Shattered

Warning advisory- this story contains themes of domestic violence and miscarriage.

‘Pour me a glass of poison!' he would call coming through the door and

like the good little wife I was, I would run to do his bidding.

I now stare at him, wondering if I have made the right choice.

Too late to go back now…he would only follow and I would be forever looking over my shoulder, second guessing each blonde male that caught my eye.

I relax against the cushion at my back and watch as he settles back in his seat and begins to loosen his tie. I’ve already poured him his drink- one of my many domestic chores that keeps him pleased- for now.

The drinking has become heavier and another tool for him to wield. The alcohol an insidious friend that follows him out of restaurants and business lunches, and back to our house, changing his persona with each glass. The look on his face will go from relaxed merry, to suspicious ugly when he’s halfway through his favourite bottle…then I become his favourite toy.

How often in the past had I glanced at magazines, or caught a show, detailing the horror and stories of domestic abuse victims? How naive i had been to turn away, as if this was a piece of fiction that would never dare enter my happy middle-class upbringing.

No longer do I turn away.

I have walked that path barefoot on shards of my former self- she that has been buried under bruises and beatings so vicious, I forget on the best of days who that person was.

If there had been red flags at the start of our relationship, I had not only ignored them but set them on fire with the passion I had felt for him. Masks were peculiar things…after years of

being his wife I watched him slip on those charming masks, hating myself for being as susceptible as our friends and family for believing the facade he wore with such conviction.

I pick at my chipped nail, knowing if he see’s, there will be punishment. He likes me to be perfect.

His need for perfection is compulsive and sweeps throughout the landscape of our life.

The house, the cars…the decor.

Me.

He had once told me that I existed solely for him. My autonomy was gone after the first year of our marriage. So slowly eradicated that I hadn’t noticed until my thirtieth birthday.

His choices had become my choices. Until the choice that had set in motion a liberation that I could have lived without, had the outcome of what caused it not transpired.

Had he shown the slightest remorse my choice on this day may have yielded a different outcome, but he had laughed at my despair.

‘It would have ruined your figure.’

He had ruined my soul.

I’m not brave enough to leave. But I have allowed myself to drift from this reality and the showroom cool grey of our pristine living room. I feel out of body as I sit on the beautiful but uncomfortable couch.

I hate this couch…he had dragged me from it on many occasions to administer his punishments. All except the last one – the final one that had shattered something which I thought had already been broken.

Hope.

There was only one thing I wanted desperately now. I didn’t require hope, or miracles or prayers.

Only myself.

I needed no one for this task.

I look at him.

He is handsome and intelligent…but empty. I imagine a glimpse inside his head would be like treading ice water or looking into the blackness of space without the light of the stars.

He leans back in his armchair, amber liquid swirling as he plays with the glass. I can almost taste his breath from here.

Have tasted it.

The sickness burns its way up and I swallow it back down. I am cool on the outside. Inside my body feels like tectonic plates slamming together-pressure rising and fighting to crack the surface. I refuse for the surface to break. It’s what he wants.

‘Elizabeth said you weren’t at the store today…a headache?’

I had been expecting this. I was also certain he’d asked Elizabeth to take me on so he could have another set of eyes on me. She was always watching…almost bird like, that red small mouth of hers a beak that chirped nonsense at me until my shift ended.

‘I had a migraine.’ a half truth. I had woken up with the lingering effects of yesterdays headache but it had gone by the time I finished showering. By the time I was ready and gotten behind the wheel I had decided I wouldn’t be going into work. I had gone to the cemetery instead.

‘Yet, you left the house.’

He raises a blonde brow, and I am filled with a sudden rage to grab the whisky bottle and hit him with it, until I can no longer differentiate his features from one to another.

Instead I shrug.

‘I needed my prescription.’

How I could lie so easily to him. I had become an expert at it the last few years.

When the cold had seeped in and not left me. When he had taken the last bit of warmth and ripped it from me. Those elegant hands of his that could perform miracles on the operating

table had taken my miracle and ended it with vicious blows- and he had smiled when doing it.

Today I might smile.

He tipped the glass back- and I watch his throat work as he finishes the last of the golden liquid.

Where had I gone?

This monster had warped me, cell by cell…with words and fists.

I watched calmly as surprise washed across those perfect features.

Then panic.

The glass slipped from his hand, and those elegant fingers began to claw at his throat. I allowed myself to relax- this was my happy ending- this was justice for our unborn child.

‘Wh-wh-what have youuu d-done?!’ foam dribbled from the corners of his mouth as his eyes began to glaze.

‘Only what you asked. I’ve poured you a glass of poison.’

I felt no regret as I watched the last gasping breath shudder from his twitching frame.

His body slumped forward, and the glass fell, splintering as it hit the polished floor.

I had become the monster he had made me.