Violet sobbed louder and slammed her fists against her thighs, “Two years, Sage! Two years I gave that cheating son of a bitch! And instead of getting a proposal, I have to be thinking about getting tested for sexually transmitted diseases!” She took a deep, shaky breath and started bawling again. “What am I going to do?” she wailed. I noticed,we all did, the big pink elephant of him hitting her in the face wasn’t what she was upset about. Truthfully, I’d had a sneaking suspicion for a while that he sometimes knocked her around, but whenever I tried to talk to her about it, she would just deny everything. Even though we all worked together, I wasn't very close with the girls. I was more of a loner.
“Wecouldkill him,” Sky shrugged, smiling at me. Her perfectly sculpted, dark eyebrows were arched, waiting for my response.
Putting my fingers around Violet’s wrists, I gently lifted her up off the floor, “Come with me for a sec, Vi.”
“How am I supposed to forgive him?”
“Forgive him?Ah, no way. Vi, you’ve got toforget him. You don’t forgive someone who physically hurts you. They don’t deserve it, and they’ll just do it again.”
I pulled her into my studio and handed her a lollipop out of my candy container. I always run to food when things go wrong.
Or go right.
Or just go.
Shut up; don’t judge me.
Anyway, while she was unwrapping the candy I grabbed my boxing gloves off the hook that hung from my workout corner next to my punching bag. I dangled them in front of her face and smiled at her.
She held up the round, pink lollipop, looked at it, and started crying again, “Lollipops always remind me of having sex with Matt.”
“What? Seriously?” I laughed. “What? Does he have a really round, tiny dick?”
“No. It’s just that he’s not going to be around anymore for me to, you know, have his lollipop. I was used to having a lollipop at least four nights a week,” she whined, the honesty dripping from each word.
That’s it, right there, that sentence comes out of Violet’s sad, little mouth, and my poor lonely girl parts start fantasizing about strangling the horny bitch. Four nights a week! I never got it four nights a week from Bren,ever.
“Hey, you know my favorite thing about having a lollipop is biting and gnawing off the edges of the sucker and crushing them with my teeth. Especially if it’s cheating and domestic violence flavored,” I growled out a sarcastic joke.
Violet looked at me and laughed. “I just feel like such a loser, like I lost the popularity contest. I wasn’t better than the hooch dressed up like a school girl.”
“Vi, there are no winners in relationships—there are just survivors. Now, I’m going to show you how to punch that bag like it's that jerk’s face, because if he ever hits you again, I want you to know you have the power to hit him right back.”
I shoved my sparring gloves over each of her hands and tightened the Velcro on them while she crunched the sucker to pieces in her mouth. Yes, I know not many normal women have a punching bag and sparring gloves on hand, but it’s one of the things I do to de-stress and work out. And someone showed me a long time ago that every girl needs to learn how to throw a punch. And throw it well. With rage and vengeance behind each blow.
“Okay, Vi. Ball your fists up tight and do not bend your wrists.” I demonstrated with my hands. “Hold your hands in front of your face, like this, and give me a little slow jab like this…” I punched the bag softly with my right hand, keeping my left hand blocking my face.
Violet mimicked my stance and punched the bag gently.
“Now, punch a little harder, Violet.”
She punched the bag again with the same gentleness and sighed, “I can’t do this, Sage; I’m not a mean person. Matt didn’t mean to hit me, and he’s been asking me for so long to dress up like a little school girl, but I haven’t and…this has got to be a mistake…”
I watched Violet turn the whole messed up situation around and place all the blame on herself. I desperately wanted to grab her in my arms and shake the stupid right out of her. “Cheating on someone is a choice, not a mistake, Vi. Mattchoseto have sex her. But that’s not why you should forget him. Forget him because he alsochoseto hit you. You were nothing more than this punching bag to him.”
She looked at me wide-eyed.
“Hit the bag, Vi.” I got close up to her face. “Don’t pretend this was the first time. You deserve flowers and candy, Violet, not punches and bruises.”
She hit the bag harder, and a small whimper escaped through her lips. “He’s a bastard,” she sobbed as she hit it over and over, landing punches harder and harder each time. “I HATE HIM!” she screamed, slamming her gloved fists against the bag.
I threw a punch alongside her. “You know, Matt doesn’t deserve you, Vi. It hurts to be cheated on, and I know you feel alone, but don’t spend any more tears on a guy who doesn’t love you like you deserve to be loved. It’s going to take some time, but trust me, you’ll forget about him, and someday, it won’t hurt so badly anymore…”
Then she went all Rambo on my bag and kicked the crap out of it. I stepped back and let her get it all out. The vibrations of the bag against the chain it hung from resonated against the walls, and all the little knickknacks on my shelves started jumping around and falling. I cheered her on, screaming her name, until a loud crash of a falling picture broke her from her wrath.
“Oh crap, Sage. Sorry,” she said, picking the frame up off the floor. Strangely enough, the glass hadn’t shattered. “I always wanted to ask you about this picture,” she said through heavy pants.
I scanned the old photo in its pewter frame, and a thick band of steel tightened around my chest. It was the last full day of summer vacation before sixth grade, and we were sitting in the tree house, all three of us. We were all ten and inseparable. On one side of me stood Jase, sticking up his middle finger at the camera, and on the other side of me was Joey, with his eyes crossed and tongue sticking out. My arms were around both of their shoulders—a giant goofy smile plastered across my face. The photograph captured us perfectly, full of fierce affection for each other, always laughing and joking together. There was an awe-inspiring relationship between the three of us, as it always is with innocent children, before there is any darkness in their lives.
