by Brenda Ford
I don’t know if he can see me. His vision is probably a bit blurry because of the blood loss. But I need to say it anyway. I need him to at least know that my feelings for him are stronger than anything. “I love you, Brad.”
“I just saw that,” Maria groans. “Honestly, you two are pathetic. The worst. Love. That’s absolutely crazy. You can’t know anything about love. You haven’t been in his life long enough. And it’s pointless anyway. Don’t you see? Loving this man only turns you into me. He won’t ever love you back.”
“Then why do you want him so much? Why not just let him go?” I demand. “What is the point of risking your life for him if he isn’t ever going to be able to give you what you want? That’s pointless, Maria.”
For a second, it seems like Maria might actually be listening to me. I think my words might be sinking in. I really hope that she is starting to see just a little bit of sense in all of this. It will only take me one moment of her eyes widening to the truth for us to shut her down and get out of here. A warm hope blooms through me. I even step forwards as if I might just run away from this, or maybe charge at her or something.
“You wouldn’t understand,” she snaps back, her expression turning to one of madness. “You don’t know what it’s like to see the man that you love give everything to someone else. Imagine that you really do love Brad and you have to watching him fall in love with another person. Can you even think of that?”
To be fair, that does cause some pain in my chest. It would be difficult to see Brad in love with someone else. But that still doesn’t mean that I would want to hurt that person. I would just be sad.
All of a sudden, a stinging sound hits. My right cheek this time. Last time when she slammed me against the wall, it was the left, so now the red hot agony radiates around me. This smack makes me angry. She can’t keep abusing me like this just because the guy she likes doesn’t feel the same way about her.
“Fuck you, Maria,” I spit out. “You’re a fucking bitch. This is ridiculous.”
I slide to the ground and scoot across the floor until I am near enough to Brad for him to reach for my hand. I can already tell that there isn’t even a scrap of energy left in his body. This asshole is killing him. She would rather him be dead than with me. I squeeze his hand, trying to reassure him, but there isn’t anything coming back the other way. He would definitely want to reassure me if he could.
He’s really losing too much blood now. I need to act soon. My eyes scan around the room and soon find my cell phone still on the floor where I dropped it earlier on. I had almost forgotten that existed! My pulse speeds up. I don’t get any sense of hope this time, but I know if I can get hold of it, we have a chance. I squeeze Brad’s hands a couple more times, hearing Maria’s tone droning above me. If I move too quickly, she will get suspicious and probably go for it before me, so I need to be extremely careful. I need to make sure she’s distracted by something else. I wonder if Brad will be able to help me with that.
“You okay?” I breathe out leaning close to him. “Are you able to help?”
“Huh?” He blinks a couple of times, clearly not really in the room. “What?”
“What are you two bitches whispering about?” Maria snaps, letting me know that I’m definitely going to be alone with this one. Brad isn’t in a good way anyway and Maria is sharp. “If you have something to talk about then why don’t you share it with me, huh? I would like to know what’s so important.”
She glares at me and I stare right back. Since she isn’t going to back down then I won’t either. I ever so slowly rise to my feet, letting go of Brad regretfully as I do, and I step closer to Maria. She stiffens, not knowing what way I’m going to go with this, which is good because I haven’t got a clue either. I just know that I need to do something to distract her for long enough for me to grab my cell phone.
“Maria. This is my apartment,” I tell her firmly. “And I never invited you here. This has gone on for long enough now, it’s time for this to end. You need to get the hell out of here.”
She tips her head back and laughs nastily. “Oh yeah, because the chick with the knife is going to listen to you. Sure. Nice try, you stupid slut. Honestly, did you really think that was going to work out for you?”
I dart down quickly, acting as if I’m going to go for the knife which is probably what she thinks I’m going to do. Then as she swings it back to make sure I can’t get hold of it. As she does this, I dive under her arm and slide on the ground towards my cell phone. My fingers out stretched grab on to it, but as the wind is knocked from my body, I can’t do anything with it right away. I need to sort myself out first.
My stomach aches, my body hurts, the weariness is really getting to me now. This has been going on for far too long. I don’t even know how long. It’s ridiculous really. I should have gotten her out of here ages ago.
“What the fuck are you doing?” Maria screams. “Are you kidding me right now? What the hell are you doing? You must have lost your damn mind. Coming at me like that. Like you don’t think I will stab you too. I didn’t stab Brad to kill him because he’s going to be with me after all of this, but you… well, you I don’t give a shit about. I wouldn’t even be worried about going to jail to get rid of you.”
I really think she might mean this which is terrifying. But I have my phone now, so this is something. I try to turn over to see where she is, but I don’t get to see anything. A pain smacks hard against my head. This time it doesn’t feel like a hand. She has hit me with something. Something hard, it hurts like hell.
“Argh, fuck,” I yell out as she hits me again and then a third time. She’s going to keep on hitting me until I’m out cold. Thank goodness I still have the ability to think fast enough to know what to do for the best. I lay my head back and slide my eyes closed, acting like I’ve been knocked out. It’s scary because I can’t see where my next attack is coming from but it’s the only way, I have a chance of getting her to stop.
