The Blood from the Scissors
By Garett Ng
An alarm sounded off. My eyes opened up as I could feel the incline of the floor leveling off.
“You’re free to move about the cabin.”
The first wave of passengers unbuckled their seat belts and raced to the bathroom, each of them bumping into my shoulder as they passed by. I looked at my watch. We were only twenty minutes into the flight. With six more hours on this red-eye flight, I determined that I was not going to be able to sleep at all. Why did I choose an aisle seat?
I scanned around. There was a family behind me, and the kids were arguing. It felt like déjŕ vu, and I wondered if my sister and I acted that way when we were kids. I smirked. To my right, there were two businessmen, talking to each other about stock options. Sitting in the aisle seat immediately next to me was a woman reading Cosmopolitan. I sat next to a couple who seemed lost in their own world as they giggled and whispered into each other’s ears. I sighed and took out my journal. I felt like writing, but nothing came to mind. In fact, this exercise of taking out my journal, opening to a blank page, and writing nothing had been going on for weeks now. I had nothing to write about.
Jenny and I broke up a year ago. By all definitions, it could be considered a rough relationship because of the exact nature of how we broke up, but the aftermath made it even harder. Although my friends back home kept telling me to forget about her and to move on, how could I? I couldn’t bring myself to forget about the time we spent together. The memories and every minute detail of our relationship have remained fresh in my mind, like a movie ready to be replayed over and over again. We had a very intense and short-lived relationship, but one that I will never forget.
***
I hated going to parties. Ever since I finished college, I’ve been to quite a few parties in the hope of meeting people, remaining active, and just to pass time in between the dullness of work and going to bed every evening. I felt like a poser. Each one played out like a broken record. I would make a late entrance to a party, greet and chat with my friend who was hosting the party for a few minutes, and then go mingle around in the room with the complete strangers whom I didn’t know and whom I probably would never see outside each gathering. I felt like a politician, working the crowd, introducing myself to the acquaintances, making small talk for a few minutes, and moving on to someone else. Repeat. I was never happy going to these parties, yet I still went because of the few minutes I got to chat with my friends and for the free alcohol that they would always supply. This was what life of being an adult was all about.
During
one party, I was in a middle of a small debate with this guy named Pete about
how we Canadians were horrible at the Summer Olympics because our forte was in
winter sports, when I met her for the first time. Jenny wasn’t the most
gorgeous person in the room. She had a normal figure, she was shorter than most
of the women in the room, and she wore glasses. But they were the new trendy
“librarian” frames, and that did it for me. I thought she looked cute in them.
After we introduced ourselves, Jenny remarked how she had lived in
One coffee date led to another, which led to a dinner and a movie date, which evolved into much, much more over a short period of time. We became inseparable as we talked about the books we loved to read, the music we enjoyed listening to, and just the goals and philosophy that we had in life. During those nights when I had to stay at the office late into the evening or she had to manage the night shift at the book store, we would both make it a point to visit each other at our workplace or to call every hour just to keep each other from going insane. I loved every minute I spent with her. It was like being on cloud nine. During the times I wasn’t with her, I would always think about what we would do next together. I was really falling for her, but I was also afraid of getting hurt again.
My favorite moment every morning would be lying in bed next to Jenny and watching her wake up, squint her eyes to look at me, and smile. I would do this every morning before I would have to leave her and head to the office. She was so peaceful, so happy, and just so graceful that that feeling of knowing that this amazing person was in my life would carry me through the entire day. But these little moments soon became a distant memory locked in the back of my head.
It all began one day when Jenny called me at work and told me she wasn’t going to come over that night. It surprised me a bit since we had developed a routine, but she said she had a long day at work and just wanted to crash at home. It happened again the next day when she called me at work. She felt sick. I told her to go home and get some rest. Maybe she had a cold. After work, I bought some cans of soup and some flowers and wanted to surprise her at home. She wasn’t there. I waited outside her place for an hour, but no one came and I went home. I grew concerned and left a message on her voicemail. She never called back that night.
