The Fight Within

by Laveen, Tiana

  Diversion became his nemesis.

  CHOP!

  No biggie…

  He gritted through the pain, popped a few ibuprofens as soon as the match was over, and went on his way until he discovered the next morning, after a restless sleep and crazy, nonsensical dreams, that his damn left ulna bone had a slight fracture.

  Oh motherfucking joy.

  That didn’t stop him however from picking up his girlfriend that same day and ravishing her body from the first strand atop her head down to her pretty pink painted toenails. Oh, he’d have her all right, recently handicapped or not.

  He hissed, gulped down a particle of pain as her arm swiped over his, reminding him that he wasn’t made of tin, metals, and everything cold and unyielding after all.

  That’s interesting… She touches me where it hurts, makes it hurt some more, but it’s worth it. I don’t even mind.

  He frowned as he toiled with the odd notions, philosophizing over things that didn’t quite compute in his byzantine brain.

  “Treasure…”

  “Yes?” She glanced over her shoulder and looked up into his eyes, wearing nothing but a slight smile…well, and clothes, but he was planning for those to be removed soon enough.

  “I think sometimes we gotta hurt a bit to get to the good stuff.”

  She turned away, but he could see her cheeks plumped in a smile as she softly caressed his hands that were wrapped tightly around her waist.

  “I see you’ve been brainstorming again.”

  “Yeah.” He chuckled. “Just thinking is all. I think I had philophobia at one point. You helped me face my fears.”

  “Philophobia? Isn’t that the fear of falling in love?” she said, her tone cool like the breeze that danced in her tresses.

  “Yeah. Anyway…” He swallowed. “I had something happen to me that hurt. It hurt real bad.” The wind gust grabbed her perfume and tossed it lightly into his space, causing him to drown in desire as his confessions came through the door, presenting themselves for her ears only.

  She suddenly looked over her shoulder again, her eyes on him.

  “Please turn around. I don’t think I can stomach lookin’ at ya when I tell you this.”

  “Well, thanks!” She chuckled, and reluctantly turned away.

  “Ahhh, you know what I mean.” He offered a slight smile. Holding her a tad tighter, as tight as he could without hurting his sweetheart, he ensured she stayed put, didn’t try to slip away… “I used to not be that way, but things change, you know.”

  She nodded, keeping her gaze focused straight ahead. The evening offered a bright, starlit night…all the better for these crippled words, a perfect stage to illuminate his broken down, bed-ridden truth within.

  “What happened, Sean? I won’t make you look at me… I won’t judge you, either.”

  He looked out into the East River, his eyes becoming suddenly blurry. He hated this shit. His damn heart was folding over like a sofa bed, threatening to shut down, tuck itself away as if it had never been there in his chest in the first place. Then, her soft caress stole him from his thoughts. She ran her fingers over his hands and wrists, bristling the fine hairs, ushering him forward, comforting him.

  I can’t turn this into a joke. I can’t make the shit funny. It hurts!

  He sniffed, embarrassed that even the thought of it still made him sicken with sadness.

  “I need to tell you something, explain myself to you. I was in love with a girl who fucking broke my heart.”

  “I’m listening, baby…”

  He took a deep breath, then continued.

  “I’ve always felt a little inferior to others since then, ya know? I dunno.” He took a deep breath. “I think I just kinda wear different masks I guess, try to protect myself, use humor, being mean sometimes…being an asshole to get out of addressin’ the real problem. I can’t believe I’m tellin’ you this shit.” He chuckled.

  “I can and I’m glad you are. How’d you meet her?” She drew lazy circles across his folded digits.

  “We met at a little get together a friend of mine was having. She was the prettiest one in the damn place. That was my downfall… I always go for the pretty ones; still do, you pretty women will be the death of me.” He grinned, felt her squirm in his grip, and certain she was smiling at his declaration. Just then someone walked past, the music drifting from their earbuds loud enough for him to make out the song—Bl△ck † Ceiling, ‘WVFFLIFE’.

