Blessed & Broken

Chapter 3

I sat in front of the refurbished vanity in my bedroom that my mom and I worked on for one of our DIY projects that we enjoyed doing so much. I ran my hand across the smooth white edging, remembering how we found this piece on the side of the road. When we got it, it was very worn and dingy. She and I worked on it with so much care and diligence. For the first time, I really looked at the finished product. It amazed me how something so battered and neglected, could turn into something so beautiful. It also really made me feel so thankful for her and the time that we get to spend together.

“Ugh”, I moaned. I knew that I had to start getting ready for this party that I REALLY did not want to go to. The only thing that made the thought bearable was knowing that Gemma was going to be there. Gemma is my best friend and basically like a sister to me. We have known each other all the way since preschool. Gemma was the only child in her family the way I was, only she was raised much differently.

It must be hard growing up with parents who really don’t give a s**t what you do. I’m not quite sure that she was wanted to begin with. Her parents probably weren’t meant to have kids with the way they treated her. Gemma grew up in a poverty-stricken family who seemed very content with where they were. Except Gemma. She couldn’t stand living there and being in the presence of emotionally absent parents. Any chance she got; she was over at my house. We were the family that she didn’t have at home.

Maybe that’s why we became so close.  I am blessed to have been raised by parents who let me have my “safe” freedoms, but also stayed involved with what I did. Sure, it can get annoying sometimes, but at least it showed that they cared. 

I have been really concerned about Gemma lately, though. The new guy she has been hanging around nowadays, Logan, has not been the greatest influence on her. She says that he is just having her “experiment” with him, but I don’t like the way she changes when she does. She is not the same Gem I know. But I still love her just the same.

I started to put on one of my flip flops when I heard the obnoxious sound of Luke’s car horn. “HONK....HONK, HONK!” I rolled my eyes. “Are your freaking legs broken that you can’t walk to the damn door”, I muttered. I grabbed my purse off my bed and started to head down the stairs. “HONK, HONK!” Luke’s horn became more frequent. “Shut the hell up”, I grumbled a little louder.

“Mom, I’m heading out”, I called. “Hey, Kal”, Aunt Jess said. “Hey, Aunt Jess,” I said happy to see her. “Where you going, Hun?”, My mom asked. “A party”, I answered back with an unenthusiastic tone. “Are you excited for tomorrow?”, Aunt Jess asked. “I’m nervous, but I will be happy to finally get out of there”, I replied. “Your Mama was telling me that you decided on U of M. That’s my girl”, she said with a proud happy grin.

We all laughed and then there was a loud impatient knock at the door. I rolled my eyes knowing that I have kept the prince of assholes waiting too long. “Ok, I gotta go”, I said as I kissed them both. “Not too late, Hun. You have Graduation tomorrow", my mom called out behind me. I swung the door open to find Luke standing there with both forearms propped on the door frame. “What the hell woman!? Let’s go!”, he bellowed. “I was talking to my mom and Aunt. Sorry you had to wait for like ten seconds”, I sarcastically snapped. “Yeah, Whatever. I don’t care”, he said.

We got into the car and started driving to the party. On the way there, I had plenty of time to think to fill the silence. We never talked because he was so self-involved in his own mind. He didn’t care about me, except for that he claimed me as his. I thought about what Luna had told me earlier that day. Everything about my dad. I cleared my throat to stop the lump from coming back up.

“Ewe, you’re not getting sick, are you?”, Luke asked disgustedly. I looked at him like he was ten steps past stupid. “No”, I responded. “If you are, breath that way,” he said pointing to my passenger window and rolled it down. My mind shifted to when Luna talked about the male in my life with the dark energy. I mean, to me, I don’t know if I would call it dark. Just more so extreme immaturity with a dash of narcissist.