It was a Wednesday, the busiest day for me at work. I had several consecutive board meetings and I also had to follow up with some high maintenance clients. During the few free moments that I did have, I called Jenny and left a message on her voicemail. I wondered if everything was okay. She finally called back when I was in my late afternoon meeting with my supervisor. Her voice was shaky and uncertain. She apologized for not calling me the night before and told me that an old friend was in town. So, I wasn’t going to see her another night.
I missed her a lot. Even though I was busy at work and had a lot on my plate, I couldn’t stop thinking about her. Was something wrong with her? She told me she felt down a few weeks ago, but I thought she was getting better. I called her back and got her voicemail again. I told her that I hoped she was having fun with her friend and to call me so we could just talk. I wanted to say more, like how I missed her a lot and how I was concerned. But these thoughts only passed through my head as I paused before saying goodbye and finally hanging up.
The
doorbell rang. It was followed by pounding. I woke up, turned to my clock, and
saw it was
“Oh my God, what happened to you?” I managed to ask. She looked like a character form a horror movie. I was in shock and I didn’t know how I was able to inspect the cuts that she had.
She was trembling in fear as she continued to sob. I needed to calm her down and looked into her eyes. “Everything’s going to be okay Jenny. I’m here. We’re going to work this out. Take a deep breath.”
After repeating this a few times, she finally eased up and became less tense. I took her to the bathroom and spent the next hour cleaning the blood off, getting her to take a shower, and finding some clean clothes for her. When she got out of the bathroom, she looked defeated. I brought her to bed where we cuddled. She began to cry again, and I whispered “I love you” into her ear repeated until she finally fell asleep. Throughout the rest of the night, she kept waking up from nightmares.
***
I couldn’t sleep. The main cabin lights were off and there were reading lights scattered. The man next to me was snoring softly. Frustrated, I turned my lights on, took out my journal, and once again tried to think of something, anything, to write about.
Nothing.
I stared at my notebook, searching and then begging for words to come out. Still nothing.
“Writer’s block?”
It was the woman across from me asking. She had her laptop out in front of her with a few articles spread on her tray.
“In fact yeah. How did you know?”
“I do a little writing myself,” she said as she motioned to her laptop. “I know the feeling.” I looked over at the screen and it looked like she had managed to write quite a lot.
“Well, it seems like you’re not having any problems tonight.” I pointed over to her screen.
“Oh, are you talking about that? That’s what I wrote before. I’ve been so distracted by Minesweeper that I haven’t done anything!” She giggled. I liked her laugh.
“What are you writing?”
“Oh, just an article. Nothing too good.”
“Are you a writer?”
“Yeah, I freelance on and off. This one’s for Salon.”
“That’s great. What’s it about?”
“Oh no, it’s embarrassing.”
Was I flirting? I couldn’t tell. “Come on, it can’t be that bad.”
“No, it’s bad.”
“I promise I won’t laugh. Scout promise.” I gave her the Boy Scout promise sign. She laughed.
“Okay, okay. I’m writing an article about people who are trying to reconnect with their former high school crushes.”
“Oh, that isn’t so bad. Is that why you were reading Cosmopolitan before?”
She seemed surprised and smile. “You noticed my reading material.”
“I couldn’t help it.”
“Well, I consider it research.”
We both laughed. She was cute.
“Well, sir, are you writing anything better than I am?”
I was a bit surprised. “Oh, this?” I pointed to my notebook. “It’s just my journal.”
“Nothing to write about?”
“No, nothing.”
“Well, I’m sure something will come up sooner or later. Or you can write about the neurotic writer who reads Cosmo for research.”
I laughed. “Well, maybe.”
We smiled at each other.
“I suppose I should go back to writing,” she finally said.
“Me too… It was nice talking to you.”
“You too. Hope your writer’s block goes away.”
I thanked her and went back to staring at my blank notebook. She went back to typing and focused in her task. I thought about the last time I had a nice conversation like that. I couldn’t think of the time. It was nice to know that at least I can still carry on a conversation. I looked back at the writer as she kept typing away at her article. I felt envious and wished I could write as freely as she was writing in that moment.