  “I wanted to take her out; she seemed to like me, too. We started going out, things happened really fast. Before I knew it, we’d fallen in love. We were planning a future together. Our friends loved us, everyone did. We did everything together. She was not only really attractive, she was smart, too.”

  “Couldn’t have been that smart. She let a man like you go…” Treasure remained face forward, but her words turned around and kissed him dead center in the middle of his mouth. At that, his heart soared like a soul rising into the grasp of God, and then he clasped her hand, uncaring that it hurt him to do so.

  “Well, it got to the point where I thought, you know, I might be able to settle down. At the time, I was workin’ at a hardware store and doing construction jobs, too. I was the manager at the hardware store. It was decent, I guess, but I knew I wanted to do more than that, I just had not figured everything out. Regardless, I knew I made enough to get married, and she worked as a teller at a bank. We weren’t rich, not by a long shot, but we would eat, bills would be paid, ya know? The basics. I could take care of ’er, and that’s all that mattered to me.”

  She nodded in understanding.

  “I even found us a real nice place. It was kinda small, but it was nice over there in Greenpoint.”

  “I lived in Greenpoint at one time, too!” she squealed, tossing him a quick glance before turning back to stare at the twinkling stars.

  “Yeah? Well, I’d never stayed in Brooklyn up until that point, but I wanted her somewhere safe where our wallets wouldn’t be busted the hell up and there was shit close by, stores and our jobs and the train not too far… So, I did all this shit for Darci.”

  “That was her name?”

  “Yeah, Darci. I did all this shit for her, to make her see that I was for real because she’d accuse me of just playing and horsing around sometimes, not being serious. I was serious about her, though. She was everything to me. I got on one knee and proposed to her in Central Park.”

  “Oh my goodness, that sounds so romantic, Sean.”

  “Yeah, that’s what she said, too. She accepted, seemed excited ’nd all. We told our friends ’nd family. Everything was fine for a few months…and then…”

  He turned away from the rolling waves of the river, his eyes burning with rage and sadness as he gulped down his pride, forced himself to continue.

  “Sean, you can tell me. I want you to tell me.” Treasure kept straight ahead, but her reassurance helped him get over his self-imposed hurdle. He couldn’t fight his way out of this shit. He couldn’t construct a perfectly timed joke and make the crowd go wild, couldn’t dump it into a huge, stinkin’ trash heap and walk the fuck away like it never happened… No, he owned this. It followed him wherever he went. It was his, and it wouldn’t allow him to turn his back ever again.

  “Come to find out, come to find out…” he repeated, reaching deep inside his gut to find the damn nerve to tell someone else this story. He’d never told a soul, except Colin. He didn’t confess to anyone what the hell went down, and he knew his brother would take the shit to his grave.

  …I don’t wanna tell her. What if she thinks less of me? But I gotta… Wait, do I? I don’t have to tell her. What difference does it make? Why’d I start telling her this shit in the first place?!

  “Come to find out, what?”

  Fuck…

  “Come to find out … come to find out she was embarrassed about me not being some big shot, like the ones she was used to dating before me. She had rich guys after ’er, men with money. I didn
’t have any fuckin’ money. I didn’t match who she usually paired up with. That never bothered me, never crossed my damn mind as a problem until…until this happened.”

  They were quiet for a few moments. Treasure gave him time to walk around his thoughts, examine them, and place the verdict at her feet when he’d mustered enough strength. He took a deep breath and continued.

  “One day, she didn’t know I was home, and I heard her on the phone talking to one of her nosy girlfriends, telling her that I was a good fuck. I thought that was pretty funny, made me feel good, ya know? So I kept from laughing but listened in, hiding out, proud that she was bragging on me.

