Breaking Hearts

by Melissa Shirley

  Sean and I settled in California, where he owned a night club and a house situated high on a cliff with only one way in and one way out. The first few days were fine, then Kieran had a tantrum when I made him go to bed. My entire world erupted. Suddenly, my new home was a riot of screaming and yelling. First Kieran, then Sean in response threatening to spank Kieran if I couldn’t shut him the hell up. While Kieran’s will outlasted mine, but mine outlasted my new husband’s. Sean stormed to the garage, and with a roar of his engine and the squeal of his tires, left.

  Sometime in the wee hours of the morning, he stumbled in the front door, tripped over a dinosaur toy, and hit his head on a marble table in the living room. I hadn’t bought the table, dropped the toy, or forced him to drink so much he could lose his balance over whatever obstructed his path. He yanked me from the bed by my arm and dragged me through the house to show me the table, as though I’d pushed him. Three drops of blood landed on the floor, and he stood over me (more swayed over me), as I scrubbed the carpet before he let me go back to bed.

  When Kieran woke two hours later, I got up and coffee’d my way through the day. That night, Sean went out, and I smiled at the relaxing peace. Earlier than ever before, I took Kieran to bed with me. All was forgotten.

  Sean and I got along fine for a while. He even planned a trip home to Storybook Lake so he could meet my family. I booked flights for the Thanksgiving weekend, still under the assumption that he was the prince in my fairytale.

  The day before our trip, Sean came home and decided we needed a bigger house, since I was “rolling” in money from my “little clothes business.” I hadn’t commented with the appropriate enthusiasm. Instead, I told him I liked our house. I must have liked it, anyway, as I’d paid off the mortgage only a couple weeks earlier. In his mind, though, stating a contrary opinion meant I questioned his judgment. I’d stepped outside the wifely box he believed I belonged in and humiliated him. As retribution for my ‘bad’ behavior, he slammed my head into the counter. Within minutes, a bruise and bump added a bit of new character to my face.

  I couldn’t go home looking like I’d been in a bar brawl. He left me no choice but to cancel our flights and make the appropriate apologies. Later, when he left for the club, I didn’t waste any time packing bags for me and Kieran. We were leaving. I would go home to my parents and beg them to help me with Kieran if I had to. So long as my baby was safe, I could live through seeing Simon with someone else.

  Kieran fell asleep during my packing, and I didn’t have the heart to wake him. The morning would be soon enough.

  The next morning, Thanksgiving Day, I woke to the sounds of dishes clattering against one another and the smell of a freshly baked turkey in the oven. I climbed from the spare bed in Kieran’s room, wiped my eyes, and walked out to the kitchen. A woman in her early senior years stood at the counter peeling potatoes.

  “Hi. I’m Danielle.” I gave a quick glance of all the area I could see, hoping to catch a glimpse of my soon-to-be ex-husband, then turned again to face her. “Where’s Sean?”

  She dried her hands and extended one to me. “I’m so happy to meet you. He’s told me so much about you.”

  “I’m afraid I’m at a disadvantage.” He’d mentioned no one to me.

  She grinned and winked as though we shared some great secret. “That boy. What am I going to do with him?” It seemed rhetorical so I stayed quiet. “I’m Sean’s mother. He called me yesterday and asked me to join you for dinner today. He said you weren’t much of a cook, so I jumped right in.” She patted my hand. “After the holidays, I’ll come by and teach you. Can’t have my boy eating TV dinners. He works hard and deserves some home-cooked meals.”

  But I could cook. I didn’t have my own show on the food network, but I could throw together a suitable dinner--Thanksgiving or otherwise--if the urge so struck.

  She leaned close enough I could smell roses and baby powder. “Now, where’s my grandbaby?”

  She didn’t mention the bruising and swelling on my face, but walked around me down the hall, presumably to wake up my boy or hers. Making a left, she went for mine, then stormed into the room like a paratrooper on patrol. I caught up just in time to see her yank back his blanket. She snatched him out of bed to hold his limp body at arm’s length.

  “Oh dear.” She wrinkled her nose. “He wet the bed.” She gave him a shake. “That’s naughty.”