Jenny
actually was the person who inspired me to keep and maintain a journal. When we
began dating, I was surprised to find her scribbling away a thought or two in
her little diary when I was coming back from the bathroom. I asked her about
it, and she told me how she felt like it was a good way to remember the little
things she was thinking. She added that she sometimes felt that her journal was
the only thing listening to her. I asked Jenny what she was writing about at
that moment, and she bluntly told me she was writing about me. I was taken
aback by how direct she was, and never asked her again about what she wrote
about. After the day when my doorbell rang at
***
Jenny wasn’t talking when we both got up in the morning. I called in sick at work the next morning and made her breakfast. She wasn’t hungry. In fact, she seemed so detached. I began talking to her and asked her if she could tell me what had happened. She said she didn’t want to talk about it. I told her how much I cared about her and how I wanted to help her, but she needed to tell me what had happened. She didn’t answer. We remained silent. After we both sat there at the table for what seemed like forever with our cold breakfast in front of us and talk radio playing in the background, she asked me to take her home.
The walk from my apartment to her apartment usually takes about 15 minutes on a normal day. It took an hour that day. In all sense, it was a funeral march as both of us took measured step after step. Jenny didn’t seem like she wanted to go home, but I didn’t understand why. I looked at her in search for any clues, but instead of the warmth of her smile, there was a detached and mournful look. I reached for her hand to hold it; it was icy cold. I rubbed it against mine to warm it, but she didn’t react either way.
The brown leaves had fallen from the trees in Jenny’s neighborhood. Along with the cloudy skies, the scene was a typical, gloomy fall day. As we approached her apartment, I saw a man waiting by a car in front of it. My heart began to beat harder and I could feel the sweat form on my forehead as we got closer to him. My stomach began turning when I first saw him and I knew something was wrong. The man was staring straight at us. His eyes lit up with fury and madness. I could see his hands gripping down on the car door handle as though he was going to break it off. I gripped Jenny’s hand a little harder as we walked up the stairs and into her building, making sure the door was shut secure behind us. I could feel his eyes follow us.
As we walked silently up the stairs to her apartment door, I knew that the guy had to something to do with what had happened to Jenny. I closed the apartment door behind me, and watched as she collapsed onto the sofa.
“Jenny, who is the man outside?” I asked. She looked back at me with a look of despair encompassing her face. She didn’t answer. “Jenny, I need to know. This is important. Is he involved with what happened to you last night?” Tears began to roll down her face. She took a deep breath and opened up her personal Pandora’s Box.
***.
His name was Max. Jenny met him when she was in college and they were in a serious relationship during her first two years. They spent every free moment that they had together, from studying together to sharing late night ramen noodles with each other. Even though most relationships in college are doomed for failure, she thought that Max was different and she thought it had a lot of potential.
Things began changing when Max’s mother died. When he came back from the funeral, Max returned as a different person than the one that Jenny knew and loved. All of his warmth and compassion had faded and disappeared. He became an irrational, haunted, and paranoid person. Max began to blame all of his troubles on Jenny. He grew suspicious whenever she was busy and began to accuse her of cheating on him. He would go out to get drunk most nights and would harass Jenny at any opportunity that he had. It began with private insults and accusations done in private, but Max soon began to embarrass Jenny in public by calling her a slut in front of her friends, saying she was fat during meals, and saying that he was too good for her.
Max’s behavior change confused Jenny. She didn’t understand why it had happened and she couldn’t help but blame herself. What had she done to cause Max to hate her? She needed Max. The arguments were just a bump in the road, she thought, and things would get better. She kept rationalizing his behavior and his insults, even though each one felt like a dagger had stabbed her heart. Jenny felt like she couldn’t turn to anyone. She wrote in her journal hoping that the guilt that can pass through from her thoughts to the page. It didn’t help. She needed some outlet and the answer came from a conversation she overheard.