My heart beats hard. It thumps so powerfully against my chest I fear it might explode, but it does the trick and she steps away from me. I hear her footsteps go towards Brad then she begins murmuring to him. I don’t know what her words are, she’s saying it so I definitely cannot hear, but that doesn’t bother me. I’m not interested in anything that she has to say anymore. I peek ever so slightly and see that she has her back to me, which means that I don’t have long. I pull my cell phone up to where I can see it better… blinking through the blurring which has come from the smacks around the head, and I type out what I can as quickly as I can. There’s no chance I can explain the whole situation. I will just have to get the main details out.
Tami: Ruby, help me. I need cops. My house.
It isn’t much. I don’t know how much she will understand of it all. I can’t read it enough to check that my words are correct but that’s all I can do right now. This is a message that she needs to see. She hasn’t seen any of my emails, clearly, because she hasn’t come to help me, so I really hope this time she does. I’m relying on her. I don’t know what time it is in the morning, but there’s a chance. She might be awake. Sometimes, she is depending on what time she needs to get to the salon. Luck might be on my side today and help me out.
Perhaps I should message some other people as well, just to be sure. Brad’s brother, Wesley, seems to always be on hand, and I do have his phone number, but it’s more time and it’s risky. I glance up and see Maria sliding backwards away from Brad because she’s finished saying what she needs to. She might be coming back for me now. To finish off what she started. I don’t know if my head can take any more smacks.
I lean my head backwards and act again like I have been knocked out. My heart continues to pound, it races rapidly, but there isn’t anything else that I can do now. I have at least reached out to someone. There is another human in the outside world who now knows about the danger that I’m in.
Now, it’s just more of a waiting game.
“Well, well, wel
l.” Maria sounds far too pleased in herself. “Looks like I’m right where I need to be. The slut knocked out; Brad all fucked up just as a little punishment for what he has put me through… so what should I do now? Maybe I should take some pictures of the scene that I have created to send to the girls. See what they think about all of this. That could be fun, couldn’t it? They might even want to come along and help me…”
Oh God, I don’t know how much hate the girls from work have for me. Would they really want to do this?
Chapter Twenty-Four
Brad
Everything is destroying me, the agony is far too much, but Maria is getting worse. She has just whispered to me that if anyone else comes here, they won’t want witnesses so Tami will end up dead. I don’t really think that someone I have had sex with could be this insane, but there’s just no telling anymore.
So, with everything that I have left inside of me, I push my ailing body upwards and I just about manage to get to my feet. Everything wants to lie back down already and give up, but I strongly resist that urge.
“Maria, I can’t say this enough times, but I will repeat it in case you don’t understand it. Your problem isn’t with Tami, it’s with me. You are angry because I don’t want to be with you, and that isn’t Tami’s fault. It’s just the way that it is. I don’t feel that way about you and I honestly never will.”
“You could have been with me if it wasn’t for her. She ruined it all.”
“But Maria, I wasn’t with you even when I wasn’t with Tami. What does that tell you?”
“You just weren’t ready then, that’s all. Now you are and it’s our time to be together.”
“Maria, I don’t want you. I want Tami. That isn’t going to change. It doesn’t matter what you do to me, what you do to her, I will never want you. And if you do anything to harm Tami, more than you already have…” I glance over to her, my heart bleeding as I see how harmed she is. It destroys me. “Then you will be in jail for the rest of your life. What do you think is going to happen then? That I will visit you in jail and be with you after you harmed the one person that I really want to be with? The person that I love?”
It feels weird to fully admit that aloud. I’ve told her that I’m falling for her already, but to say love is something different. But you know what, I do love her. There isn’t any point in pretending otherwise. I don’t even think that it’s my hazy state causing that thought. I’m sure that it’s the truth. I don’t have anything to compare it to because I haven’t ever been in love before, but if this isn’t love then I don’t know what is.
“Fuck you, Brad. Don’t feed me that bullshit.” Maria shakes her head. “What a crock. You wouldn’t ever do anything to harm me because you know that you have feelings for me as well. As soon as all of this is over, you will understand. You will admit it and we can just move on from all of this. We will get a happy ending.”
“You can’t believe this. Seriously, Maria, you can’t. I would be mental to remain with you after this. Who knows what you’re going to do next, huh? I would never be comfortable with you. I could never relax..”
“You would also never be bored. Not like you are with little miss basic bitch.” She looks at Tami who is still completely out of it. “Look at her. She doesn’t even have any fight left for you. She’s gone.”
“You knocked her out! Of course she isn’t fighting any longer. Have you lost your mind?” I roll my eyes. “Stupid question. No one in their right mind would do anything like this.”
“Brad, don’t you remember what it was like being with me?” she asks wistfully. It’s almost like she is reminiscing over something amazing that happened long ago. “We had such a nice time together, didn’t we? Me and you. We shared a sense of humor, we had a lovely time watching movies and stuff, and I treated you well, didn’t I? I was basically like a wife to you. Cooking you meals and everything.”
