The Blind

by A. F. Brady

  My hands are lined with thorns and I can’t clench my fists. My hair is trapped under the wheels of the chair, and the Mountain Dew level is rising to my ears. Lucas is looming over me, completely silent, holding the scissors above his head. The blades are glinting in the sun, and just as the Mountain Dew begins to choke and suffocate me, it’s all over.

  My office phone is blaring loudly, and I pick my face up off the floor and wipe away a stream of drool. This is the dream I keep having now. Sometimes I wake up sweating, sometimes crying, but always out of breath and exhausted. I crawl up onto my hands and knees and answer the phone.

  Rachel asks me what happened in the bathroom with Jenni. We haven’t had a chance to talk since then. I explain the details of the incident and let her know how it was managed. I even give Julie credit. As I’m telling Rachel that I will call her back as soon as I get an update from detox, she interrupts me.

  “Before I let you go,” she breathes heavily into the receiver, “thank you for the OMH summary. I really appreciate you doing that for me. Things are still such an unbelievable mess around here, but with your help, it’s been a bit easier to manage.”

  “Of course, Rachel. We’re all together in this,” I say, holding the phone between my ear and shoulder. I scratch at the zipper marks on my face, leftover from using my coat as a pillow.

  “Tell me, what happened to the original reports from the psychiatrists at OMH? I don’t see them in my office?” My heart stops.

  This was bound to come up at some point, and now I have to explain. If I can get away with this, I may be in the clear. “Right. When I dropped off the summary, your door was locked, so I couldn’t drop off the folders, as well. I just slipped the summary under your door and filed the original reports in the records room downstairs. I hope that’s okay.” I hold my breath and clench my teeth, waiting for her response. I can hear her breathing heavily, shuffling papers around. My eyes are squeezed shut and tiny tears are starting to form in the corners. My shoulders tighten, and I hear a click on the line.

  “Uh, yeah, that’s fine. My other line is ringing, so I have to let you go. Thanks again, Sam.” I hear her click over to the other call, and I release my breath. I unclench my muscles and hang up the phone. I pull open my desk drawer to see my OMH folder still sitting there, looking back at me. I gently slide it out and tuck it safely in my handbag.

  JANUARY 20TH, 2:23 P.M.

  David and I are having a late lunch together but I’m still licking my wounds from his comments a couple weeks ago, when he called me malicious. So although we look like we’re better, I’m keeping him at arm’s length. I haven’t said a word to him about the evaluations or stamping the visitor pass for Jenni’s sister or leaving the janitor’s closet unlocked. As I take a bite from my half of his sandwich, he pries into the Lucas situation.

  “We gonna talk about what’s going on with you and Lucas?” he asks me with his mouth full, as if by being informal, he is minimizing the gravity of the question.

  “What about me and Lucas?” I’m only going to give him exactly what he asks for, and nothing more.

  “I haven’t heard anything about him in a while.” David holds his open palm in front of his mouth as he continues.

  “Well, I haven’t seen him in a while. We’d been fighting a lot, and I didn’t feel like handling his shit as well as the messes that have been going on here, so I took myself a little break from Lucas.” I speak into my sandwich.

  “How’s he taking that?”

  “Honestly? I’m not even sure he noticed. I bet he has plenty of other women around to keep him warm. It’s been like, three weeks. He sent me a few text messages, asking if I am intentionally avoiding him. He knows I’m pissed. He kissed some chick at that pretentious New Year’s Eve party, and before that, he was blowing lines again, and I couldn’t take the lies anymore, so I took off. I think he’s just giving me space.” I sigh a long, ragged sigh and sip from a giant Coca-Cola.

  “Didn’t you kiss the waiter?” David raises one eyebrow at me, takes a bite of sandwich and wipes his mouth with a napkin. His office is a little bit bigger than mine, but whenever he gets haughty and superior, it feels like the walls are starting to close in.