But really, what was I doing in a relationship with him? He didn’t make me happy. He certainly didn’t care about me or how I was doing, especially after just losing one of the most important people in my life. In fact, he made my stomach turn. Not in a fluttery butterfly way either. More like I just got done scarfing down the biggest, greasiest cheeseburger, with a load of chili cheese fries, washed down with the thickest chocolate milkshake that made my stomach want to bust open. Then, went on a roller coaster ride that whipped me upside down, around and around, making you want to vomit. That’s how Luke made me feel.

What was the sense of going on with this? We will both be going to college soon. One hundred and eighty-three miles away from each other. One hundred and eighty-three very long miles away. I need a fresh start. Now, I just need the courage.

The party was no different than the rest of them. Booze flowed like careless rivers. I swear, every other word that came out of people's mouths were profanity laced, “Woo’s.” The only difference with this party was, every person looked at me with pity. Some announced their condolences. Luke saw a group of his buddies and headed their way. I didn’t even bother to follow. Instead, I went looking for Gemma. I found her.

She had already been drinking and doing who knows what else. “Kali!”, she yelled as she slightly stumbled my way. “I guess you started without me”, I less than giggled. She knew me well enough to see that I was somewhat annoyed. Even though we were the same age, I always saw her as the younger sister that I never had. I felt the need to take care of her. Maybe that’s because I was the one who really showed her that I loved and cared about her.

As an older sister figure, I noticed that she had started to lose weight. Her face was gaunter. She didn’t have as much pride in her carefree appearance anymore. It made me even more sad than I had been before. Tears started to well up and Gemma knew I needed her. “Oh, Kal”, she said in an apologetic voice. “Come on Babe, let’s go talk.” She took my hand and led me to the pool where it was quieter. I kicked off my flip flops and sat on the edge of the water, dipping my feet into the cool liquid. Tears were streaming down my face as Gemma wrapped her arm around me and let me bury my face into her shoulder.

“It’s ok, Babe”, she softly said. She knew that silence was the best for me right now. That is what I loved about her. She knew what I needed, when I needed it. After a moment, she took the corner of her tank top and wiped my face, the way a mom would wipe the face of her two-year-old who just snotted all over themselves. “I love you, Booboo”, she softly said. “I love you, too”, I replied as I wiped under my eyes, trying to fix my face.

We sat there for a few more minutes just swaying our feet in the water. “Are you ready for tomorrow?”, I asked. “Hell yeah, I am!” she said excitedly. I half smiled at her. “Have you thought about what you are going to do?”, I asked. She shrugged her shoulders and said, “Logan was talking about doing a road trip across the states. Living by our wits.” She giggled and wrinkled her nose at me. “You’re leaving?”, I asked sadly. I don’t think she was expecting my reaction. “Well come on Kal. You’re going off to school.”, she answered. “Yeah, but I’m not leaving. I’m still going to live at home. I mean, at least for a little while,” I said.

“Kal, you are going to be so busy with school. When you are not at school, you’ll be busy with homework. Not to mention, you said that you were going to keep your waitressing job on the weekends”, she explained. “I want to get out of this hell hole of a town. I want to go explore what this world has to offer.” She was right. I would be busy and she has wanted to leave for as long as I can remember. But I wasn’t ready to let her go.

We sat for yet another quiet moment and she let out a small laugh and shook her head. “Why anyone would want to teach sticky, snot nose little demons is beyond me.” I let out a chuckle and said, “I love kids, what can I say? I want ten off them!” Gemma scoff and said, “Yeah, well I would have to drop kick a kid if I was a teacher” I smirked and said, “That’s funny. That is the same thing that Luke says.” Gemma looked down. “Yeah, that’s the only thing I agree with that Bastard on”, she said disapprovingly.

Gemma and Luke’s relationship was a rocky one. They never saw eye to eye on anything and I think they basically tolerated each other’s presence for my sake. It was an uncomfortable environment when they were in the same room.

