The Knowing: Awake in the Dark (18 page)

My mind flashed back to the
pictures
I’d had when I was eight, of the two women (that as it turned out, I knew from high school) and their conversation and I was stung with the truth of what I’d seen.
I have to abort this pregnancy, I can’t have another baby.
I thought. I made an appointment at a women’s clinic.

I dropped Raine off with my mother and as I made my way out the door my mother said, “This baby is meant to be and if you abort her, she will find a way into your life. It’s a mistake Nita, and you will regret it for the rest of your life.”

And there it was, her
knowing.
My mother almost never interfered in my life and her statement made a powerful impact.

Crap,
I thought as I walked out the door.
How does she know it’s a girl?
I drove to the clinic and sat in a hard, blue, plastic chair while my stomach churned and the voice warned me.
She’s right, it’s a mistake. The child is yours and waits for you.

“Nita,” the nurse called from the inner door. I quietly gathered my things and left.  For the next eight months I tried to bury my dread. I carried a child I falsely believed I didn’t want. I felt helpless and trapped.  I waited for my daughter’s birth and I did not suspect she would change my life the instant I gazed into her beautiful, pale, blue eyes.

Elizabeth had a light that astonished me and all my anxiety and fear melted away. She was beautiful with smooth skin and pink cheeks, blonde, hair and sky blue eyes. I felt her inner strength radiate from her tiny body and
knew
that now my family was complete. I had to find a way to leave Aaron, I just wasn’t sure how. I was eternally grateful for my mother’s insight.

Aaron’s behavior was unnerving and his actions had become increasingly erratic. He’d sauntered in one afternoon and casually related what had occurred only moments before. “Some stupid cunt cut me off on the freeway” he said casually and untied his shoe. “So, I sped up and passed the bitch and then got in her lane and slammed on my brakes and backed up. The bitch barely missed me! She probably pissed her pants!” he laughed.

“What is wrong with you, Aaron? People don’t do things like that. You have a serious problem. You’re sick.” I said, horrified and clutching Elizabeth to my chest.

I have to get away from him. I have to make him so mad, so disgusted with me
,
he will kick me out. Then it will be his decision. Maybe, if he hates me, he will leave me alone, and want nothing more to do with me
and I
will be free
. My thoughts ran wild with manipulation after manipulation. I was afraid of Aaron and unable to stand in my truth and say, “I don’t love you and I want out.”  A scheme took shape in my mind to have a one-night stand so he would hate me for cheating, something he accused me of regularly. I convinced myself that was the answer.

I arranged a ski trip to Tahoe with a girlfriend for a week and left my children with Isla. Elizabeth was just five weeks old.

My plan was simple, cheat on Aaron, admit it and let him kick us out.

As soon as we arrived in Tahoe, we went to a bar that night where a band played and I spent the night with the lead guitarist, cementing my manipulation. The thing I remember about it, was that the experience was empty and sad.

On the drive home, uncertainty of my plan grew and choked the resolve that had been there before it. Inner anxiety caused my hands to sweat and my mouth to dry. My eyes dilated with fear. I never imagined what Aaron would do.

Immediately when I stepped through the threshold, accusations of infidelity sharp and bitter flew like daggers from Aaron’s tongue. I denied such behavior and my chance to escape was washed clean away. I put the children in bed for the night and Aaron’s filthy monikers raged on.

“I know you fucked somebody!” he screeched. “You’re a whore and always have been!”

I stood silent;
just say it,
I thought,
tell him he’s right, I did it and let him kick me out
.

“I did it,” I blurted. “I’m sorry but I had an affair, I did it.”

My insides felt like putty as I waited for his response. Aaron scowled at me.

“You fucking cunt, I knew it!” He screamed. “Just say, I’m a fucking whore.” His eyes were wild and he grabbed the hair at the back of my head and forced me down the hall to our bedroom. He pushed my face into the mirror,

“I am a fucking whore!” he screamed, “say it! I am a nasty, dirty, stinking, fucking whore!” he went on. “Now say it, cunt, say it!”

I was stunned. “
Please god, please, don’t let the children wake up
, I prayed.  My teeth chattered and my body shook as though I were in a snow storm, and I whispered, “Please, p-p-p-please, Aaron, d-d-don’t w-wake the children. Sh-sh-sh-sh.”

“I said say it!” He bellowed louder than ever.

“O-k-kay, I’m a w-whore,” I choked.

“No, stupid! I’m a dirty, fucking, whore!” and he pushed my face against the cold mirrored glass. Spit and snot smeared my reflection and my mouth was gaping, my lip began to bleed, spreading a pink tint across the mirror and my gums.

“I a-a-m a d-d-dirty, f-f-fucking whore.” I breathed.

And my mind raced as I listened for the slightest noise or cough. My ears attuned for my children’s cries. Thank God there were none.

Aaron’s hateful breath assaulted my face.  I felt rage on his breath as I was forced to inhale his toxic and broken soul. He tore at my clothes and chanted vile sentiments like a man possessed. He threw me on the bed and I plunged downward with the water that filled it. He held my face in his hand squeezing the soft pallet of my cheeks together, his fingers nearly touching while he raged. His knee was planted firmly on my chest.  He held himself in one hand masturbating furiously, and although he was unable to grow hard- still he expelled his sickness on my face.

“That’s how whores like it,” he groaned.

I felt such shock-such repulsion-a fire drill screeched in my mind- evacuate, evacuate it trilled and I did. Like a guilty marauder I fled the scene from my conscious mind leaving my body to witness and be the keeper of all that came after, alone and abandoned. I retreated to a desolate mental cage cowering and afraid.  It was as if I’d never known him, as he pushed inside me, ripping and tearing innocent flesh.