  “Yes, but I kissed the waiter in retaliation for Lucas kissing some random woman. I didn’t go in there intending to kiss a waiter; he was the only person on the balcony when it was midnight. I would have kissed a fish if he were the only one on the balcony with me.”

  “Are you going to break up with him?” he asks.

  “Ugh, I don’t want to do this. I don’t want to talk about this shit. I know you don’t like him, and I know you sort of know what’s been going on, but I don’t have the energy for this, and I would love it if you could just leave me alone about Lucas.” I’m whining and I don’t want to be confronted about my decision making.

  “I haven’t seen any evidence of abuse for a while,” he slowly points out.

  “‘Evidence of abuse’? Why do you say it like that? I’m not a patient. You don’t have to treat me. You haven’t seen blood in my hair or bruises on my face. I get it. Okay. Well, that’s because I haven’t been staying over at his place for a couple of weeks, and he hasn’t been to mine. So… God. What do you want from me? I don’t want to talk about this.” I shove the rest of the sandwich into my mouth and hope that David takes it as a sign to stop prying and let me be.

  “I think you’d be better off without him.” He holds his hand up in surrender. “That’s it, I’m done!” He pops the last of his sandwich into his mouth and claps his hands together.

  I look out David’s window at the scaffolding across the street. Now I’m forced to think about Lucas and wonder what I’m going to do. I’ve become so accustomed to hating him or loving him that I need him in my life so I can occupy my mind with something. Hate and love are the same fucking things, just positives and negatives of the same emotion, the same actions, the same feelings. And I long, desperately, for indifference.

  When he’s calling me, I have something to hold on to, something to be mad at, something to bitch about, but when those calls stop, where will I be? There’s no one here to replace this bullshit, and I need my daily dose of bullshit to get by. I’m addicted, and that’s why I can’t get enough. I say I don’t want it, I say I don’t need it, I say I’m better off a thousand times without it; but pretty soon my head is going to start screaming for more.

  JANUARY 20TH, 3:15 P.M.

  I’m in a group session waiting for the rest of the patients to trickle in, lost in my thoughts. I realize now, finally, that my time has run out with Lucas. There is an expiration date, because that’s how I want it. I’ve incited the part of myself that takes care of business by cutting off my affair with AJ. I know I need to officially break up with Lucas soon, or else I will lose my nerve and go back to him. I end up thinking for days that I’m going to be fine without him, and he won’t be able to hurt me anymore, and I can’t save him, and then my head explodes.

  Everyone’s now here and we’re sitting in a circle, and as the side chatter dies down, the ladies look to me to present a theme.

  “Hi, everyone. Today, I want us to discuss a topic that might be a little bit difficult for some of you. As you know, this is a safe space to discuss whatever is on your mind. Everyone who is in this institution is here to get better, to take some time for themselves and get back on their feet. Sometimes, it’s important to face the scary things, and that’s what we’re going to do here today.”

  “We’re going to talk about husbands?” Nancy asks.

  “Maybe. What I wanted to talk about was domestic abuse. Violence.”

  “Huh—” Anna leans back and crosses her arms. “Husbands.” I’m a bit surprised that Anna is using the term husbands being that she is gay and her wife was her abuser.

  The ladies offer muffled giggles in response. I look around and see several patients absentmindedly touching scars, pulling their shoulders up to their necks, looking down. I notic
e myself squinting, blinking my left eye and matting down my hair.

  “Do you mean to say that everyone in this room had a husband who was violent?” Tashawndra.

  “Well, not always a husband, but yes, everyone in this room is a survivor of abuse.” I hope they won’t ask if I’m included.

  “We supposed to share our stories?” Nancy.

  “If you like. This is a safe space, and sometimes sharing stories can help. Would you like to begin?”

  “Okay. I can start. Hi, my name is Nancy. I am a survivor of domestic abuse. I was married for a while and my husband, Glenn, used to beat me up when he was angry. That’s my story.”

