Read part one here.
Things got better after that. The late-night phone calls ended and she started reading again, an activity she had neglected the past few months. Her eyes got brighter and we were able to talk easily just like we used to, before it all began. We went back to spending weekdays in class and the library and weekends splitting our time between secondhand stores and garage sales. She found a hideous wooden chair that she claimed would be perfect for our dining room. I made the mistake of second guessing her and she spent the rest of the day sanding and painting it.
“See, I told you Jenna. It was just a rough patch,” she said as she took a step back to admire her work. I knew she was talking about more than just the chair, which was now a soft white and matched perfectly with our decor.
“Yeah, yeah, whatever.”
“You don’t need to worry about me so much. I’m a big girl.”
“I just wish you saw yourself the way I do.”
“God, you sound like you’re in love with me or something.”
“Oh no, was I that obvious?” I gasped, grabbing my chest in mock surprise.
She smiled at me, punching me in the arm, and I couldn’t help but smile back. I helped her readjust our room to include our new piece of furniture and we celebrated with pizza rolls, French fries, and Diet Coke. We called it our Feast of Champions, and I remember looking at her and thanking God for such a beautiful friend.
I got home late from a work event a few nights later, and I could hear screaming from the parking lot. I came rushing through the door. I found him and her in the kitchen. The whole apartment reeked of booze and sweat. Her shoulders were slumped, and she turned her face away from me, trying to hide the fact that she had been crying. He stood towering over her, his hand gripping her arm. He looked down and removed his hand, turning to face me. I could see the marks on her arm from the doorway. We stood there for a minute, just staring. I wondered how this one person who could cause someone else so much joy and happiness, could also cause them so much pain.
“Is everything okay here?”
“Everything is fine,” he spoke.
“I wasn’t talking to—“
“Jenna, everything is fine. I promise.” She still refused to look at me.
“Pinky—“
“Yes, pinky swear.”
I went back to our room and put in headphones and pulled out my laptop. I heard a door slam, and she came in a few minutes later. I could tell she didn’t want to talk about it, so I didn’t push her. We sat there for the rest of the night, both pretending to be working on homework, both knowing that things were slipping out of control.
The next morning she sat with me on the porch and handed me a cup of coffee. I tried not to stare at the bruises on her arm.
“We broke up.”
“Okay.”
“You were right.”
“Okay.”
“It wasn’t okay the way he was treating me. Things got out of hand. You told me so, and I didn’t listen, and you were right and now its over.”
“Okay.”
“I’m not my mother.”
“I didn’t say that.”
“He’s not like my father. Or the others, this time I’m through.”
“I said okay.”
“Are we okay?”
I took the coffee and sipped. She tried to hold eye contact to prove to me that she wasn’t scared, but I could see her knee shaking, and I knew it wasn’t from the cold.
“Are you okay?”
“Of course I am. I pinky promised.”
We smiled, and she grabbed my hand.
“You didn’t put in enough sugar.”
“Seriously, Jenna, we were having a moment!”
We both laughed and it was forgotten. Just like that he was forgotten. I was ready to finally have my best friend back. I was ready for her to feel beautiful again.
After work the next day I stopped by the store and bought a bag of frozen pizza rolls, French fries, and a case of Diet Coke-- all the ingredients for another Feast of Champions. I even stopped by Connie’s Custard and grabbed a carton of Connie’s Triple Fudge Brownie ice cream for dessert. I considered stopping to rent a movie as well, but decided I was taking too long and I didn’t want her to start to worry, which she usually did if I was running late and didn’t call.
I could see the police lights before I ever turned onto our street.
The police report said that she let him in willingly. He said he just wanted to stop by and say farewell before heading back home. He said that she told him that he couldn’t stay and that he needed to be gone by the time that I got home from work. It upset him that after two years she wouldn’t give him just fifteen more minutes. He began to yell, and she kept expressing that he needed to leave. That was when he grabbed the bottle of whisky. He hit her twenty four times, once for each month that they were together. He called it closure; the police called it attempted murder.
I dropped all my classes and moved in with my parents while they finished cleaning all the blood from the carpet. The stains wouldn’t come off the wallpaper, so it took them longer to repaint. I tried to visit her in the hospital but I couldn’t bear seeing her hooked up to all those tubes and machines. I took one look and I turned around and ran out of the hospital. It was just too hard, all of it was just too hard.
I miss her more and more every day. I kept all her books and old hand me down clothes, and tried my best to mask the acidic smell of bleach that now coated every inch of our living room. Every morning I sit in our white, wooden chair and stare at the spot where he beat her. I sip my coffee and run through every minute of their relationship in my head analyzing every stupid thing I did wrong. I should have come straight home, I should have forced her to stop seeing him, I should have just done more. Deep down I blame myself, but even deeper down I know its not my fault.
She was a beautiful girl who loved ugly things. A beautiful girl now confined to a hospital bed. The doctors say they don’t know if she’ll wake up, but I still have hope. She tried so hard to fix him, but she just couldn’t understand that people can’t be fixed the way that objects can. I know that, because no matter how much sugar I put in my coffee, it still tastes bitter.