  “She went on and on about how hard it would be to walk away from me because of the sex. Once she said that, my heart kinda dropped a bit… I was in our bedroom thinking, ‘Walk away from me? What is she talking about?’ She added that I looked good, had a nice body and face, her other friends liked me, I made her laugh all the time and was pretty good to her, but…she said I had no ambition, no money, and wasn’t going anywhere in life, so she didn’t know how to tell me that the engagement was off and that she tried to love me but just couldn’t…’cause I was broke…”

  Treasure sighed and tightened her arm around his.

  “Plus, she liked the apartment we had and her fuckin’ credit was so jacked up from living above her means all the time, she wanted to string me out until the lease was up. I was bustin’ my ass payin’ all the bills so she could just use her money to go back to school. I had told ’er to, told her I’d take care of everything if that’s what she wanted to do. I wanted her to be successful at everything she wanted a stab at, you know? I wanted to be the type of man that never stood in his woman’s way, but helped pick her up, give her a boost to rich, I mean…” He took a deep breath, “…to reach the fuckin’ stars that everyone else said she’d never get to touch.

  “But when I heard her say that, I dunno, Treasure. I kinda felt some shit I never felt before. I kinda felt mad and worthless and some angry shit grew in me that I didn’t get rid of for a long ass time. I became a mean, fucked up person. Shit, maybe I always was…it just took some fucked up shit to happen, make it all come out.” He sniffed, his heart pounding a mile a minute.

  “Oh my goodness, I’m so sorry, Sean. I have to look at you, can’t stay like this… Let me go!”

  The woman broke her promise and turned, looked him in the eye. He hated that it still hurt after all these damn years. How could that be? How could something that happened so long ago control him as if it were freshly done? As if the smack of words across his heart still stung? But it did, and it framed so much of his thought process, the way he saw the world, the way he interacted with others and of course…how he viewed women in general.

  “Yeah, she was just using me, treating me like a piece of shit and I didn’t even know it!” His laughter came out covered in a blue funk. He found himself looking down at the ground, tearing up a little inside. “So, I let her finish her conversation, ya know? Wouldn’t want to interrupt such a thing. Then, after she hung up, I stood in front of her, still smiling, Treasure, smiling big and wide, teeth showing…yeah. The more it hurts, the more I grin.”

  The woman squeezed his fingers.

  “I wanted to take every damn piece of furniture in that place and throw it all over the fucking room! It took all of me to not do it! You should have seen her goddamn face.” He grimaced, shook his head. “I punched a goddamn hole in the wall, asked for the ring back and begged the landlord to let me out the fuckin’ lease all in the first hour of her little confession. I kept a strong front in people’s presence after that, made it seem like it was no big deal, ya know?” He moved his hands up and down her stomach, wanting to be inside her so badly as he poured out his truth.

  “After I get done making a fool of myself in front of you, telling you this embarrassing shit, can we go somewhere?” He peeked over her shoulder, checking her reaction.

  Her cheeks plumped in a sugary smile. “Go somewhere for what?”

  He shook his head and let some people walk behind and around them. “Don’t try to play me, you know what.”

  She chuckled lightly. “Yeah…you already know we can.” She faced him, caressed his jaw, and cast him a wink.

  “I’m going to finish.”

  “At this point, never mind. Look, you don’t have to, Sean. I think I get the gist of it… I don’t want you to torture yourself.”

  “I finish everything I start now.” He looked at her sternly, then softened. She blushed when he gave her a flirty wink and secured his arms around her. “So, I played it off, like the shit didn’t hurt me, but it did. Colin, like I said, is the only person who knows what went down. I want you to meet him soon by the way.” He grinned.

  “I’d like that. You two seem like two peas in a pod.” She chuckled.

  “Yeah, we are. Anyway, he knew I was all fucked up over it, and Kyle, my best friend, knew it too, but I refused to talk about it in detail with him. He only knew Darci and I broke up.”

  “Why’s that?”

