20. Hiding the Truth

I stopped by the mirror in the bathroom on the way out to let Shay and Mike up. Not so bad. It wasn’t that obvious, I thought after a quick scan for damage. It was dark in our apartment, though. All the lights were out. I stepped out into the hallway and my eyes took a couple of seconds to adjust. I practiced covering my mouth with my hand as I walked down the stairs, in a yawn. No that would only draw attention. I got downstairs and walked to the door as naturally as I could without looking head on, positioning myself so that my profile would hide the busted lip on the left side of my face.

I could see Shay and Mike standing at the glass doors. I opened them and before they even stepped in, I saw the look on Shay’s face. Mike’s mouth dropped.

“What happened?”She said.

“We got into it,”I admitted, adding nervously, “he didn’t hit me.”

“He didn’t hit you?” My sister looked at me incredulously. “You sure about that?”She fingered the swell on my lip.

“Shay,” I locked eyes with her convincingly, “You think I’m bout to let a man hit on me?” The irony.

“I tried to push him and hit one of those big closets up there,” I continued. There had been pushing and shoving.

“It’s over now, everybody’s calmed down, but ... I hate to ask this, it’s just ... been so crazy with us lately.” I stammered nervously.

“What?” Shay hurried me along.

“Can you guys stay at a hotel tonight? I’m so sorry to even ask. I just really think it’ll be more comfortable for everybody.”

“Yeah, if you come with us,” Shay retorted.

“No, I can’t do that,” I began.

“It wouldn’t be any trouble. Bring the baby,” Mike added.

“No, that would just make things worse. I need to stay here tonight,” I said. “He’d never let me take the baby with me, anyway. Not now.”

“I don’t feel good about this, Mel. I know he’s not gonna try shyt with Mike here. Just let us stay tonight and we’ll get you out of here in the morning when he goes to work,” Shay said.

All of the sudden we were hatching plans of escape. The hallway was bare with a high ceiling. It resounded in unforgiving echoes.

“Shay, really, it’s not that bad. It was an accident and it’s over now. We gotta get out of this hallway, my neighbors can hear everything.”

I’d left the door to the apartment cracked. We walked in and I did not turn the lights on. I stood in the living room with Mike as Shay went to the bedroom to gather her things.

She later told me she and BD had this exchange:

“Hey, BD. Can I turn the light on?” she’d asked entering the bedroom. The door had not been closed.

BD was rocking the baby in the glider, facing the open doorway leading to the living room.

“I’d rather you not,” he said flatly.

“Well it’s dark and I can’t really see,” Shay said reaching for the switch. The room brightened.

She took a few minutes getting her things together quickly from my closet on the wall right next to BD. And with her bag in hand looked at him and said, “Well good night. We’re going to a hotel.”

He hadn’t said a word, short of asking her not to turn the lights on. 
---

Shay rushed out into the living room with a twisted face.

“He is weird,” she mouthed exaggeratedly in a whisper. What is wrong with him? Why is he acting like that?”

The front door was already open. I put my hand on her back and softly pushed her over the threshold. Mike went after.

“Mel,” she said one last time. She was asking me again to go with them.

“It’s okay,” I said, this time forcing a half smile that I’d hoped would make her comfortable enough to just go.

That night, I lay in bed with the baby spread eagle lying asleep in between me and BD. We'd taken to sleeping like this. The baby between us kept me from having to brush up against him at night and it kept him from brushing up against me. The thought of him touching me made me cringe. We hadn't been romantic since near the time I found out I was pregnant and the baby was almost eight months old now. That's a long time. His advances had become less frequent but I was no less disgusted at the thought.

Sometimes, I'd sleep on the futon in the living room just to get away. He forbade me from taking the baby with me, though. I don't think he was really scared I'd actually tiptoe off in the night. I think he just wanted to make his position very clear about the difference between my leaving and my leaving with my son. Though one may have been inevitable, the other was an impossibility.

That night though, as I lay awake thinking about how quickly this weekend had deteriorated, I still hadn't made up my mind to go. The inevitable, though, was fast approaching. 

For all my attempts to rush Mike and Shay upstairs into the darkness, I had no idea how thankful I’d be for those couple of minutes when not one, but two people had seen me, disheveled and bruised just moments after one of BD’s black-outs. That night, under the harsh florescent light in our building’s foyer would be the only evidence, ever, to back the claims I’d later officially make of emotional and physical abuse. I wouldn’t know the importance of that day until almost a year later.

As it appeared that things were falling apart, they were really lining up into place.

 Originally posted March 13, 2008