  “Hey!” I took him from her and held him close. “What are you doing?”

  “Oh, you have to punish him. You cannot let a little boy as old as he is get by with this kind of behavior. Once a pisser, always a pisser.”

  Seriously. I had to get the hell out of there. It wasn’t just Sean. Their family tree must have been struck by lightning.

  She stood with her hands on her hips, apparently waiting for me to dole out a punishment. The previous day, he’d seen his father smack his mother around. For a kid who’d never known anything more than unconditional love and inside voices, he’d handled it well. If a little bedwetting was the worst I had to deal with, then I would deal.

  “I’m going to give him a bath.”

  “He doesn’t need a bath. He needs a whipping.” She sniffed as I glared at her. “If you aren’t willing to take my advice, I just don’t know how I will ever be able to feel as though you accept me. I’d hoped we would be close.” She turned on heel and walked out.

  She could hope all she wanted.

  * * * *

  After Sean and his mother washed and put away the dishes, I waited for Sean to leave, but he never did. He sat beside me on the sofa. If I scooted away, he inched closer. When I went to look for my cell, it had magically disappeared from its spot on the dresser in Kieran’s room.

  His mother drank a bottle of wine and fell asleep in the recliner. I took Kieran to bed. While I read his dinosaur book to him, she came in to kiss him good night. He flinched and she pinched him.

  Acting from sheer instinct, I shoved her away from him, putting my body between her and my son. “He doesn’t know you. Don’t you ever touch him again.”

  Without another word, she stomped out to the living room. A second later, Sean appeared in the doorway, arms crossed, eyes flashing with anger. “What the hell did you say to my mom?”

  “Can we talk about this later, Sean?”

  Kieran still fussed over the welt left by her nimble fingers.

  When I walked out of Kieran’s room an hour later, Sean’s pacing had worn a trail into the carpet. His mother stormed out earlier when he couldn’t make me apologize right away. She vowed never to return. At first, he stayed calm, the proverbial before-the-hurricane-kind-of-calm.

  I jumped on the offensive, yelling at him over his mother, forbidding her from seeing my child. He jerked his head toward me. Rage reddened his face. His fists clenched, and before I could duck or react with more than a blink, he attacked.

  By morning, the right side of my face matched the left, and I had a plan to leave. I grabbed my packed bag and snuck through the house to the garage. For a full minute, I stood gawking at the empty space where I parked my car. I dropped the suitcases and checked the driveway. What the hell?

  Sean had fallen into his usual drunken coma, his arm thrown over his face. His car keys and phone were conspicuous in their absence from their usual spot by the bed.

  I tore the house apart for more than an hour before he woke up, came out to the kitchen, and dropped a kiss on the top of my head. My mouth fell open.

  “Sean, where’s my car?”

  “Didn’t I tell you? I had the guys from my garage come pick it up for servicing. They’ll drop it off in a couple days. Don’t worry.” He pulled out a chair at the kitchenette. “Make me a cup of tea, would you?” He cocked one eyebrow. I didn’t know for sure if his expression signaled a dare, but I didn’t think a cup of tea merited a fist fight, so I put a kettle on to boil.

  * * * *

  For a while, I knew nothing but pain. I
prayed every day for Simon to save me, I knew it was ridiculous and I should save myself, but my heart just wasn’t in it. I’d lost Simon…lost hope…lost the will to help myself. I couldn’t help but wonder if this was my punishment for the long list of sins I’d committed over the course of my life, or if it was just the product of a bad decision.

  No matter why it happened, it continued. Sean piled bruise on top of bruise while keeping me a prisoner in the house. By the time Christmas came, I was broken, a shell with only Kieran to make me smile, and even his powers had begun to fade. My phone never turned up, and though Sean said he would take me to get a new one, he always ended up too busy.

  On Christmas morning, I awoke to find Kieran already out of his bed, in the living room with Sean and his mother. A mountain range of gifts sat under the tree, and Kieran excitedly waited to tear into the bright colored paper.

  When I walked in, Sean looked up and smiled. “Oh, honey. We’ve been waiting for you.”