“Oh, Gemma”, I fake cried. “I feel like I am losing everyone around me.” She hugged me back into her shoulder and said, “You are not losing me. I’m not going away forever, just a little while. Besides, you have your mom, your family, and Luke.” I slowly sat up straight and announced, “I’m breaking up with Luke.” Gemma eyed me cautiously and said, “Kalia Elizabeth Stone, don’t toy with me.” I looked at her. “No, I’m not”, I promised. “With everything that has been going on, it has made me realize how shitty he is towards me. I don’t deserve it and I don’t want it anymore.” Gemma looked at me for a second, threw her head back and tossed her hands up to the sky and shouted, “Thank you, Jesus! She has finally seen the light!” We both got a good laugh out of her outburst as I gently pushed her arm and said, “Shut up.”

The night was coming to a close and Luke was driving me home. I already felt uneasy getting in the car with him behind the wheel, knowing he had been drinking, but I knew that I had to break it off with him. I was working up the strength and courage on how to start this conversation. I took a deep breath and slowly let it out. I didn’t realize I did it loud for him to notice. “You practicing some Lamaze over there?”, he asked sarcastically. “No”, I answered. I think he was becoming impatient with my short answers. “What the hell has been up with you lately, Kali? I mean...man! It’s like you don’t care about me. You don't even try to please anymore. It’s like.... What the f**k?”, he said, almost lost for words.

That was it. I didn’t need courage now. I was livid. His words just flipped a switch within me. I looked at him discussed. My words loathed, “I don’t try and please you?” I was in disbelief of what he just said. “You know what? I am done! I am completely done with you. I am completely done with this relationship. I can’t take it anymore”, I fumed. “I can’t take the way you treat me anymore. You are the biggest, most selfish prick in the world. My dad just f*****g died only days ago.” Those words felt like a hot knife slicing the inside of my throat. “Not gone away on a business trip, he didn’t go on a vacation and will only be gone for a few days. He’s dead! He isn’t coming back!”

Tears started to hit my cheeks, my throat burned and my head felt like a vise was crushing into it. By this time, we were parked out in the street, in front of my house. It was quiet in the car and the air was thick. I thought that maybe, just maybe, something sympathetic could come out of this arrogant fool’s mouth. I was wrong yet again. “You’re right”, he calmly said. I looked over at him, hoping that he was finally getting it. “He is never coming back”, he said as his mood grew dark.

He slowly ran his fingers across the steering wheel, his voice edging on the side of sinister. “I know that man never really cared for me. The way he would look at me.” It was as if Luke was deep in thought to a time of delusion. “I know that he was always judging me in his mind. I was never good enough for his precious daughter.” He paused in a moment of silence. “But now look. I’m the only man that is left in your life. Don’t you think you need to be showing me some respect? Holding tight to me and our relationship?”

I stared off at the middle of the dash board. My anger now turning to apprehension. I was walking a fine line, but I knew I had to stand up for myself. Shaking my head slowly, I whispered, “I don’t want it.” These words were the ones that pulled the trigger. The words that made the hammer pound the bullet. Luke slammed his body right next to mine, making my frame jerk and my heart feel like it was in the pit of my stomach. His hot breath poured onto my cheek as he shouted, “You b***h!”

I could feel droplets of his spit shoot onto my face as his words raged. “Do you really think that you could find anyone like me?”, he said with fire in his voice. “You were nothing before I met you. You still aren’t s**t when I’m not around you.” I was so scared and anxious at this point that the tears just overflowed the brim of my eye lids. It was as if every time he spoke, his face got closer and closer to mine. “You want this to be over?”, he seethed. “That’s fine. I’ll have a hundred bitches lined up waiting to take your place.”  His hand grasped ahold of the passenger door handle so that his body leaned over mine. We were now face to face too where I was now forced to look at him. “Look at you”, he said with disgust. “You’re nothing special. You’re a b***h. A nasty, ugly, bitch.”

