You Don't Have to Have Anything

“So, how are you feeling lately?” the doctor asked and, for the first time in her life, Maria answered that question honestly. When she felt the familiar tears starting in the corners of her eyes, she didn’t blink them away but let them fall. Then, shakily, she told the doctor everything.

Monday mornings, although hated by cartoon cats and most of her coworkers, were Maria’s source of relief. She’d sink into her chair and pull from her pocket that tiny black notebook, her friend and confidant over the past muddled year. Opening to the bookmarked page, she smiled at the sight of a cute leafy doodle encircling the words “YOU get it girl!” On the opposite page were the other inspirational quotes she’d written for herself just after her diagnosis three months ago.

“Sounds like you have General Anxiety Disorder,” Dr. Ajele had said.

For Maria, this disorder started slowly in the mornings. She felt physically paralyzed and, over time, that feeling had stretched into late afternoons. Soon, she was second-guessing each decision, every action a fight between mind and her own body. She was forgetting how to make the most basic of choices - and forgetting other things as well. Short term memory loss. That was the symptom that scared her the most.

“A lot of people see success with meditation,” Dr. Ajele had said. “Personally, I like the app called Insight Timer. And you’ll want to do some rigorous cardio exercise at least three times a week. That will fill your brain with good chemicals - dopamine, serotonin - they help you fight anxiety, stay awake, keep motivated.”

Maria nodded, and began to write down the doctor’s suggestions in the pages of her leatherbound friend.

Looking at the notebook now, she read the words she’d scrawled then: meditation, cardio, medicine - cipralex/sertraline.

“It’s not a mind over matter situation,” the doctor had explained. “You can’t will the chemicals in your brain to function properly. It’s like someone taking heart medication. Our bodies are flawed, and need help sometimes. Right now, your body is in survival mode, producing too much cortisol, which is affecting your memory.”

Maria nodded. When had the tears started again? Had they ever stopped?

“Without meds, your symptoms could get worse, and you could start noticing other physical issues.”

Maria opened her pill bottle, and popped one in her mouth, as she flipped a few pages forward and saw a phone number there. The bank where she’d opened her private account. Monday morning was usually the time she checked that account, given that she couldn’t access it at home, not with Ahmad obsessively checking her search history.

He said he did it for them, to make sure they could trust each other. She hadn’t trusted him for years.

Soon after they married, Ahmad suggested merging their bank accounts. He’d said it so lovingly. “I can manage the finances. That way, you don’t have to worry about anything.”

Her savings dwindled from thirty thousand, all the way down to two. It only took a year of Ahmad’s habit of chasing one ill-advised “business venture” after another.

She’d tried to stop him, to speak to him. But always, his guilt and manipulation put her back in her place. You don’t have to worry about anything. You don’t have to have anything. You don’t have to think at all.

There was a mistake in her private account. A twenty thousand dollar mistake.

On Friday, she’d had a little over a thousand dollars hidden away there. Now, the number on the screen read $21,053.92, thanks to a mysterious transfer. The name on the transfer was a line of gibberish, just numbers and letters that meant nothing to her.

She was on the phone to her bank in seconds, but they assured her the transfer was legitimate.

A familiar tingle of fear creeped through Maria’s body. What had she forgotten? But before she could consider any further, Dave from Sales knocked on her cubicle wall.

“The Monday meeting’s starting. They got the good donuts again.”

Maria tried a convincing smile and a quip. “They know that’s the only reason we show up.”

Then, she slid her notebook into her pocket, and followed Dave towards the conference room.

Speaking to anyone hadn’t been easy during the bad times, but now Maria found herself easily making small talk. She noticed she was slowly rediscovering her old self, as she spoke more with Ellen, her therapist, and her wife Sheila. During their chats, she was the one who enjoyed life and laughed a little too much.

Returning to her desk, Maria realized she had forgotten her phone, which sat face-up on her desk, notifications screaming out at her.

Three missed calls.

All Ahmad.

Swamped by the fear of what he would say and the shame at having worried him, she almost called him back immediately. But that was what he wanted. She recalled the words on the second-last page of her notebook, “coercive control.”

“Have you heard of coercive control, Maria?” Ellen had asked, during their first day of therapy together.

Maria shook her head.

“It’s any control that a partner tries to take in a relationship. An abuser relies on holding power over their victim. Power over their finances, food, employment, access to transit. They’ll try anything to keep that control. Emotional abuse, minimizing, denying, intimidating, blaming the victim. Does that sound familiar at all?”

“You don’t need to worry about anything,” Maria muttered.

“Pardon?”

“Something Ahmad always says, every time he takes something away from me. Like he’s doing me a favour. Like taking over my bank account, or selling my car. He said we needed the money. But, you don’t have to worry about taking transit or walking. I’ll drive you wherever you need to go. And if I wanted to go alone, then what husband would he be if he didn’t take care of his wife?”

