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I couldn’t just leave; I shut my car off, leaving it hidden, and I tried my best to stay caught up with her vehicle through the wooded area, thankful that it wasn’t terribly crowded. A man met her outside, stopped her before she got to the large porch, while I stayed hidden just beyond the treeline.

Shouting, his voice slurred with alcohol and thick rage. “Where the hell have you been? You were supposed to be home at five!”

Her response was too quiet to make out, but his reaction wasn’t. The sound of a hand meeting flesh sounded across the yard like a cannon. Then her cry, small, pained, and trying to stay quiet.

Everything in me went cold, yet burning hot at the same time, when they moved their fight inside. I followed without a conscious thought, carrying me up the steps of her porch, my vision tunneling until all I could see was the door, and all I could hear was the voices inside.

“I’m sorry—you know it takes a while to get back home!”

“Don’t lie to me! You think I’m fucking stupid? You think I don’t know what you’re really doing?”

My fist raised to pound against the door, to punch it down, to do whatever it took to make the guy stop hurting her. But when I heard them again, something in her tone made me stop.

“I was listening to my book in the car, honey. Look, I can show you, it’s still pulled up—”

She was managing him, de-escalating the situation. Me bursting through the door acting as an avenging angel would only make things worse for her when I left.

I was strong, but had no real plan beyond wanting to hurt the person hurting her. I would obviously obliterate that motherfucker, but then what?

So I stood there, trembling with impotent rage, listening to the sound of my own breaking and the man’s voice getting quieter.

“Don’t fucking embarrass me like that again. You understand?”

A quiet ‘yes’ in response that made my soul bleed.

“Clean yourself up and lose the attitude.”

Footsteps, the sound of a door slamming, then silence.

I stayed on the porch for twenty minutes, watching through the windows dim light as shadows moved inside the house. Then I finally saw her silhouette pass by the window and heard the sound of laughter, as if that fight hadn’t happened just a short while ago. I forced myself to leave, but I didn’t actually go far.

The spot I stood in earlier, hidden in the trees, became my spot, where I could see her window. I was settling into the environment, taking my place as the world’s most pathetic guardian.

Her light stayed on until almost midnight. Sometimes I would see her shadow again and tell myself that as long as she was moving, she was okay.

When her light finally shut off, I walked back to the road where I’d ditched my car, her pencil burning a hole in my pocket, and a new understanding of life settling in.

Protecting her wasn’t going to be as simple as standing between her and the world. The devil lived inside her world, shared her bed, and probably told her that he loved her between the bruising and threats.

But I was determined to do it. I wasn’t sure how; I needed to make a plan, and somehow I was going to figure out how to get her out of there. Even if it killed me.

25

Darling

The highway to Vegas shimmers under the afternoon sun, heat waves rising from the asphalt. I slouch in the passenger seat, legs propped up on the dashboard, and a floral dress flowing around my legs. The polyester material is itchy against my skin, but it was the nicest thing we could manage to find.

Vegas looms, a wild promise in the distance; a mirage of neon and fake grandeur where reality bends at the edges. At least on TV, they make it seem like Vegas is a place where no one asks too many questions about where you came from and what you had done to get there.

“You ever been?” I ask, turning from the window to face my soon-to-be husband.

The desert wind through the open window has tousled his dark hair, and there is a peaceful energy in the way he holds the steering wheel, unlike all the days before. He’s driving toward something, instead of away.

He shakes his head, a slight smirk playing at the corner of his mouth. “My family did the Tahoe thing. Clean mountain air, respectable gambling. Vegas wasn’t really their taste.

“Perfect. It’ll be our first time together.”

He looks over, one eyebrow raised in a way that makes my stomach flutter, especially after the morning we’d had together.