Vengeance Bloomed When I Bled

A Lingering Ache

Max was not done yet…

Still gripped to her hair like a lion clawed to its prey, he kept pounding against her as hard as he could. Like she was rigorously being slammed by a wall. Over and over and over.

The roughness of the sofa against her face. The humiliation she felt under her skin was stinging but she kept telling herself “this world be over soon, and Max would never get another opportunity to hurt us again”

Shortly after, he began to fidget. Fingers clutching tight enough to leave crescent marks on her waist and belly.

He invaded every part of her, as was his habit. Seeking more than just her body. He wanted control.

He grunted, cursed, finished… When he was finally done he pulled her head to the side, tightly gripped to her left breast for support, then he whispered into her ears with mock tenderness… “What a good girl you are. Now You can Get the Fu*k Out…”.

A cruel grin crossed his face. Childish. Triumphant.

His shorts hug lose as he slid off her, opened the door and shoved her out. Not hard but hard enough.

She stumbled forward and froze, tongue-tied. Then she heard the door shut and the lock clicked behind her. Shame clung to her like a second skin.

Buzzing sounds filled her head, eyes squinted as she struggled to regain balance.

“What just happened?” this question kept resounding in her head. “How did she get here?” “Here: With Maxwell, to this apartment, to Succumbing to aunt Nene’s wish, to losing her power, allowing herself to experience all the rigour and turmoil she had to endure. HOW?

"I would have avoided all of this by simply accepting that this was long over, instead of showing up here trying to prove anything. What was I going through?”

The little voice that has been around since she met Max, attempted to whisper as usual: “Maybe you were not as submissive enough this time. You must have missed a cue. You probably didn’t arc your back right. There is something you could have done differently that would have appeased him and you would have at least been allowed to stay in the living room for the night, and maybe by tomorrow everything would have gone back to normal, but you didn't. It is all your fault”.

But there was a new voice now. A voice that has been fighting for a place since ‘that other night’, a voice that has finally been birthed and is here to stay. So it drowned out the tiny voice, bit by bit”

“No, mate..”

“That’s not on you, it had never been. Max is cruel, he has always been a bad egg. He hurt you. He takes without asking and today was just another day in the office for him, it had nothing to do with YOU. He is a monster. You deserve better Izzy, and you are strong enough to choose it now.”

The tussle between these two voices ensued, and It felt like being pulled in different directions and not knowing where to lean.

Then she felt something dripping down her thighs. So, she looked down. It was a bit red, but more Creamy. More sticky, “not again” she exhaled.

It began to rain, first gently then it went wild. Stormy winds, the sounds of objects slamming into other objects, trees raging like an army charging into battle, but Izzy still stood on Maxwell's porch unfazed.

Body trembling. Her reflection on the window was barely human. Just some soaked broken thing with hollow eyes, unable to move because her body had betrayed her.

Slowly crumbling to the floor, her back leaned against the shut door, that had once welcomed her home. She pulled her knees to her chest, trying to create something from of support, and the ache between her thighs deepened.

Izzy could swear Ella was in there, she could imagine her laughing, maybe singing, probably wearing her favourite towel or Maxwell’s shirt. Maybe lying bare on the same bed where Izzy had bled seven months ago, in the room where her whole life had unraveled like a pulled thread. The room she thought would one day be her matrimonial room.

What kind of a beast jerks off on one woman by the threshold while the other laid waiting in his room, under the same roof? Well, one like Maxwell.

Something similar had transpired when she first met him, it didn’t make sense then but it does now. There were strange sounds coming from the living room that day, including the voice of a lady who sounded very upset and distressed.

But Max had asked her not to come out for any reason, because his mother who was stopping by and she did not yet approve of their relationship. When Izzy tried to enquire about the strange noises, Max told her she was probably overthinking and hearing things. Mom was gone now and they could have the entire evening all to themselves, so Izzy should relax. He had learned early not to push too hard, so she didn't.

The wind turned sharper and sharper, and the rainfall grew fiercest. There she sat, soaked to the bones on the wet wet ground.

Her body shivered but refused to leave. She couldn’t. Not yet…

What if the door opened?...

In what sounded both like dead silence, and a deafening downpour, memories began to creep in.

How he used to kiss her on the forehead and call her his little miracle. How he used to wait for her at the station, hands in his coat and eyes lighting up like she was the most spectacular sight his eyes had ever met. How he would get the car door for her, and every other door that needed to be gotten. Took her out on picnics. Listened to her dreams and promised to help her achieve them. He told her she would make a very talented Neuro Surgeon. They spoke about how many kids they would like to have, the number of daughters, the number of sons. How she wished they would have his hazel eyes, his silky hair, his tiny lips, the freckles on his face, his height of ‘six foot seven’, his white ancestry, and his pale skin; especially because she didn’t want them to have to experience the alienation she suffered by being a black kid in a predominantly white family.. But they could have her wit, and her smile. Her doggedness, and her unhinged commitment to survival…

She remembered how he used to tell her they were made for each other and that nothing would ever come in between them. That she was the hottest girl alive. That she would make such a great mom, and a wonderful wife.

Izzy had believed him, maybe a part of her still clung to that belief, stubborn like a bruise that wouldn’t fade.

But now, she found herself asking the questions that once felt too dangerous to voice. Had he ever truly believed in them? In the fragile, aching promise of a love unfinished? In the forever they once whispered about, the kind that only survives when both hearts walk the fire together, hand in hand?

Had he ever truly believed in her? In the raw, unfiltered way she loved him, so fiercely, so faithfully that she would’ve bled herself dry just to keep their story from slipping through the cracks? Or had it always been just her, holding on for two?

Each drop of the rain took her memory back to “that other night”, so she bled again. This time not between her legs, but in the realization that came with a question:

“Is this what the older women meant when they said, “one day you’ll understand?...”