Ellen nodded thoughtfully. “Everyone deserves their own freedom of choice.”

“The only way I’d have that is if I left him.”

Maria was shocked at her own words, how easily they tumbled out. There it was. The thing she’d known all along. The only happy ending available to her now.

“But I can’t,” she said, her voice almost a whisper now. “Not on my own.”

“There are people who can help in situations like this,” Ellen explained. “Social workers.”

“Know any good ones?” Maria said, sniffing away a stray tear.

Ellen smiled. “As it happens, I’m married to one.”

When Ahmad got angry, he didn’t shout or call Maria names. He simply spoke with a cool calm voice, saying the most irrational things as if they were clear and logical.

“I’d like you to explain why I had to call you three times for you to pick up,” he said.

“I left my phone on my desk,” Maria replied, “and I was in a meeting. I’m sorry.”

“It hurts me when I have to worry about what you’re doing or who you’re with. If your job is too much for you, maybe you don’t need to work as-”

“My job isn’t too much for me,” she hissed back into the phone, “I’m not-”

I’m not letting you spend the rest of our money all over again, was what she had been about to say. She had stopped herself just in time. If she started shouting at him about money, she was liable to mention the mysterious funds and she didn’t dare do that.

He continued on along his usual diatribe and never mentioned money again. Good. That meant the transfer had nothing to do with him and her secret account remained a secret. If that money had ended up in Ahmad’s hands, he’d have flushed it away, as he had with all those other well-crafted turds he called “investment opportunities.”

“I have to go call a client,” Maria said, interrupting Ahmad.

“Ok, Goodbye, sweetie. I love you.”

“Love you too,” she said, her jaw popping as it clenched.

“I do love him,” Maria admitted. “I shouldn’t, but I do.”

Sheila sighed. “That’s human nature, darling. We can’t control who we love or how we feel. But we can choose what we do about it.”

That was the day they did the math. It would take eighteen thousand dollars for Maria to leave Ahmad. The number was a punch in the gut. How long would take to hide away that much money?

“I opened a new bank account,” she told Sheila, “like you said. It wasn’t easy, with what he’s done to my credit score…”

“And Ahmad doesn’t know, right? It’s important he doesn’t know your plans, or he’ll fight to keep you under control. When it comes to someone with such a pattern of economic abuse, we can’t give any opening, any control over your finances.”

Maria nodded. “No one has the account number but work. Even then, I told them to keep sending my paycheck to the joint account. Ahmad checks every pay day.” She took a deep breath, clearing the memory of that day away. “Eighteen thousand dollars, Sheila? Where am I going to get that much money?”

Maybe it was Sheila, Maria considered. They had spoken about grants for women looking to escape abusive relationships, but she said those usually went to women with children.

Only at lunch did she get a chance to call Sheila, who swore that she and Ellen knew nothing about the money. And just like that, Maria was out of ideas. Was it a mistake? Or was it a miracle? She wanted to believe in that. Maybe Allah had really heard her prayers, the begging ones that she’d prayed during her time of anxiety. Maybe, she thought, I’m Jesus 2.0. At that, she could hear her mom’s tutting in the back of her head and it made her smile.

The day dragged on and Maria knew she wouldn’t be able to spend the money freely if she thought the error might be corrected at any moment. As five o’clock rolled around, she turned off her computer and collapsed on her desk, rubbing her temples.

“Hey, what are you still doing here?” a familiar voice asked.

Maria sat up to see Leila from HR hanging over the wall of her cubicle.

“I thought you’d be out spending your little present,” she said, with a wink.

“My little-” Maria started. “You mean, you… how? Where did you get that money?”

Leila spun around and waved her hands in a flourish.

“It’s yours! First off, you’ve got two years worth of back pay for unused vacation-”

Maria stood, shaking her head. “That doesn’t add up to twenty thousand dollars. You forgot to carry a one or something.”

“Secondly,” Leila practically sang, “the rest is your bonus! The bosses have their eyes on you, lady. The clients all love you, and you’ve brought in so many more this year.”

“But why did you use my new account? I said not to use it yet for my salary.”

Leila shrugged. “Not your regular pay though, right? Also, you should really take some vacation. Stop working so hard, you know? You seem exhausted these days and-”

Maria cut her off with a tight hug.

“Hey, hey,” Leila said, patting her back. “Whatever it is, you know you can always talk to me, right?”

Maria let her go and smiled back at her friend. “I know. I’ll tell you everything soon, I promise. And I think I will take a week or two. I’m going to need it.”

“Yeah, that’s it! Treat yourself, gurl!” Leila exclaimed. For the first time in 5 years, Maria felt like she could afford to.

They shared another hug and Leila left Maria at her desk. She took out her black book and opened it to the bookmarked page. On the other side of her leafy inspirational doodle was a list of actions marked EXIT PLAN.

If you or a loved one is experiencing abuse, please visit: ccfwe.org.