BELL
Dennis was so angry. I thought he’d kill me for sure this time. And when the world went black, I welcomed the final release from this earthly pain.
Only to wake up the next day….
Sore. Swollen. Only able to see out of one eye. But still alive.
This time, both arms were handcuffed to the bed I’d thrifted from the local Ruth’s House domestic abuse shelter’s annual charity drive.
Back then, I’d felt like a grateful survivor of DV while buying it.
This morning, I felt…
Nothing at all, actually. There would be no double summer wedding for me. No grandbabies. No ever seeing my daughters again. Because I’d failed.
Vacant Little Thing.
All that hoping stuff was over. The emotional numb settled back over me like a familiar blanket.
“You really don’t get it, do you?”
I looked over from my uncomfortably prone position to find Dennis sitting in one of the dainty yellow chairs I had picked for my kitchen table.
Back when I had a job. When I had freedom and my daughters’ respect.
All three of those things were gone now.
And apparently, so was Dennis’s patience.
The gun he’d threatened me with when he first arrived rested on his thigh. Black. Sleek. With a silencer attached.
“You’re only alive because I’ve decided to let you live, even after you fucked me over.” His voice took on a whiny, resentful note. “I had to sit in a jail cell for ten years because of you. Ten years eating powdered eggs and showering with twenty guys in one dirty bathroom. You owe me! You owe me for that. And if you ever, ever try to run from me again, I’ll?—”
“Do it.”
I stared at him dully, then said the four words I’d only thought before. “Just kill me already.”
“You think I won’t?” Dennis lurched up from the chair and stalked over to the bed to press the gun’s cold barrel into my temple. “You think I won’t do it?”
“No,” I answered without flinching, “I’m afraid you won’t.”
He blinked. Then sputtered, “Wha…What?”
“You’ve already taken everything from me,” I explained to him with the utter calm of someone who had no effs left to give. “Why would I care about keeping the life you’ve made worthless?”
Dennis’s jaw tightened. His chest rose and fell in sharp, quick breaths, openly seething.
But then… my new worst fear came true.
“No, I’m not going to kill you.” He lowered the gun. “I’m not letting you off that easy.”
He shook his head at me, eyes glittering with resentment. “No, Belly, I’m going to hurt you bad. Cut you. Show you what I learned in jail. Make you beg me to end your worthless?—”
A knock at the front door cut him off.
Both Dennis and I froze.
This was a coded building. All deliveries were either buzzed in or left downstairs. The rent was paid electronically to a landlord I hadn’t seen since signing my lease.
