Blow(51)

Their door shut.

“Give me your wrist,” he said. “Give it to me, Susan.”

“You don’t have to tie me up, Henry. You can have me.”

“I can have you? I can have you! You’re mine. I don’t have to have your permission. I’ve let you get away with your ‘I have a headache, I don’t feel well, the girls are awake, I’m really sick today’ excuses long enough. From now on, when I want you, you’re mine. Do you understand me?”

“Yes,” she said calmly. She wasn’t as upset as she usually was.

“I thought we had an understanding, Susan.”

“So did I.”

He laughed. “What? You’re upset because I’m putting my dick in someone who wants me?”

“Yes. You promised me you wouldn’t do that again.”

“I have needs that you can’t meet. When you can, I won’t have to seek alternate outlets. But Susan, you’re distracting me from the issue. The problem isn’t me or who I have to f*ck because you can’t satisfy my needs. It’s what you’ve been doing behind my back. I provide for this family and you grow it. That was our deal. I’m doing my part but you’re not doing yours. Do I have to stop providing for you to understand? Leave you and girls on your own? With nothing. Would you like that?”

She didn’t answer.

“Do I?” He yelled louder.

“No,” she cried.

I knew she was scared to be on her own. I’d heard her talking to someone about it once.

“I didn’t think so. Now give me your ankle.”

I left my bed and went to sit next to my sister. “What’s he doing?”

“I think he’s tying her up.”

“Why?” I gasped.

She shook her head. “Because she doesn’t want to have any more babies.”

That thumping started again, but there were no cries from my mother and no yelling from my father.

It was scarier than when there were.

My sister ran to the window and opened it. “Come over here, Gabby.”

I did.

She opened her dresser, which was beside the window, and handed me a small box with a red ribbon around it. “Here, happy birthday. This is from me. Mommy let me buy it with my babysitting money.”

I looked at her.

“Open it.”

I did. Inside was a delicate silver chain with a silver disc on it. On one side was a tiny diamond chip. On the other the words, “Blow, just blow,” were engraved.

“Blow, just blow, Gabby. Everything will be okay.”

I turned the charm around and pretended the diamond chip was a dandelion and blew.

We heard the thumping off and on all night. I’m not sure if we fell asleep or not, but around seven the next morning, our door unlocked.

“Get yourselves ready for school, girls, and make some breakfast. The bus will be here in thirty minutes,” my father commanded.

My mother always had our breakfast ready and walked us to the bus stop. I opened the door and saw my father walking into the kitchen. I tiptoed to my parents’ bedroom door and knocked, but my father was back before I opened the door. “Your mother isn’t feeling well. Now go on and get moving. You don’t want to miss the bus.”

I did as he said.

My sister had to babysit after school for our neighbor and when I came home, my father was there. He didn’t have a shirt on and he was dressed in the same pants he had been wearing this morning. Beer bottles cluttered the table. I knew he hadn’t gone to work.

He looked up from the papers he was reading. “You got homework?”

I nodded. “Yes, sir.”

“Go to your room and do it. And Gabrielle,” he said.

My body started to tremble.

“When Elizabeth gets home, have her make you some dinner and go straight to bed. Your mother will get you off to school in the morning.”

His words were slightly slurred, but I understood we were not to disturb him.

I nodded again and walked down the hallway. Instead of going to my room, though, I went to my parents’ room. I didn’t knock. I just opened the door. My mother was lying on the bed, not moving. I was petrified.

Until she glanced up.

She must have been sleeping.

“Go, Gabby, go. Please,” she pleaded.

Her tearstained face was all I could see and I hated that she’d been crying.

“Go, before you sees you in here.”

Terrified, I looked around the room. The rug had been moved to the foot of the bed and rope was tied around the posts, but everything else seemed in place. Not understanding what was really going on, I shut the door and ran to my room. A few minutes later I heard the lock of my door.

That thumping that drove me mad started right afterward. This time my father was louder, groaning and talking to my mother. “I’m sorry, Susan. I don’t want to hurt you, but I need to be inside you.”

“I’m fine,” she said, no inflection in her voice.

“You’re not. I can tell.”

“I want to see the girls.”

“Tomorrow. This is for your own good.”

“How is keeping me away from my children for my own good.”

“It’s the only way I can think of to make you understand I have needs, too.”