  “Hi, I’m Anna. I had a wife and she beat me up, too.”

  “That’s great, ladies. Thank you for starting. Do you think that either of you would be willing to tell us a little bit more about your experience? I find it can be helpful to your recovery to talk about it.”

  “You could go.” Anna, nodding toward Nancy.

  “Okay. Umm, well, I was married for four years. I had a grown daughter from a different relationship, and she lived with me and Glenn on and off while she was between jobs. I liked it when she would stay with us because Glenn wouldn’t beat me if anyone else was around. It’s funny, even now when I think about him, I don’t feel angry at him. I feel guilty. I feel sad and sometimes scared. I’m always looking for the things that I could have done differently so that he wouldn’t get so angry.”

  “Yeah, me too! I always think of it like that.” Lucy. “Like if I just remembered that he hated my pink skirt, then I wouldn’t have worn it, and it wouldn’t have gotten me in trouble.”

  “Yeah,” Nancy continues. “There’s always something that’s gonna make them angry. Always something that’ll make you get in trouble.”

  “One thing I want to talk about is leaving. How did you all get out of your own abusive situations?” Wondering if their stories could help me, wondering if any of us have any sense at all.

  “Well, Glenn got arrested. So, when he went to prison, the situation didn’t exist anymore. I had a social worker come talk to me, and she helped me get a lawyer and we filed for divorce while he was away. He’s still in prison now.”

  “How did you get the courage to report him?” Tashawndra.

  “I didn’t. He got arrested for burglary. I never even told the cops or the lawyers that he beat me. I was too scared.”

  “Scared,” I say, trying not to remember myself cowering between the toilet and the wall, covering my head with my arms. “Often victims of abuse are too scared to report it to the police. Why do you think that is? Shouldn’t we ask for help? What is it that stops us?” Are these the pronouns I should be using?

  “Because, what if you don’t have enough evidence? The men always lying about it anyway, always saying they never touched you, and saying you fell down, or you got drunk and that’s why you have marks on you. What happens if the cops believe him and not you?” Lucy.

  “And they always say to you that if you tell anyone they’ll kill you. Glenn said he would bury me and no one would ever know.”

  “When my wife was hitting me, or right when she was finished, she would tell me she loved me and she was so sorry. Sometimes she would cry and tell me she didn’t mean to hurt me. I felt bad for her. I didn’t want her to get in trouble.” Anna, probing the long scars on her arms. I think of Lucas throwing me an ice pack.

  “Right, and if this is what he does when he loves me, what will he do when he hates me?” I watch the words come out of my mouth as if they’re encased in a cartoon speech bubble, and I want to suck them back in before anyone hears me.

  “That’s right, Miss Sam, and the best way to make them hate you is involving the cops.” Nancy draws the attention away from me before I can be exposed.

  “Scared that you’ve got nowhere to go.” Diana. “The house was his. The car was his. If I get the cops involved and they take him away? I’m homeless again. The money was his, everything.”

  “So you feel you have to tolerate the abuse,” I say, “in order to avoid homelessness?”

  “Yeah. And the friends are his, too.” Sue. “When I was trying to figure out if I could leave him, all my friends were his friends. I knew I would be all alone. We had been married for so long, and I was so isolated from everyone in my life before him, that everyone I knew was through him. So if I left him, or reported him, I would have no house, no car, no money and no friends. So, what’s worse?”

  Sue escaped her abuser using a network of survivors who shuffled her between various secret pickup locations under the cover of night in disguises. Before she left, when her name was still Rebecca, Sue was beaten nearly to death. Both her eye sockets were broken and a cracked rib had punctured her lung.

  “That’s interesting that you use the word isolated. Many abusers have a pattern of isolating their victims. Pulling them away from friends, from family members, sometimes even having them quit their jobs, leave their own homes. It’s about control.” I think about Lucas asking me to move in with him, to leave my apartment, to leave my independence, to force me to rely on him.