It was Christmas season, and everyone seemed to be in a festive mood as shoppers frolicked from department store to department store searching for special gifts for their loved ones. Jenny had decided to take a coffee break and was people-watching by the window when she overheard two young teenagers chatting next to her. One of the girls was gossiping about how this girl in her class was using scissors and cutting herself. She said it was making her feel better. The two girls talked about how gross it was and talked about how everyone noticed it, but no one was confronting their classmate about it. It was a secret that warranted a vow of silence amongst everyone who knew.
That night, Jenny locked herself in the bathroom and took out a pair of scissors. As she sat on the toilet, she made a small cut on her arm. The blood began to burst through the skin and dripped down the wall of her arms. Jenny closed her eyes as she felt a short burst of a pain, followed by a moment of euphoria. It was this sensation that became an addiction for her. She missed feeling this sense of joy since Max had changed and she enjoyed the power of being able to control how she felt. As she opened her eyes, she saw the scissors still in her hands and made another, deeper cut on her arm. She repeated this over and over that night and in the following nights to handle all the pain that she had to endure from Max. She started wearing long sleeve shirts in order to cover up her arms, which had turned into a sea of healed scars.
On Christmas Day, Max dumped her for another woman. She had a nervous breakdown and thought about killing herself. She felt so much guilt from the failure of the relationship and did not know where to turn. Her friends had kept their distance, not wanting to be nosy. Her family never approved her relationship with Max. She had nothing to turn to, except her journal and her scissors. Jenny fell into an abyss of denials until finally she rose out of it and stopped cutting herself. She never went back to her old ways, until Max came back into her life two days before she came to my door at 3 am.
***
I was pacing back and forth. I couldn’t help it. I was shocked at what Jenny was telling me. I felt angry, hurt, and confused. I had passed the person who had caused her so much pain just minutes before. I wanted to destroy him. How can he do that to anyone? What was he doing butting into our life together? I looked at Jenny for a moment and couldn’t bear looking at her any longer than that. She was a different person than the one that I met. Her eyes were all irritated from the tears that she had been shedding. She was sitting there in front of me, but she ˙˙˙đE-ńw7Ç` |v <˙˙ŕ ˙˙ü € ˙˙ţ @ 7Č 7Ç` € ˙˙˙˙˙˙ ˙˙˙˙˙˙ 6ř«Á ˙ ˙ \ ` T height:200%'> “No. He wanted to be my boyfriend again.”
I felt like someone had punched me in the gut. I couldn’t believe what I was hearing.
“What did you say?”
She shot her eyes at me. I could see she was getting angry. “What do you mean, ‘What did I say?’? I said I had moved on and I was going out with someone else. He didn’t believe me. He said I was bullshitting him and that he wanted me back. I told him to get away from me. I began to walk away and he held my hands down.”
“And then what?”
“He…” Jenny collected herself for a moment. “He said he couldn’t live without her.”
I thought about this. He couldn’t live without her. Max was insane, I thought. She needed to get away from him.
“What did he mean by that?”
“He meant that he would kill himself if I didn’t go back with him.”
“What? That’s bullshit. Why the fuck would he say that?” I was furious. I realized I was yelling back at Jenny. “You didn’t believe him, did you?”
“I thought he was lying and was just getting desperate. I pulled my hands free from him and began leave the table booth when he just got a bunch of pills and junk in his pockets and began to swallow them in front of me.”
“My God…”
“He began throwing up and seizing. We had to call 911 and they stabilized him at the hospital and pumped his stomach out.”
I thought about what she had said and asked, “And you stayed at the hospital?”
She looked back at me inquisitively. “Yeah. The doctors sent me home though. Said there was no point in me sticking around. I left them my phone number in case anything happened. I went home. I was so confused. So much had happened. You called. I couldn’t bring myself to talk to you. I couldn’t stop crying. All the pain from the past was coming back… I… I couldn’t stand it… it was all coming back….”
“So you cut yourself again.”
She closed her eyes. “Yes. I couldn’t help it. It just came to me and I did it.” I stopped pacing and stood there looking at her as she sobbed silently.