 Just then, a spot light shined from behind us and I heard a car door slam shut. Luke quickly adjusted himself back into his seat, grabbing my hand as if he were holding it. He rolled his window down and sweetly said, “Hey there, Officer Mills.” Office Mills was a friend of the family. He had told my mom that he would do nightly drive by’s past the house on his rounds. I suppose it was to make us feel safer. “Luke”, Officer Mills nodded. “Hey Kali”, he acknowledged. I was wiping the river of tears that flowed down my cheeks. “Hi”, I replied. “Are you ok, Kal?”, he asked. I had to think fast. My mind was so cluttered with what had just taken place. I knew that I needed to get out of the car while Officer Mills was still here. I had to get away from this monster.

“Yes, it’s just been a rough couple of days”, I answered as I tried harder to fix my face. “I was just going to go inside before you pulled up”, I said. “Oh, well here. Let me help you with your door”, Mills stated as he headed towards the front of the car to the passenger door. Luke’s head quickly turned my way with a look on his face that read, “Don’t you dare get out of this car.” As my door opened, I looked straight into Luke’s eyes and whispered, “Let me go.”

I tried to pull my hand away as naturally as I could without Mills noticing that Luke was not going to let it go easily. Neither one of us said anything else to each other. Officer Mills took my hand and helped me out of the car. He put his arm around my shoulder, turned to look at Luke and said, “Have a safe ride home, Luke.” Mills then led me to my front door. I could hear Luke rev the engine of the car, but not obvious enough for Mill’s to be suspicious. For me, it was a warning. About fifteen minutes later, it started. The phone calls. The endless calls and messages that Luke left for me. I took the phone off the hook, laid there in bed, and prayed that he would just leave me alone. A sense of peace swept over me and my eyelids grew heavy to where sleep prevailed.

The morning sun peaked through the blinds, shining upon my eyes. Half awake, I took in the warmth of the bright fireball in the sky. As my mind became more and more aware, I began to plan what I had to do for the day to get ready for graduation. Then the panic set in as I thought about last night with Luke. I quickly sat up in bed and flung the covers off of me. I pulled the blinds up, making each slat smack against each other in a moment of haste. I took a sigh of relief when the front of the house looked normal and I didn’t see him camped out in the street.

As much as I did not want to put the phone back on the hook, I knew that I had to. Someone could be trying to get ahold of my mom and I didn’t want her irritated with me. I put the phone back in the cradle and stood by it, waiting for it to start ringing. All the while I was praying, “Please God, don’t let him call me.” My body started to relax after a few minutes of silence. “Well”, I thought. “Might as well go empty my bladder.”

Suddenly, the loud ring of the telephone started to scream at me. My heart flew down into the pit of my stomach. I sat there panicking for a few short seconds, not wanting to answer it. But somewhere deep inside, bravery took over. I wasn’t going to take his intimidation anymore. I marched over to the phone, pounded the talk button, and confidently bellowed, “Hello!”

“Daamn Kal, did we wake up on the wrong side of the bed this morning?” The person on the other end was Gemma. “Oh, Gem, it’s you,” I said breathing a sigh of relief. “Well, it ain’t that dipshit of a man you have”, she said sarcastically. “Had”, I replied back. There was a dead silence on the other end of the phone followed by a, “NO!?”, Gemma was full of disbelief. “Yeah. I thought that maybe you were him calling”, I said.

“Oh my Gosh”, she said with breathless excitement. “You really did it? What happened? What did he say”, she feverishly questioned? “I just couldn’t take it anymore”, I replied. “Well, I knew you said you were going to break up with him, but I didn’t think it was going to be so soon”, she stated. I would have at least waited until after today.” She just had to remind me that maybe I had jumped the gun. “I should have, but on the way home last night, I couldn’t take his s**t any longer. He started to talk about my dad.”

I couldn’t finish my sentence without Gemma interrupting with her, “That piece of s**t!” She was angry. “You wait until I see him”, she said through her teeth. “No, Gem, don’t”, I begged. “I’m nervous enough and I don’t need him to cause a scene today.” Gemma had always been protective over me when it came to the way others treated me. I may have always felt like the worrisome older sister, but she was the feisty little sister that didn’t take crap from anyone. “Alright”, she said in defeat. “But I’m not promising anything after today”, she stated sternly.

