Inside Out - Lauren Dane [11]
As Elise had told her just a few weeks before, she wasn’t alone. She had her friends, and that took the edge off a lot of crappy days. She was still smiling as she parked her car in the very well lit space near her apartment building’s front door. The stars were out, but the moon hid, glowing through the high clouds shrouding it.
Summer had faded, and early fall was beginning to settle in. It got dark earlier and light later. The brilliant blue of the sky would fade as the rains made the bright red and yellow leaves stick to every surface like confetti. The rain would settle in soon, and like most Seattleites, she didn’t mind it. She worked around it and found ways to enjoy the weather because it was simply the price one paid to live in a place so verdant and lush.
One small, dark corner of her heart hated it when it was dark so much. It brought the edges of her fear closer. It was the darkness and the way it could hide things. People. She paused at that last thought, remembering.
She’d been walking back from her car. Had deliberately disobeyed Bill by staying out late with her cousins who’d been visiting from Maine. It had been dark and cold, though her cousin Sharon had mocked Ella. After all, Mainers were made of stern stuff and scoffed at thirty-eight degrees!
She’d been smiling as she hurried toward their apartment. Earlier, before she’d left, she’d made him his favorite dinner. Pork chops, mashed potatoes and green beans. Sometimes such little things could keep him happy, and he’d let her infractions slide.
It was then he jumped out from the hedges at the front door, screaming, grabbing her and dragging her toward the alley. Her heart had raced, more so after she realized it was him and not a stranger. He’d clamped a hand over her mouth then and told her, as she’d trembled and held back her sobs, that if he’d wanted her dead, he could make it happen.
“See what could happen if you stay out after dark? No one would miss you but me. I’m all you have, Ella. Don’t you forget it. When I tell you to be home by eight, I’m being generous because it’s your family. And then you go and ruin it by making me worry.”
As he spoke, he’d pressed her into the brick wall at her back, his hand around her throat. The world dimmed, the darkness at the edges of her vision encroaching more and more until she felt herself let go. For one moment there had been some peace, and then he’d slapped her hard, letting go of her throat.
He’d been conciliatory then, taking her inside, making her tea and coddling her. But she’d never forgotten that lesson, and she’d never been late again.
The dark was a reminder of that helplessness, and so, each time she confronted it, even if she broke out in a sweat at the very thought, she won.
As she shook off the memories, she pulled herself back together again. Mainly she was past it. She had seen Erin’s therapist, a woman specializing in survivors of violent attacks. It had helped immensely, and Ella would be forever grateful for Erin, who made sure Ella’s insurance coverage would pay for the sessions.
Erin had offered to pay at first. Because she had so much and Ella didn’t. Erin’s reaction was part of who she was. That had been touching, of course. But it was always Erin’s insight, the way she seemed to understand Ella’s need to do it herself and the way she helped make that possible—it was that sort of love that made Ella so loyal to Erin. They shared some common history with their past, the violence that had changed them totally. Facing the fear helped. Most days. But the thing about fear was that it ate away at your reason, made you smaller.
It was her mini dare each day to come home to this place. To embrace normal and live her own life on her own terms, even if she was afraid. Her life was her own. She made it, and no one would take it from her again.
This building, this parking spot, her nearby grocery and the Vietnamese restaurant two doors down were her prizes for living and being happy. It wasn’t big or new or even grand, but it was home.