  His mother stood tilting her cheek toward me. I hid a reflexive shiver by tightening my sweater around my shoulders and inhaled a big whiff of her rose scented perfume before smacking my lips into the air beside her face.

  Sean moved to sit beside Kieran on the floor and handed him a big box wrapped in Ninja Turtle paper. I hadn’t been allowed to buy anything, so the arrival of such a vast amount of stuff shocked me.

  Kieran opened the latest technology in remote control pets. He leaped to his feet and brought it over to me. “Look, Mommy. I got a Scruffy!”

  I couldn’t help but smile at the enthusiasm. His happiness comforted me, and for the moment, it was enough.

  An hour and a half later, after we’d repeated the routine with every gift he received, Kieran began picking up the paper strewn about the room. I stood to help him. There had to be five hundred yards of gift wrap on the floor.

  Sean’s mother wrapped her fingers around my arm and dug her nails in. “He needs to learn responsibility.”

  Seriously? The kid was barely four, but rather than risk more wrath from Sean for disobeying his mother, I sat.

  Sean scooted across the floor on his knees to hand me an envelope. “This is for you.”

  I shook my head. “I didn’t get you anything.” …because his behavior didn’t exactly inspire my gift giving hormone, and I was his prisoner in our home.

  “You already gave me the greatest gift in the world.”

  I raised my eyebrows in question.

  “A family, silly girl.”

  He ruffled my hair, and bile made its way from my stomach to my throat. I almost gagged. Instead, I pasted a smile on my busted lips and accepted the envelope.

  Tickets to fly home for New Year’s. Three tickets. Oh yay.

  Chapter 11

  By the time we arrived in Storybook Lake, the worst of the bruises had faded and could be covered with foundation. My lips healed, and Sean had kept strictly hands-off since Christmas, even pretending his abuse never happened. My parents adored him, Kieran whose love had been bought and paid for at Christmas, worshiped him, and I sat quietly watching the Sean-love-fest proceed without any encouragement from me.

  When we returned to the hotel, we sat up most of the night talking. He apologized, promised to be better, then made love with me so tenderly and so completely I almost went an entire night without thinking of Simon. Almost.

  Then, the New Year’s party happened and my world fell apart again. We walked into Hood’s Hideaway and Sean’s sulking began. My parents had Kieran, so we had a free night without the worry of taking care of him when we returned to the hotel. It left Sean free to drink himself into anger.

  Simon arrived a few minutes after we did, and my pulse kicked into high gear. Simon in a tuxedo… The fantasy I’d indulged in on more than one lonely night was nothing compared to the reality.

  “Hey, Dani.” He leaned in and kissed my cheek.

  For the tiniest measure of a second, I relaxed into his touch.

  Oh, that smile. “Hi.” I turned away. I couldn’t look at Simon without wanting him, without needing him to hold me, to take me away from it all.

  “You are beautiful.” He ducked his head, then looked up at me with a shy smile. “How have you been?”

  “Oh, you know. Just living the dream.” More like a nightmare. I kept the thought to myself.

  “It’s great to see you.”

  One smile, one glance into those amber eyes, and my bones left me Jell-O-legged and ready to puddle onto the painted floor.

  The bartender handed me Sean’s drink as he stepped up and wrapped his fingers around my shoulder. “Leave it. We’re going.”

  “But it’s not midnight yet.” I’d forgotten the golden rule…talking back to Sean would only earn me new bruises. He slapped me the first time in the elevator. I would have yelled, screamed for help, but I didn’t want anyone to know, so I kept quiet, trying to make myself as small as I could. Luckily, he stopped with the one slap to my face. Once we returned to the hotel room, it got worse.

  The next morning, he drove to my parents to pick up Kieran. He told them he’d let me sleep in, but he’d actually threatened me with death if I told anyone. At that point, I had no reason to believe he wouldn’t follow through. When he returned with Kieran, he changed our flight reservations, and we flew back to California on New Year’s day.

  * * * *

  We returned from our holiday vacation in Storybook Lake--me with two black eyes, him with a cashmere sweater and Italian loafers my mother bought him. Even though the signs were there, no one at home noticed or came to save me. Not that I’d expected much, but being there reminded me of how my life should have been. I had to get out. What was left of my life depended on it.

