She folded her arms nervously looking around to see if
anyone noticed her. They did. Her hair was sticky and matted to her forehead in
an unconventional way, her eyes sat in a pool of tears and her shoulders
twitched from time to time. She clasped her hands in her lap and bent her head
down low so that the people passing by couldn’t see her face. She squeezed her
hands and then released immediately because of the jolt of pain that ran
through her fingers. She touched her face lightly and instead of her usual
creamy soft skin, she felt what felt like a bump on her cheek. She popped her
collar and sank further into her jacket. She looked out at the snow covered
street laid out in front of her blur as she sighed and a cloud of fog appeared.
For a moment, she smiled a small smile at the memory coming back to her.
“Sarah! Sarah! If you attack me with another one of those,
you’re dead!”
“What? This?”
“That’s it now I’m coming
at you with this gigantic snow ball. It’s perfect”
“Nothing is perfect. This
world will never be perfect”
“True but this moment
right here with you is pretty perfect..”
“Really?”
“Hah! Got you!”
She found it remarkable that she could still muster the
thought of those rare happy memories despite all that had happened. She clutched
onto the handle of her suitcase giving herself a few more minutes. Her hands
were frozen cold and the purple bruise on her hand stood out even more against
her pale skin. Her lower lip trembled. It was the same hand he had put their
engagement ring on. She knew she was stalling, she should have been gone by
now. This fact was confirmed when she saw him running up the street calling out
her name. She just sat there waiting for him to reach her.
“Sarah! I’m sorry please. Come back home. It’ll never happen
again”
“I know.” Lie.
“I don’t know what came over me, you pushed me too far. Why
must you argue?”
“I don’t know”
“Well I’m sorry but it wasn’t just my fault. Just come home,
I swear I won’t do it again”
“Okay.”
And she let him take her home. Again.
It is the saddest thing, when we can't break away from the things that cause us so much pain. Such a helpless feeling.
ReplyDelete“Nothing is perfect. This world will never be perfect”
ReplyDelete“True but this moment right here with you is pretty perfect..”
“Really?”
Her tinkling laughter wafted across the still winter air, joyous and oblivious. Oblivious to the perfection of this moment. She was an impossible, unnatural dollop of colour against the white landscape. The perpetually upturned corners of her lips extended in a smile as she made another snowball. WHY COULDNT SHE SEE THE PERFECTION IN THIS MOMENT? What was perfection? why couldnt it be a subtle fleeting feeling that titallated the senses yet left them strangley unsated.The slight touch of her skin against his as he put the ring on her finger. she never understood the perfection of such moments. But then she had never had to. Everything had always been so perfect for her,that perhaps she didnt understand the concept. He felt the familiar sinking feeling as he thought about the future, their future. He couldnt make it perfect for her, even if he wanted to. his thoughts were broken by the soft cold impact of the snow on his face.
He packed the snow even tighter, wound up and let go with all his might....
The connection was sickening, his knuckles hurt as they smashed against her cheek.He drew back and came again but she shielded her face with her hand. He cursed as he hit the ring on her finger and moved forward to strike again. But then she lowered her arm and looked back at him and he was transfixed by her face. By the thin line of blood seeping from her cheek, across the blooming crimson imprint of his hand like a river of blood on the fractured map of their life.
She looked stunned..her eyes, large ovals of disbelief, her face vulnerable, hurt, lost. The first tear rolled down her cheek burning a track of guilt and pain across his heart, making him hate himself even more. But then the facade broke, her face contorted in pain and hate, became that of a stranger. She tried gto say something but couldnt, choking on her anger and pain. ... "You.... you......son....." but it didnt take her long to regain her voice.
He stared at her, uncomprehending,..the words should have stirred him, provoked him into doing something more foolish.... but they had lost their meaning. lost their significance. The only thing that mattered was the hate on her face. Raw, scathing, irreparable. How could so trivial an argument lead to this? How and whn had they become so different? He stumbled out of the room, buffeted by the unrelenting tide of her hate.
when he came back she had left. He called out, searched for her frantically. He hated himself for what he had done, felt guilty, but this was not the first time that they had argued on the subject. He knew he couldnt ever make things as perfect as she wanted, even if he wanted to, yet she failed to understand, to consider. He looked down at his bruised knuckle. It would heal, so would the mark on her face but her words had again logded somehwere deep inside,smouldering,inextinguishable and inextricable just like those small moments of perfection. He ran towards the door........
"Why must you argue?”
“I don’t know”
"Just come home, I swear I won’t do it again”
“Okay.”
And he took her home. Again.
Nothing makes abuse okay. No matter how pathetic or vulnerable or useless a man feels. Nothing justifies it.
DeleteThis was not meant to be an endorsement of abuse, absolutely not. Just 1 of a million different scenarios that can precede such a situation. The resulting abuse is always unwarranted and evil. I just played out a "possible" cause not the "most probable" cause. Also, while physical abuse is abhorrent in all its forms, we often ignore the far more damaging psychological abuse that is often present in such situations and is not always unilateral. Domestic abuse (barring extreme cases which get reported) is not always a product of pure hatred, greed or sexual domination as its usually portrayed but can have its roots in multiple reasons, ranging from extremely mundane ones like differences in opinion, lack of compatibility to more pervasive ones like illiteracy (applicable to both sexes) and economic woes and like all other areas of human interaction apportioning blame on a single party is a simplistic and naive solution.
DeleteRegardless, my apologies if i offended anyone with the piece. It just stoked my imagination and i wrote a speculative piece about a "possible" scenario that could've have tarnished what seemed to be a previously healthy relationship. It was not intended to justify any position or elicit sympathy or even empathy, although i feel the latter is always something we can use more of.
Don't have the guts to post as who you really are?
ReplyDeleteI am sorry if i touched a raw nerve or offended your sensibilities with the piece. That was absolutely not the intention. I can empathize with your POV. It was not meant to be an argument, justification or apology for abuse. If you have mistaken me for someone then i am definitely not the person, just a random visitor.
DeleteI was greatly impressed by the profundity of the piece
and(barring the repetitious use of she in the opening paragraph :))its coherent construction and just wrote another POV of the story. Write more often!
Sad but true. Happens almost all the time, and the girl always goes back to go through some more misery, for various reasons, even though she doesn't deserve any of it. :-)
ReplyDelete