“What happened next?”
She reopened her eyes and looked down. “He woke up in the hospital and was discharged. He got my address and waited outside for me. I came home from work and he was there. He wanted to talk some more and to explain what had happened the day before. I got in his car.”
I began to pace again. “Oh my God… I can’t believe you did that. What were you thinking?”
“I couldn’t fucking help it! He almost killed himself because of me and I didn’t want him to do it again!!!”
The silence pierced the air between us. We stared at each other, observing the battle wounds that were inflicted on both of us. It was a stalemate. I flinched.
“I’m sorry. What happened next?”
“We argued and fought. He still wanted me to go back to me and leave you. I wasn’t having any of it and told him to let me out. I got out of the car and began to walk away. And then he…” Jenny broke down in tears. “He hit me with the car. I fell and hit my head against the road. The police were there. People saw. He was arrested.”
“But he’s outside!”
“They asked me if I had been abused and if I wanted to press charges. I said no. They warned me that this looked serious and that it looked like I was beaten. I said nothing and he was let go.”
I was livid. Why didn’t she tell the police about him? He could be gone. Away. Instead, he was ruining our lives, her life, and my life. A silence fell between me and Jenny. I continued pacing back and forth and walked over to the window to take a quick glance outside. He was there, looking up at me through the window. He was waiting.
***
I looked at my watch again. Only ten minutes had passed since the last time I checked it. The seconds hand continued to move.
Tick.
Tick.
Tick.
Why was it going so slowly? It felt like twenty seconds passed each time it made the next ticking sound. I suddenly felt anger towards my watch. I couldn’t believe it. The watch must be lying. Maybe the battery was dying. I shook my watch and banged it a few times. The seconds continued to tick as he it had before. I gave up and stuffed the watch into my backpack.
Everyone on the plane was asleep except me and the writer next to me. She had her headphones on and was playing solitaire on her laptop. I felt like talking to someone, and she didn’t look too busy. I thought about whether or not I should bother her, but before I realized it, I had already tapped her on the shoulder. She took off her headphones and smiled.
“Oh hey. I thought I was the only one awake on the entire airplane,” she said. I was relieved she didn’t seem angry or annoyed at me.
“I’m sorry. Am I bothering you?”
“Oh no. I’m stuck on my article and thought a little game would inspire me.”
“You haven’t finished it yet?”
“No. I still have quite a bit to go.” She thought for a second. “Oh, and how is your journal writing? Did you get anything down?”
“No, I gave up. Maybe I’ll come up with something later.”
“I see.”
An awkward silence filled the air for a moment as we both searched for something that would continue the conversation. It was quiet enough that I could almost hear my watching ticking through the bag. I finally broke the ice.
“I never caught your name.”
“Oh!” She giggled. “I’m sorry. My name is Molly.” She extended her hand to meet mine. We shook hands. They were so warm and soft.
“My name is Steve.”
“Steve. I have a cousin named Steve.”
“Oh really?”
“Yeah,” she responded. “He’s still a teenager though and he’s obnoxious.” She paused and then added, “I’m sure you’re none of those things.”
“I hope not!” I responded. We laughed lightly together.
“So, do you live in the Bay Area?” she asked.
“Oh no.” I thought about it again. “Well, I guess I am now. I’m moving there.”
“Really. Did you use to live in Boston?”
“Yeah. I worked there for the last few years.”
“And not anymore?”
I hadn’t expected that question, and I searched for an answer. I could see that she saw how uncomfortable I was becoming.
“I’m sorry. Seems to be a hot button. You don’t have to answer that.”
“No, that’s okay. I was just a little surprised. I’m not working there anymore. There’s actually a whole long story about why I left.” The mind was racing as I thought about Jenny, my co-workers, and the mess that I left behind.
***
I couldn’t do it anymore. Jenny needed help, and I knew it was beyond what I could provide for her. I was already feeling the cancer of jealousy and hatred developing within me. I tried to resist it. But with each passing moment, I couldn’t stop thinking about the man waiting outside her apartment. The more I thought about him, the angrier I would become.