“Ok, well come over so we can start getting ready”, I said. “Ok, see you in a bit”, she rushed off the phone. After a while, Gemma came to my house where we got ready for graduation. I tried my best to look scholarly as possible. The soft curls of my hair, flowed past my shoulders. I wore a simple white dress with equally simple blue heels.

Gem on the other hand, tossed her hair up on the top of her head. She wore an above the knee jean skirt with chunky strapped platform heels. But she and her artsy self-looked amazing. I wish I could be more of a free spirit the way she was. I lived my life too worried about what others thought of me. I wish I was brave enough to break free from those chains of acceptance. Mom and Aunt Jess left the house early to do some last-minute shopping. I could see the sadness around my mom this morning, even though she did her best to try and hide it. I knew that she was really missing my dad and so was I.

Walking down the aisle with my cap and gown on left me feeling so many things: a sense of sadness; leaving behind what I have known for over a decade, pride and exhilaration for what I have accomplished, a sense of loss looking into the crowd, seeing my mom without my dad by her side. Also, I felt excitement and uncertainty of what my future held. With all of the emotions that I was going through, the one thing that stood out the most, was the readiness. I was so ready to leave behind this chapter of my life. Ready to begin a new journey. A new one that did not involve Luke.

I could feel his eyes burning through me during the whole graduation ceremony. It made me feel incredibly uncomfortable, but I tried my best not to let it show. The commencements seemed to go on forever. One speech after another. My mind wondered off periodically. Then came time to walk across the stage to get our diplomas. It was such a strange feeling seeing all of these people who met when we were all just about five years old, now all grown up and walking across the stage. This would be one of the last times to see them in this setting. A setting that we knew for thirteen years. That diploma that sat in my hand felt like an eternity to earn, but an eternity that went by in a flash. Turning the tassel on my cap from right to left was like unlocking the door to my future.

Afterwards, Gem and I found each other in the crowd. “We did it, Kal!”, Gemma shouted in sheer delight. We embraced in a warm hug. “I can’t believe we are all done. It’s kind of scary”, I said in an unsure manor. Mom and Aunt Jess found us and surrounded Gemma and I in hugs, giving each one of us a bouquet of flowers. “We are so proud of you girls!”, they both exclaimed. As we all stood in a moment of silence with smiling faces, my mom looked at Gemma and asked, “Where are your parents at, Honey?” Gemma looked at the ground, stuttering on her words. “Oh, you know? MIA, I guess.”

I looked to my mom to see her trying to mask the sadness that filled her eyes for this girl. Mom wrapped her arms around both mine and Gemma’s waist, kissed both of our foreheads, snuggled us both to her side as she whispered, “I am proud of both of my girls.”

As all of the picture taking and congratulations finished up, I realized I had to go get my keys and belongings from the room that all of the Seniors were in before the ceremony. As I walked down the hall, I saw Luke coming down the opposite side. He wasn’t alone either. Hanging on each one of his arms were some girls. Not just any girls though. These were some of the prettiest in the whole school.

He stopped me as our pathed crossed. “Oh, hey Kal”, he called out. I turned to look up at him with a face that read, “I am not in the mood to deal with you.” “Me and my girls here are having a party tonight at my place,” he said in a friendly tone. “Ok”, I replied straight faced. He looked at the two that were standing at his side and said, “Hey girls, go ahead and I’ll catch up with you.” I took a deep breath. I did not want to be alone with him. He looked down the hall as they walked away from us. “Look at those asses. Those are nice, aren’t they?” He turned his head to look at me. He took a few steps forward, backing me up into the wall. He rested one arm on the wall, so that he towered over me. “How does it feel to know that while you are crying your eyes out tonight, I’m going to have two like that that coming through the front door while two more are leaving out the back?” I just looked at him, showing no emotion. “Your loss...Bitch”, he said in disgust. I watched as he walked away, hoping that I would never have to see him again.