Your World Explodes - Where Do You Run?

His whole demeanor had changed in the hour he was gone.  He stood up straight, his eyes were gray like steel, he was determined.  Gone were the puppy dogs eyes pleading for love. Gone were the slumped shoulders that were burdened with rejection. He came in to the foyer just as I was hanging up the phone. Tears were still in my eyes, but his were dry as the desert.

He grabbed my arm with a firm grip and he took me into the living  room just off of the foyer. "You can have that and you can have that"  pointing to items in the room that he was willing to depart with.  "Don't think that you are going to take this or that," again pointing to each item that he was determined to keep untouched. From room to room he guided me with a firm grip on my upper arm.  As he pointed out certain items, I was taken back by his new found determination.  

Was it not just an hour ago that he sat there, eyes welled up, looking like the little boy that had just dropped his ice cream cone on the sidewalk? Where did he go? This man with the death grip on my upper arm was not even familiar to me. He had never laid a hand on me. 

We were in the bedroom and he told me I could have that furniture as he was keeping the custom made bedroom furniture when it was delivered. He wasn't giving up much, nothing offered to me by him had even been considered by me for the taking.  I was leaving with the clothes in my closet and the bedroom furniture only because I knew he would want the custom made furniture. 

We ended up in the kitchen and he told me what I could take and then he looked me straight in the eye and with the most terrifying look and deep voice, he said, "If you think  you are getting anymore than that, I'll kill you first and I know how to kill  people, remember that."  "Don't think you are getting houses, cars, boats and motorcycles out of this, you will take what I allow  you to take and nothing more."  Ah, there was the Killer I knew and every reason I had listed for leaving did not compare to this right here before me, he didn't love me, I was a possession and he was making sure his possessions that could not walk out the door were protected by a threat.

He wanted to know if I had  told my parents.  Really? My Mother  told me nine years ago that she was done with me and to never call her if I was in trouble.  Why would he think I would call my parents.  I was almost free, white and well over 21. I didn't have to call my parents to get their permission to leave him! 

He dialed their number and handed me the phone. "You are going to tell them that you have lost your mind and you are leaving me!" My Mom answered the phone.  He stood there in the foyer with a grip on my arm, glaring at me, daring me to speak, but only the message he had intended me to tell them.

"Mom, I'm leaving Killer,"  Tears in my eyes, my voice quivering, my insides shaking from the shock of  the last fifteen minutes. Killer got what he wanted, he let  go of my arm and left me there on the phone with my Mother.

What does a loving Mother say to their child who calls, their voice filled with heartache and pain as they announce their marriage is ending? I would not  know. For the words that came from my Mother's mouth were as sharp as the words spoken from Killer.

"What the hell is wrong with you? Have you lost your fucking mind?" Well, did I dare tell her that the consensus  here in East Lansing was, yes, I had lost it.  No, I couldn't speak. My stomach was in my throat.  I didn't want to cry but I was.  I had not prepared to tell my Mother that the bed I made was no longer one I wanted to sleep in.

The next blow though was just too low, even for my mother. "What is wrong with you? He has given you every thing! You have a nice house, you drive a nice car, he buys you jewelry, clothes, that man loves you, so you must be fucking someone else, who?"

WOW!  No credit for standing on my own two feet.  I drove a nice car because I had a good job.  I didn't have a house, Killer had a house.  She had no idea what it was like behind those closed doors.  She had only seen Killer outside of the confines of that homestead.  She had glimpses of who Killer was, but just glimpses, nothing to confirm one way or another that things were questionable behind closed doors. The air was poisoned between us. My Mother. Even at times that I needed to have her just say one small word of encouragement,  she let me down.

This woman who raised me to be every thing that she was not, knocked the wind out of my sails. This woman who preached to me from cradle to adulthood to  always look out for number one and to never be dependent upon a man, was on the other end of this phone questioning  my judgement of looking out for number one, me.

I  couldn't talk to her. This was Killer's plan.  He threw me under the bus of Mother Beadle knowing she would not approve of this escapade her daughter was pulling. He was expecting Mother Beadle to talk sense into me, but he didn't know that Mother Beadle never controlled me, not twenty years ago when I couldn't make it home before curfew and not nine years ago when she threw her hands in the air and told me she was done with me. My Mother was still spewing her disappointment from her mouth when I said good-bye and hung up.

I picked up my car keys and walked out the door.  I had no idea where I was going, but I was not going to stay there waiting for the next bomb to drop.  Within minutes, I pulled in to Michael's drive way, tears still stinging my eyes.  He was washing his car and  he dropped the sponge and came over to my car as I got out.  I was a mess, falling apart at the seams, my whole life fell out from underneath me and he held me as I cried my eyes dry.