?" I questioned interestedly. "You hit like a fucking bitch." I laughed, despite the fact that I was already beginning to taste the salty flavor of blood seeping into my mouth from my swelling lip. I seen more than felt his clenched fist coming toward my face beneath the dim street light.
That's also all I remember up until some hours later when I woke up cold, soaked with rain, and lying in a ditch just off the highway. I sat up in a dazed state for a few moments, desperately trying to gather my befuddled thoughts and recall the nights event. Shock that he would leave me like that was the biggest thought that weighed on me, until I started taking account of my appearance.
I couldn't piece together much. My blouse was torn open, one of my boots was lying a few feet away and my pants were only still covering one leg, my panties were no where in sight. That realization frightened me more than anything. Wondering if my husband was the reason my woman hood hurt so, or if a stranger had come along while I was unconscious and took liberties with me.
I saw my purse lying a few feet away from me caked in rain and mud. I laid back on the ground and stretched to reach it, I was in far too much pain to get to my feet just then. I dug out my cell phone praying that the water hadn't soaked through and damaged my phone. A painful sigh of relief slipped through my busted swollen lips as my screen lit up ready for service.
Instinctively, I dialed my parents number, never mind the fact that they were three hours away from me. All of my friends and family were. I didn't want to have to spend the next three plus hours out freezing in the rain waiting for some one to come that far.
Then another thought occurred to me. I couldn't call my parents. My finger froze on the send key. I couldn't let my father see me in the state I was in. I was his baby girl. If he had any clue how my husband treated me, my father would have been in prison years before that moment.
I'm still a little fuzzy on how the small white receipt with Hailey's number on it caught my attention laying on top of my other belongings, but it did. My hands trembled violently from the cold, the pain, and the anxiety of calling what amounted to a total stranger to ask her to come to my rescue. What she blew me off? I was scared, alone, and hurt, the chance seemed worth taking.
It stunned me, even to this day, how the sound of her breathing a sleepy 'hello' into the phone stilled the panic in my heart and mind. In that one moment, it was like every bad thing, thought, feeling, everything just disappeared and was placed with an odd sense of calm. It took a second for me to catch my breath enough to speak.
"Hey, um I know this is probably the strangest call you're going to get..." I breathed, surprised that my voice, though cracking, didn't sound too different than usual considering the circumstances.
"Cara?" she breathed, you could almost hear her bolting up in the bed with excitement. "I honestly didn't think you would call." she said honestly, the school girlish excitement in her voice making the butterflies that already filled my stomach go into over drive.
"I know that I'm asking a lot considering that you and I don't know each other all that well. But I kind of need a ride." I said, trying to suppress a cry as I sat up and felt a sharp stabbing pain in my side.
"I'll take you any where you want to go." she said sweetly, as I heard her moving about her room opening and closing drawers, getting dressed. "Where are you Baby?" she asked softly.
"I'm not really sure." I frowned. "I don't know the name of the high way."
"Wait... What?" she questioned confusedly. "Why are you on a high way?"
"It's a really long story Hailey." I breathed not knowing why I digressed from telling her the truth. If she came to get me, she was going to see the truth in blue and black marks all over me. "I'm pretty sure though that it's the high way that runs out front of the club heading towards Irwinton."
"Okay." she said slowly allowing the word to draw out screaming her uncertainty. "I think I'm about 15 minutes from you, I'm getting in the car now." her voice sounded grave and almost protective. "So you have 15 minutes to tell me a long story, so you don't have to do it when I get there."
"I'd rather not talk about it." I whimpered, tears flooding down my puffy cheeks. Finally the dam of tears I'd been fighting for a while burst.