  “I always had this notion that it was embarrassing.” Chloe. “Like I should be able to handle it, I should be able to get him to stop. I thought that if I told anyone, they would pity me or judge me. I was afraid they would think I was weak.”

  Chloe is an Ivy League–educated woman who had a long career in finance. She worked at a large bank in Manhattan when women were scarce in the banking world. Her husband of nearly twenty years periodically drugged and raped her. She would wake up in clothes that didn’t belong to her, in hotels she didn’t remember checking in to or in neighborhoods she didn’t recognize. Only when she hid a recording device in her handbag did she discover what was going on.

  As the women continue sharing their tales of survival, I find myself drifting into my own story.

  When weapons of choice were compared—belts, fists, bottles—I thought of Lucas always cornering me in the bathroom.

  When Sue said her husband knew how to hit in such a way that he didn’t leave marks, I wondered if Lucas had practiced on other women.

  When Nancy said it was anger that triggered Glenn, when Lucy said that it was jealousy that triggered Julius, when Anna said she could never predict the triggers, I thought of Lucas and booze, and I wondered if it would stop if he were sober.

  When we listed all the different ways the women escaped, I wondered why I haven’t just left him yet.

  JANUARY 24TH, 10:44 A.M.

  “So, today’s the first day of the new deal.” Richard steps into my office. He looks encouraged and apprehensive at the same time.

  “Is that what you’re calling it? I’m calling it ‘the blackmail.’”

  “You going to give me shit the whole time? I told you this is for both our benefits.”

  “I’m not going to give you shit, Richard. Let’s just get this over with—I need to finish your file. Start talking.”

  He awkwardly hovers over the patient chair while he contemplates his response. “I don’t know what to say; don’t you just ask questions?” I guess he only thought this through far enough to get me squirming in his hand.

  “You don’t have something in mind to start with?” I am terrified to ask Richard the details of what happened with the murder. Maybe now we’ll both be squirming. “Well, why don’t you finish the story you started a few weeks back, about your mother.” I quickly look away after asking him.

  “What story about my mother?” Richard is sitting down, getting organized. His papers are in a stack on my desk corner, he has pulled out two tiny bottles of tequila, and he is laying his hat on top of the newspapers. He takes the caps off both bottles and hands one to me. As our bottles clink, he says, “What story? What did I tell you?” We drink our nips.

  “Richard. You said you were in prison because you killed your mother,” I stammer. I’m holding out my empty bottle for Richard to stash in his coat pocket. He tak
es it and presses a fresh bottle between my fingers.

  “You’re gonna need more than one for this. I am, too.” We go through the routine a second time before Richard begins speaking again.

  “I had a real special mother. She was a single mom and didn’t have a man to help around the house. I don’t have brothers or sisters, so it was just she and I growing up. Woodside was pretty much an Irish neighborhood, so even though it wasn’t so safe, being that we were Irish, she never seemed too scared of anything. My dad died when I was just a baby, and she had a rough go of it.”

  Richard is looking out the window while he’s beginning his story. His legs are sticking straight out in front of him, hands clasped over his belly. The air is strange in here. I can’t tell how I’m supposed to act. The tequila has dulled my sensibilities, but only slightly, and I’m on high alert because I’m frightened. I can’t believe he’s managed to get me to agree to this.

  “I don’t tell this story, Sam.” He looks back to me.

  “I don’t drink in my office with patients, Richard. You’re the one who asked for this. You said you wanted to be treated like an equal, not a patient.”

  “Fair enough. Alright. I don’t… I don’t know how to tell it.”

  “I want to hear everything you’re willing to tell me.” Standard response.

  “Bah, ‘everything.’ Women.” He takes a deep breath and starts again. “It’s complicated to try to explain what it was like. I lived with my mother, Frances, in a three-family house on Sixty-Fourth Street, near Trimble. You know Woodside?” I nod, although the only thing I know about Woodside is that it’s in Queens; beyond that, I have no idea.