“I don’t remember, Maria. It didn’t mean anything to me. I don’t want to be an asshole, but I don’t know how else to make this clear to you. The only person who I have ever felt a connection with is on the floor.”
“But that action movie… I only watched that for you. Because I wanted you to like me.”
I gulp feeling like shit as I realize that my bad boy behavior of the past has created this. It doesn’t matter that I was always honest, it makes no difference to anyone. This has happened anyway.
“I’m sorry, Maria. That’s all I can say to you. That I’m sorry. I wish that I could go back in time and change what happened, but I can’t. So, what we need to do is focus on the future and where we go from here.”
It isn’t easy to keep my focus when in so much agony, but there’s a laser sharp need to keep my attention.
“What would you have changed?” she demands. “If you could go back, what would you change.”
“Well… sleeping with you. Wasn’t that much obvious?” I furrow my brows confused.
Maria gasps in sheer shock as if she wasn’t expecting this at all. She still isn’t getting it, this is impossible. “I thought that you would say that you would change breaking things off with me and losing me. You wouldn’t even want to be with me? You would lose those three days? Those three magical amazing days.”
For a moment, it looks like tears might explode out of her eyes, she might actually break down which could be the start of the end, but instead it’s an intense yell that breaks free from her instead. A shrill sound so loud it practically shakes all the walls in the house. I half hope that it might disturb some neighbors enough to call the cops or something. I’m actually surprised that someone hasn’t already heard the whole incident.
“Fuck you, Brad. You fucking asshole. How could you do this? How could you?”
She grabs a vase from the side and tosses it towards my head. Thankfully, her aim is terrible because I don’t know if my reflexes would be good enough to move away. It smashes loudly on the wall behind me, creating a damn mess everywhere. This unleashes something in Maria. She grabs everything that she can get hold of to break it. Now, she’s on a mission to create as much damn mess as possible.
“Maria, stop!” I scream out. “Stop this already. Just let it go.”
“Fuck, fuck, fuck!” I don’t think Maria notices the knife slipping from her fingers, but I see it. It clatters to the floor and slides underneath the table out of her sight. This is good. If she doesn’t have anything to attack me with then I have a chance of taking her down. Even in this state. “Fucking hell, why can’t you just… just…”
My eyes dart everywhere, I’m searching for something to work with. I don’t think right now I can do it alone. My next move needs to be a careful one though, because Maria is getting worse and I don’t want to set her off.
“Brad, why are you…” More stuff smashes. Poor Tami won’t have much of a home left after this. “Why do you still want to hurt me, huh? Why can’t you just be with me? What is your problem?”
She pulls out her cell phone and stares directly at me, her eyes flickering with madness. She dials a number, one that I half hope is the cops because she’s lost her damn mind and she might think that she needs them now, but then it quickly becomes clear that she’s called either Hayley or Tawny. One of the other girls who has been directly involved in this. One of them who gave Maria Tami’s number and sparked all of this.
God damn it, I hope that I get out of here for long enough to see what happens to them after all of this. I want a detailed account of who did what and why. Then they will be long gone. Locked up too, maybe. In my fantasy, I would love them all locked away, facing a few years in jail to punish them. To make them think about their actions in the future. I don’t want anyone to ever have to go through anything like this.
“Get here now!” Maria yells into the hand set. “I don’t know what to do now. I need you.”
It becomes very clear that the person on the other end of the line isn’t comfortable with this, but that doesn’t make me feel any better. Maybe
the others didn’t know how far Maria would go, but that doesn’t make it any better. They shouldn’t have played with fire, it’s as simple as that.
“I can’t do this by myself anymore. You can’t all abandon me like this. It isn’t right. You all wanted this…”
She’s interrupted by a loud knocking sound at the door. Maria spins, half panicked, half elated that everything is going her way after all. If this is one of her friends, this could get worse. But then a movement behind me catches my focus and makes me turn my eyes. Tami is sitting up, recovering from her injures.
“Ruby,” she mouths to me, nodding like this knocking is good news.
Ruby. That’s her friend. Maybe somehow in all of the chaos, Tami found a way to contact her friend and now we might be saved… maybe. Or it might be another person in danger. I really don’t want someone else dragged in to this damn mess. It’s messy enough as it is. I don’t know what to do, whether to go and answer the door or to just ignore it, to attempt to save another person’s life. I feel all frozen and stuck.
“Police!” That word being yelled through the apartment stops everything. “We know of an incident…”
I flicker my eyes between Tami and Maria. Maria is in full panic mode now, obviously having not considered that as a possibility, and Tami looks relieved. But no one moves. So, I take control. I push past Maria and I swing the door open. The police man outside catches sight of my wound and immediately knows that this is serious. His whole demeanor changes as I step aside to let them in.
Him and his colleague move past me and I step aside to let them go. As I do, a strange sense of numbness over comes me. I don’t really feel anything. I’m just frozen in this moment in time.
It’s over. I try to process this. To come to terms with the fact that this is finally done after what feels like forever. It’s over. Maria is done for. Me and Tami are going to be okay…
“The window,” I hear Tami gasp out desperately, pain evident in her tone. “The window.”