  If I fought back or resisted, he hit harder, kicked with more precision. Because he’d turned part vampire and didn’t like leaving the house while the sun was above the horizon, he allowed me to run his errands or buy food. He timed how long it took me to get to the grocery store and return home. If I varied by more than ten minutes, an all-out battle royal followed. I grew accustomed to losing, to hiding the abuse behind makeup and dark glasses. My only peace came in the evening when he bathed in his cologne and left for his club. This went on and on.

  He finally found my cell when my mother, after not being able to reach me for more than a month, threatened to call the police if she didn’t get to speak to me. After that, I kept it close, took it with me everywhere and slept with it at night. Time raced by me while I sat back waiting for an opportunity to get away.

  The week before I finally found a way out, makeup stopped covering my bruises. He’d bought me Gucci sunglasses as a cheap cover up for an earlier punishment for something I’d done, or not done, and I’d taken to wearing them inside. My bruises scared Kieran.

  Though he’d grown impressively tall and I was normally weak from the beatings, I held Kieran as often as I could, even when he slept. As I cradled him close to me, reading a romance novel I’d found in Sean’s mother’s basement stash, my cell chirped.

  Simon: Hi, stranger.

  I looked at the phone for a minute. I’d deleted his number right after I returned home on New Year’s to lessen my temptation, to get him out of my system once and for all, but I’d never forgotten the digits that would let me hear his voice once more.

  What could he possibly want? Our last meeting, before a couple of spoken pleasantries at New Year’s, had been less than cordial, and his sister had broken my nose. She’d been angry about something I said to him, and with the full force of an enraged twin, acted quickly. I didn’t blame her; I would have hit me too. Since my new marriage had become a veritable punch fest, I probably should have called to thank her for lesson number one in taking a fist to the face.

  Me: Hi.

  I took a deep breath and waited, hoping this wasn’t some messed up fluke of technology designed to teach me yet another of life’s more cruel lessons. I didn’t spend long pondering th
e notion before he responded.

  Simon: I need to ask you a question. What happened to us? Why did you break up with me?

  I knew he’d lost parts of his memory because of the shooting, and I felt bad for him, but the last thing I wanted was to rehash the part of our relationship that hurt more than any beating I could take from Sean.

  Me: I would never break up with you.

  I would have walked through fire to keep him. The idea of it going any other way never crossed my mind. That he could think so brought a sad smile to my lips.

  Simon: I miss you, Dani, and I need to know what I did to make you leave me. Please.

  Simon: Simon says tell me.

  The little smiley face at the end of his statement made my heart flutter.

  Me: I didn’t break up with you. We just drifted apart, I guess.

  There was no point in correcting his version of the facts. It didn’t matter who left who, or who dumped the other one on her backside. Well, it mattered less now than it did then, anyway.

  Simon: I can’t imagine ever letting you go.

  Why couldn’t he have felt that way when we were together?

  Me: You wanted to go out with little Kelly Hollywood, but it’s okay. We had a good run. There are no hard feelings.

  If wishes were within the realm of possibilities, I would wish myself back to him, to safety, a place where only we existed with Kieran.

  Simon: Huh?

  But since wishes only led to heartache, I concentrated on the headline. Walking down that memory lane wouldn’t help either of us.

  Me: It doesn’t matter, Simon. You’ll find some nice girl, and you’ll live happily ever after.

  I swiped at a tear, then patted Kieran’s back about a thousand times before he answered.

  Simon: I don’t want any other girl.

  Chapter 12

  I put the text conversation out of my mind as much as I could, but at night, I dreamed of his voice, of hearing him say he loved me.

  Three days after my exchange with Simon, I woke later than usual and slipped my hand inside my pillow case feeling for my cell. I patted the pillow, turned it upside down, shook it until I had no choice but to believe the phone had disappeared. Panic vibrated through me. What if Sean went through the history? Found the texts I’d been too stupid to delete? I threw back the blanket and paced the room for a minute before I drew the blackout curtains open. The sun… It had to be at least noon. Why hadn’t Kieran been in yet or cried out for me to get him?