  He shrugged. “Ego I guess…plus, I was a little jealous of Kyle ’cause he was the type of guy she really wanted.” He paused and scratched his forehead with his thumb knuckle. “Kyle’s got money. I hated how I was feeling toward him after that… I didn’t feel like a man anymore. I felt completely emasculated. She made me…she made me feel like shit. I couldn’t let anyone know how fucked up she had me. I had to be strong, ya know?”

  She turned back away, giving him space, and looked over the bridge.

  “Women come and go, that’s what I told myself…but I loved her more than anyone else at that time. People would try to ask me about it, try to get me to talk like I was a witness to some murder or some shit. Whenever they tried to bring it up, I’d say, ‘Who cares!’ or some shit like that. But I cared. I cared all right.”

  They were quiet for a few moments, and she offered her silent support and understanding in the form of a squeeze.

  “I never let anyone get that close to me again. I became kinda cynical, too.”

  “About women?”

  “About everything. I resented that I didn’t have any money. I hated rich people, blamed ’em for my situation, ya know? I thought that was the reason she’d done that shit to me, because I wasn’t like them. I said that stuff, believed it, but that wasn’t it at all. It took me a long time to realize,” he said, then paused briefly, “that even if I was rich, she still wouldn’t have been happy. I’d missed the damn point. Didn’t get the moral of the story for years.”

  “When did you wise up?”

  “After I got to know you…”

  Treasure jerked around, stared at him with wonder. He ran his finger along her chin, studying her like the beauty that she was, then returned his hand to her waist.

  “I know, I know…” He swayed, a smirk on his face. “I like how you didn’t say anything, bring up our argument in front of your house while I spilled my guts just now. Now it all makes sense to you, right?” He grimaced as she nodded with new understanding.

  “I do care about poverty in our country, I care a whole lot, but that was just an excuse. All that shit was really about me, and my hang-ups and issues. I knew it right after you cursed me out.”

  They both chuckled.

  “You helped me look at things differently, realize I was mad at the wrong damn people. I got more than I bargained for with you, Treasure. I thought I was just getting a date with a pretty woman…my weakness. I honestly assumed we’d have sex shortly after meeting, maybe become friends afterward, keep in touch…shit like that. I never would have guessed we’d get along like this, be like this… that you’d be bigger in my world than I’d ever imagined…something worth fighting for. I fuckin’ fell in love…didn’t see it coming. You were a challenge for me, too.”

  “Why? Because you had a smart mouth and mine was even smarter and you wanted to argue?” she joked.

  He grinned, “Nah, that’s true, bu
t it is because you were exactly what I needed. I think sometimes, you know, we just have this gut reaction, a feeling deep inside where we know a change is long overdue. Sometimes, the shit we claim to hate, we just want for ourselves…”

  “So true…”

  “I looked over your financial success, seeing it as some sort of disease, an ailment, but you worked hard to get where you are in life. I didn’t have any right to make the assumptions about you that I did. You earned it, deserve it. Just ’cause I work hard too and haven’t gotten there didn’t give me any right to judge you, or anyone else for that matter, based on how much money they have in their bank accounts.”

  “But I’m not rich.”

  “Don’t have to be. The haves and have-nots don’t see shades of gray. The shit is all black and white when you live from paycheck to paycheck.”

  “I suppose you have a point there.”

  “Anyone livin’ in a neighborhood like yours, wearing clothes like yours, and all that shit became a problem, a sore of society in my book. It was just justification so that I wouldn’t have to look at the real issue, ya know? Examine myself.”

  “And after you examined yourself, what did you find?”

  “That I was scared of reaching my full potential, Treasure, and blaming others for that. It was always someone else’s fault that I couldn’t succeed. That’s so fucked up. I’ve always been so quick to point out other people’s bullshit and couldn’t see my own. I think now, in retrospect, that I was a little happy that Darcy gave me an out.”

  “Really? Why’s that?”

  “I loved her with all my goddamn heart, but I had fears that I was messing up, would never be good enough. And there were signs, Treasure.”