There was no tenderness in his hands, only a disgusting depravity that burrowed like flesh eating weevils into my skin. I held no concept of time as he raped and bruised my body forcing him-self inside of me; the hours flew.

At some point during the night, I found myself naked and huddled against the rough stucco wall outside of the duplex where we lived. I didn’t feel the cold, although I saw my breath.  I had no recollection of how I’d gotten there. The porch light blazed and I pleaded through swollen lips,

“Please, Aaron, please let me in. I’m sorry, pleeease, Aaron.” Eventually, he did.

My frame of reference after I came inside is vague at best but, eventually Aaron was spent and he lay beside me asleep. I inched carefully and quietly from my prison of water to the floor. It felt as though it took a long time.  I knew Aaron had a rifle high on a shelf in the closet and some unknown part of me drove me forward until I sat naked and shivering on the closet floor. I held my breath and fantasized of how I would shoot him.

“
Can you kill him
?” a voice whispered.  I wondered then,
is the gun loaded and if not where are the bullets and how do I get them in without waking him?
What will become of my children if he awakens and kills me
?

I abandoned my fantasy and crawled on hands and knees down the hall, sick with the reality that I could not kill him. I wrapped myself in a bed sheet from the hallway linen closet and tried in vain to wipe away his fury that dripped like acid down my thighs. I waited, my body tucked inward like a child scarcely breathing, for him to awake and my mind took me back to a memory from six months before this nightmare began.

A
light-body
had materialized before my eyes. Its vibration rattled my insides like I had just stepped off a train. I was not afraid and I recognized that this
light-body
was different from the one I was familiar with.

Pictures
behind my eyes began along with the
knowing
and I saw a very old Chinese man with skin that looked like leather and hung from his bony arms. My body felt the hunger that filled his empty belly. He walked bent with the weight of loss on his shoulders. Tied to a tether he held, was a mule so skinny that the bones of its flanks stuck up like air fins. In his dark and desolate eyes I saw the whole of his life. Who he had been before growing old was clear and I experienced the wisdom and pain that lived within him. I shared in the essence of who he was. In that moment, I felt our oneness. It was other-worldly for me.

There were no words spoken but I
knew
the
light-body
before me had been the old man in a past life and had lived countless other lives too, although I held no knowledge of past-life ideology.  I knew the
light-body
was connected with Raine to guide him or teach him, they were part of each other, we all were but I wasn’t sure how.
“It’s time to go now.”
He said without speaking.
“To stay changes life path and soul intent. It’s time to go.”

I
knew
that Raine’s life choices and mine were intertwined and unbreakable. The baby inside of me kicked as if to say,
do you get it
?

I understood the message, but I was afraid to make a change.  The
light-body,
like all I had encountered in the past, emanated loving steady energy. And in only moments it was gone leaving me with more questions than answers.

Crap
, I thought,
what am I going to do?
I
knew
I had to leave Aaron, but I was afraid of what he might do.

He will never let me go
. I thought. I struggled daily to hide my growing anxiety, fear and disgust. That was why I’d formed my plan to escape.

Noise, from the back bedroom meant Aaron was awake and brought me back to the present moment. Aaron got up and left for work like it was a normal day. I pretended to be asleep but feared he would see the hard pulse of my heart, move with the sheet that covered me. He never came near the couch where I lay wrapped like a mummy. Immediately after he left, I woke the children, got dressed and called Isla. “Isla, it’s me. Can you come get me?”

“What’s wrong? Is something wrong?”

“Yes, something is wrong. You have to come get us, right away. I’m leaving Aaron; he’s gone over the edge. It’s for good this time, I swear. Please, Isla hurry. I know he’ll come back and try to stop me.”

“Okay, let me get gas and I’ll bring the van. I should be there in an hour.”

“Thank you, Isla.”

In a frantic dash I shoved all I could into giant green trash bags and pushed the horrors of last night from my mind.  When Isla arrived, we quickly carried everything to the van.

Suspecting my departure, Aaron left work and returned home. I had just fastened Elizabeth into her car seat when Aaron pulled in the drive. “Where do you think you’re going? Fucking cunt.” He spat.

“I’m leaving, Aaron, and you can’t stop me.”

I ran back into the house to get my purse and one last bag.  Isla had called the police from a neighbor’s phone the minute she saw Aaron.

“You think you can do anything you want?” he hissed.

Aaron spun violently around and I watched his anger form in hostile circles of rage. Spotting the broom tucked between the refrigerator and kitchen counter, he grabbed it turning the wooden handle into a weapon. He swung wildly and shattered my beloved house plants. I stood immobile and watched the dirt and clay rain down like exploding grenades.

“You think you can just leave?” Sweating and red faced he dropped the broom and went to our bedroom to retrieve his rifle, brandishing it like a sword.

“I’d rather shoot you,” he said in a choked and broken voice. His eyes filled with tears.

“The police are coming.” Isla called from outside.

Aaron looked away and regained his composer. He slid the glass door open calling to our neighbor who stood on his back porch, eavesdropping.

“Hey, buddy, can you hold this for me?” He asked as he handed his illegal firearm over the fence.

I couldn’t believe the gall of our neighbor, whom I never laid eyes on. The officers arrived and separated us, taking me outside to hear my part of things.

“I want to leave.” I said to the officer with me. “He’s threatening me and broke all my plants. He has a gun, but he gave it to the neighbor over the fence. If you leave, he’ll get it and shoot me. I know he will.  Please, just stay while I finish getting our stuff.”