I eat my food in silence. Peaceful with the fact there's no one here to hit me, scream at me, spit on me, or take my things away. Right now I'm just a woman sitting in a booth and enjoyingdinner. Right now, it's the best, most content feeling in the world.
Until it's not.
I spend the fifteen-minute drive home playing instrumental music to soothe myself; however, the feeling quickly morphs into dread when I pull into our little paved driveway and see the lights on in the front of the house. Brandon is home, and by the looks of it, he's still awake.
Dammit.
I blink back tears as I fight to keep my dinner down. I hadn’t wanted to deal with him tonight.I was having such a good day.
Walking into the house, I sit my purse and tote bag on the little kitchen counter. He's sitting on the couch in the living room, the television on and muted, and the resentful energy chokes me from twenty feet away. His face is hard, impassive, and he's holding a glass of something dark. Drunkagain.The stuff seems to seep out of his pores in a vile, sickly-sweet smell, making my stomach roll once again.
Pausing in the little entryway of the living room, I place a shaky hand on my tummy over the top of my purple blouse, willing the nerves to go away. I just have to get to these apartment tours.
God, help me get something and fast, please.
“Where the fuck have you been? You were supposed to be homehoursago.” The weary tone of Brandon's voice sends dread through me, his blood-shot eyes shooting to mine quickly as I force myself to remain silent.
The hairs on the back of my neck stand up as his energy begins to assault me. The hushed accusation lining his rough tone makes me nervous. I glance at him before hastily averting my eyes, feeling something different in his energy tonight. I wet my lip and shift my weight onto one foot, desperately wanting to put a door in between us. I push my hair behind my ear witha trembling hand and make myself speak loudly, confidently. Trying my hardest to make myself sound strong.
“I went for a late dinner and caught up on some work while I was eating.”
He grunts. Hard eyes drift down my body. "Since when have you ever had to catch up on anything, Mrs. Goody Two-Shoes? You think I'mstupid?"
"No. You're very smart, Brandon," I say flatly. "Always have been."
Feigning confidence, I take off my cardigan, draping it lightly over one of the two wooden stools at the peninsula off the kitchen. I flinch as Brandon gets up suddenly, slamming his cup down on our new glass living room table, spilling the contents onto the wood frame.
My eyes widen. Not wanting my new table to be ruined, I rip a paper towel off the roll that's on the peninsula and quickly hurry over to the spill to clean it up so the liquid won’t bubble the wood. As I bend over to wipe it, I yelp as Brandon’s hand shoots out and slaps me across the face.
White-hot pain reverberates through my head, and I fall with a hard thud on the floor, pulling my legs to my chest, and covering my head with my arms.
“Brandon, no! Why are you doing this to me?! Stop it! Please stoopp!I thought you loved me!”I sob.
Self-preservation kicks in, and I panic. Rolling over, I try to crawl toward the kitchen, thinking I should just get a kitchen knife and be done with this.
I'm only able to make it a few feet before my knees drag my skirt down. Shaking, I glance up in terror when the sound of his boots bring him closer to me, and I hastily reach a shaky hand back to grab the material so it won’t drag off my hips. But before I can, pain explodes across my back as he kicks me mercilesslyhard in the center of my spine, causing me to scream before it's cut off by the air shooting out of my lungs at the contact.
Sweat dots my upper lip as I shudder flat on my front and desperately heave, working to suck in another breath.
It's like breathing fire, it hurts so bad.
"Ugghh!"I grunt, my body jerking as he lands another kick to my hip.
He pulls his foot back again, making contact with my shoulder blade now. I screech in pain when he grinds the hard sole of his boot in, almost falling over me with the severity of his movements. "You fucking cheating,lyin' ass, bitch!"
In his anger he rears his leg back and kicks me again with a dull thump into my back, over andover.
"No, God, pleeaasse.Please stop it!"I scream, my eyes widening in fear, and my words coming out garbled with every blow into my back.
"Shut up!"Brandon yells.
I flinch hard as his boot bites into my ribcage once more. Yelping, I put my hands to my ears and curl inward, trying to close off my ears to the sounds of Brandon’s furious grunting as his blows land all over my body. Throwing out my arms, I drag myself, but it's no use. He kicks me repeatedly as I attempt with everything in me to crawl over the hardwood living room floor to the tile of the kitchen. By some grace of God, I make it and fall to my side.
He mercilessly ignores my screaming until I'm suddenly overcome with pain and vomit all over the kitchen floor.
Flopping to my side, my body gets hot, and I break out into a sheen of sweat as I lose control of the contents of my stomach. My screams cut off as he keeps kicking me while vomit pours from my mouth and through my nose, choking and gagging me.
Dry heaving now, I choke just as he delivers a nasty kick to my upper back, making me slide into the mess I’d made. An eeriesilence descends upon the house, only broken by my cries of anguish. He watches me, laying stunned in the aftermath of his fit of rage. I press shaky hands to my face in terror.