We didn’t talk for a few hours that day. She remained sitting on the couch, staring blankly at the floor. I tried to occupy myself and handle the silence by continuing to pace around, obsessively checking my email, and flipping through the channels. But my attention and focus were still on Max’s reappearance in Jenny’s life. Why did he come back? Why couldn’t she just stand up to the bastard and tell him to go away? Why did she even care about what he did to himself?
The cloudy skies outside soon gave way to the deep darkness of the evening. I turned on the lights to the apartment and made dinner for the two of us. I served two plates and put one at the table next to me for Jenny. She never came. As I ate, the steam from the food eventually disappeared and the heat changed into coldness. I saw all of this and lost my appetite. I thought to myself, why am I becoming the victim in all this?
I began to analyze that question. Why was I becoming the victim? I was the good boyfriend. I was the person who really cared for her. I was the person who was by her side when she was sick and I was the person who would do anything in the world for her. But I was the person who was getting robbed out of this and she was to blame. She deceived me by not telling me that she had gone to see him. She was causing me pain because she didn’t tell him to go away. She made me care about her and she was causing me to feel all the anger that I was feeling. There was no one else to blame except her. It was her fault. And she was the only person who could fix all of this.
I made a decision. Jenny had to confront him. I wasn’t going to be a part of this mess and she had to choose between him and me. I wasn’t going to be dragged around any more. It was her problem and she had to fix it. This made perfect sense to me and the more I thought about my decision, the more satisfied I became.
I was going to tell her after I finished washing the dishes. I thought about how I was going to tell her. Should I just be direct to her or should I talk about my reasoning? I thought about the pros and cons of each as I put the plates away, when I heard some quiet crying in the living room. I shut off the sink. It was her. I began to feel ashamed of myself. What was I thinking, I thought. I looked at the sink. Little droplets of water were falling down from the faucet. I never helped Jenny to fix it.
In fact, I had become so self-absorbed and so selfish with what had been going on. I didn’t want to get hurt and I avoided thinking about what Jenny must have been going through with this ordeal. Jealousy had consumed me and stopped me from helping her. She came to my door in search of someone who would not pass judgment. A person she could trust. I was neither to her then. I loved her. I loved her so much that I couldn’t let my feelings for her stop me from helping her.
I walked out of the kitchen and saw her. Jenny’s head were collapsed in her hands as she cried silently and tried to hide herself from me. I sat down next to her and looked at her for a moment. I thought about how I would do anything for her, how the thought of someone hurting her made me full of fury, and how I just wanted things to go back to the way they were. I wrapped my arm around her and we swayed back and forth as I looked down on the floor. She lifted her head away from her hand and we looked at each other. Her eyes had become bloodshot from all the crying. There were still tears rolling down her cheek, and I wiped a few away. I kissed her and I found myself tearing up myself.
“I’m so sorry. I’ve been an asshole,” I whispered to her.
“No, no, it’s okay. It’s my fault.”
“No, it isn’t. I should’ve been there to help you to begin with. I- I was blaming everything on you and I don’t understand why. I’m so ashamed. In the kitchen, I thought about leaving you. But I’m not. I won’t. I’m here for you, and I’m not going to let you go. I love you so much, and I want to help you. But I think we need someone to help us. A professional.”
She looked away when she heard that. “No, it’s okay. I don’t need help.”
“Jenny, it’ll work.”
“I tried already. They don’t do anything.”
“They do. If someone doesn’t work for you, we’ll find someone else.”
“No, I’ve tried. I just need some time to straighten this out.”
“What will that do though?”
“He’ll get it. He’ll go away. He’ll forget about me. I’m nothing to him.”
“No, I don’t think it’ll go away. We need help Jenny. Please, just do it for me.”
“Steve, you don’t know him. He will go away. He’s… I don’t want him to hurt you.”
“What makes you think he’s going to hurt me?”
