Destiny

Some call the worst deadly sin. Some call it a miracle. Some just plain call it what it is, attempted murder. May sound like a telenovela. Only this is real life. Mine.

Putrid grey tattoo prison arms were thrown around my neck. The tiled walls of our shared bathroom started to become unfocused, as he swung me about for a proper strangle.

I thrashed about, clawing at what I could hold onto. I caught a few strands of his long Native American black hair.

River yelped. Then went on to call me everywhere degrading words in the female book of misogynistic men’s manual.

He pried my remaining middle finger of my right hand out of his hair.

I tried to get away, while he was hopefully too angry to notice. His hour-long tirades were epic at this point.

But, he was too fast and too strong. He caught me just in time, holding me back as he had done many times before. When I attempted to leave him in the dust of my silver bug, to the safety and comfort of my parents den.

River wasn’t dumb. He also knew how to hold me just far enough away from him, to have no saving grace.

The aching pain in my lungs made it impossible to breathe. My eyes shut with pressure as they sealed themselves shut. My face was about to explode. I thrashed like a mad woman. It was taking him minimal effort to end me.

My teeth grinded and with an angry pitch of energy, as I came back into play. I pushed him away, with everything I had. It didn’t do much, as I only got him to release his grasp for a few seconds.

Once again, River was on me full force, his face boiling. He screamed, “You cheater.”

I wanted to say he was the only cheater here. But he never listened.

My blood vessels were likely bursting as my mind hammered, pressurized. My face burned red hot, like a thousand sunburns…the scent of his fire whisky breath was the last thing I noticed before everything faded to darkness.

Somewhere between death and life. There he appeared, as if an Angel. He sat beside me, stroking my hair, “Choose life. Choose to run far away. Help is coming. I am coming.” I memorized the two moles on his right cheek, his long medium colored brown hair and kind warm brown eyes.

A peace unlike any other came over me and unconditional love and joy swelled within my soul.

I came back to my face on the tile. I had probably passed out. He stood above me, smirking.

Reality and pain came back. No ambulance. No police. No one here to save me. The cops around here don’t answer my domestic violence calls.

I got up off the floor, and started to leave the small, one-bedroom studio built in the 19 century.

I was wobbly, but I was moving. The front door was slightly ajar. The light at the end of the tunnel was mine.

He stood in front of me, pushing me back, this time hard on my stomach. The first words out of his mouth were not an apology, to get me to stay. We were past that.

“And that’s what I will do to your parents, but this time I would make sure they never woke up,” he said, his skinny but muscular frame shook with fumes.

Most of my adult life I prefered to be with men. As most of my pre-adolescent to teenage years were spent avoiding the girl bullies in my neighborhood who never gave up a chance to harm me in some way. Verbally. River’s speciality, as well. It didn’t leave a mark, as he liked to say.

Oh, it left a mark to an already deep infested wound.

All my friends I trusted were men, even my Dad. My best friend, whom all my sisters now called brother, was the sweetest, most gentle and compassionate human being. He had my back and defended me to anyone who listened. This time was no different.

I met River at the treatment center I go to during the day for those with disabilities, physical or mental, and need help finding jobs. We are close at first. Until I learn he can cheat or say or do whatever suits him. While I walk on eggshells, apologizing for everything.

Even though River is on parole, he could still get a gun in seconds. Says he could, anyway. He’s always bragging how connected he was. We live in probably the most dangerous area of all of Utah. Plus, the police in that city say they are simply too busy to bother with a domestic situation. They have and I quote one officer, “Better things to do.”

My family was connected, a lot more connected than he was. And I had my family’s support. River lost his family’s support a long time ago, adopted from a life on the reservation to a rich, white, religious family who never fully accepted him. And even less so due to his chronic drug use and assaults, including the attempted murder charge on a former friend of his. He pointed a gun at his head and would have shot, if their friends hadn’t stopped him. He was high on meth. Five year in prison. Being high and having overcrowded prisons worked in his favor.

The treatment center, where we received our housing blamed me. The victim. My friends from the job program or center took his side. The staff and a few clients said I was the one who needed to leave. I had caused too many problems with the men around here. I had only a traffic ticket on my record.

Luckily a few months later, a hospital rest, and a stay at a battered shelter for safety. The judge ruled in my favor.

The judge raised his eyebrows at him, “Do you feel guiltless?”

“But she did…” He was standing as he refused a public defender.

“I don’t want to hear it. Look at her.”

He gave me his normal death eyebrows.

I scooted further away from my sister, and my lawyer, and put my head down into my lap. My niece sat in the second row. Hadn’t yet passed the bar, but stuck her neck out as she worked in the legal aid office and with no prodding from the family, got my case extended as I was in the hospital at the time from a suicide attempt. To say, domestic violence or dating violence didn’t wreck havoc on the soul, even more than the body, would be a bold faced lie.

“Any man should feel guilty for making a woman that scared. I rule in her favor.

I was finally free.

Well on the road to freedom for the first time in years.

No longer will I try to be everything to everybody. I no longer hide the person I am or my feelings. I changed little about me except how I saw me. I learn to love all parts of me. I take. A year recovering and becoming my own best friend through therapy and med changes.

I slowly started to date again. A disaster already. My mom sees me crying one day after the guy I like tells me he likes me too much to commit to me and be my boyfriend. “You’ve had your heart ripped into pieces too much.” She says, as if her own heart is breaking. “Knowing when the right person comes along it’ll be easier. He will heal your heart. Don't break it.”

She wasn’t wrong.

I went to the post office to mail his shoes that were so much more important than my health.

My black dachshund rode on my lap in my silver bug to the local post office, trying hard not to slide on the slick snowy roads.

I froze, this time not due to PTSD.

There he was. The Angel-like being from my strangling near-body experience. Right in front of me.

As one of the workers called out, “package from Spain.”

I got a better look of him. Same moles from the vision and on the left check. Same cheek. And same warmth.

I told him the first thing that popped in my head, “I like your hair.” Not at all a lie. It was long and thickly brown.

He raised his eyebrows and shook head. “Que? Study English,” he continued by way of explanation.

I ask him if he’s attending the University of Utah.

He nodded.

I thought this was some cruel joke. Not only did he not understand most of what I was saying but he was clearly half my age. Plus, My Spanish was worse than his English.

I rambled on anyway. It was a nervous thing.

“No understand.” He says, with a thick accent.

This was the man. No question. But his voice. His accent was stronger.

I found a pen and paper, writing down I can tutor him in English. Just be some reason I ran into him in real time. Plus, I received my degree from the University of Utah in English.

Can I trust another man? Something told me I could. My inner voice. I had healed. The PTSD attacks had stopped with hard work; therapy, daily exercise and medications.

“Paul. Mucho gusto,” he reached out his hand.

“Igualmente,” I say, shaking his back.

We were in the wrong place at the right time. I had to eventually take my package to UPS. He was told to take his package to Spain to FedEx.

A few hours later, Paul walked up my driveway, increasing his gait when his eyes met mine. No car in sight. No way. My closest friend was fifteen miles away. No one went anywhere in the outskirts of Salt Lake City, especially this late, without a car.

As if reading my mind, he got out his phone, using a translator, as an English voice came alive on his phone, “I live over there.”

He was so close to me. The house was down the street. A two-door home. I recognize the house as one I see almost every day of my life. I sometimes stopped by to look at their farm animals since you can see them from the main road. Didn’t know the family. Animals gave me a breath of fresh air in the midst of all my heartache and fear. They were unconditional love. Speaking of, my service animal wasn’t barking for once, even as he came into the house, behind me. She still barked hysterically at some of my brother-in-laws.

He was literally the boy next door. Or close enough. Something I wanted to find my whole life. Especially since, my Mom and all my sisters lived only a few miles from their husbands. All still happily together, including our parents

After we watched a movie and with my parents overseas, closer to his hometown.

He reached in and grabbed me, with an admonition of a boy who knew what he wanted. I almost squeal with delight as his hands collect my hair and pull. I couldn’t get more lost in him.

I stared into his chocolate eyes. His lips finally merged with mine. A thirst so tender, so strong and so unbelievably breathtaking I wasn’t going to come up for air.

Paul was such a romantic. Not like the American boys, where any show of affection is sissy or non-masculine. When I’m with him, I was happy. No matter what is going on or where we are.

Everything could be falling down from the ceiling and coming up from the floor while being invaded by supernatural creatures, yet all I could see was his face. The two moles on his cheek, his soft, lips and authentic eyes. There was no one quite like him ever in my whole existence.

Falling in love was magical, a dream I didn’t ever have to wake up from. Two years and a wedding later, I have yet to wake up.

Real hope was a part of me for the first time in years.