“I don’t know… I don’t know…”
We both looked down at the floor.
“Jenny, you know I’ll do anything for you.”
“I know that Steve.”
“Then please, let me do one more thing for you. Let me get you help.”
We sat in silence for a few moments as she thought about it. Was she thinking about this seriously? Would she allow me to help her? I waited anxiously as I saw her think this through. She turned to me as tears began to well up in her eyes again.
“Okay Steve. We’ll do it your way this time.”
We embraced and collapsed in the couch. It had been a long day for the two of us. I felt drained and we eventually exhausted ourselves to sleep.
***
I had to go to work the next day. I couldn’t call in sick. I woke up when a faint ray of line shined through the window and onto the bed. I slipped out of bed to get ready for work. When I returned back to the bedroom, Jenny was still sound asleep and I sat next to her. She looked so at peace and at rest, and I didn’t want to disturb it. The sunshine continued to pour into the room and went down on the bed. Jenny’s dark, black hair was shimmering in the line and I went out to brush it with my hair. They were silky and glimmering as though it was something sacred. I moved my hand down through her arms. I scars from the cuts were still there and I felt the contrast between her smooth skin and the rough, bumpy scrapes that were left behind. I eventually got to her hands and held them. Her eyes opened and she looked up at me. At that moment, I didn’t want to go anywhere. I wanted to just be with her. Today was a new day and a new beginning in our relationship. I wasn’t going to just abandon it.
“You need to go,” she finally said.
“I don’t want to,” I managed to say.
“But you have to.” I nodded. She got up and sat next to me on the bed. We were looking at our feet.
“Don’t-“ I began.
“You don’t need to say it. I’ll be fine. I can handle Max.”
“Call me if you need anything. I’ll come home right after work.”
“I know you will.”
I held her hand up and kissed it. I finally had to let it go and got off the bed to walk out. Before leaving the room, I turned and looked at her. She hadn’t moved and was looking at me from where she sat. Her eyes expressed deep sadness. I still didn’t want to leave and from her eyes, I knew she didn’t want me to either. I had no choice. I had to go. I mentally assured myself that this wasn’t going to be the end. She couldn’t be trapped in one place forever. Things will work themselves out and eventually, Jenny and I will be happy together again. I hope and optimism filled my heart as I smiled at her one last time and turned out the door.
When I first stepped out of the building, I could see him sitting in a car. He saw me and got out of the car. By the time I reached the sidewalk, we were about one hundred feet from each other, staring straight at each other. The leaves rustled between us as we sized each other up. I didn’t like anything about him, and I sensed that the feelings were reciprocal. My adrenaline began to rush through my veins and I could feel my heart pumping harder. I was not going to let him stop me any more from moving on in my life. I began to walk forward and he also started walking forward, towards me. Every muscle in my body began tightening. I began to perspire as I got closer to him. I was getting a bad feeling of what was going to happen. I could see his hands forming into fists as his bloodshot eyes glared straight into my eyes. We were getting closer and closer to each other and neither one of us were backing down. If he wanted to fight me, I was ready for him because I was not going to stop for anyone.
And I found myself completely passing him. We didn’t say anything to each other, we didn’t hit each other. We just walked past each other and I continued on to work and he stopped and watched me walk away.
I arrived at work as usual at 9:10 am. It seemed like forever since I had been in the office, even though it had only been two days. So much had gone on. During that morning, no one came by and asked if I was feeling better from my “sickness.” No one checked in to see if things were going okay in my life. They just didn’t care. I had dedicated my life to my work, spent more hours with my co-workers and clients than I had with my family and friends, and yet, no one was concerned with how I was doing.
I had my normal project meetings, phone conference meetings, business luncheon, and analysis reports to do during the day. I was busy, but I couldn’t stop thinking about Jenny. I thought about the moment I left her. Her eyes had said it all; she wanted me to stay. What was I doing at work? I should be with her. I had abandoned her. I needed to leave. I needed to go to her.
I was in the middle of a board meeting. They told me that I needed to make a good impression with these top executives to maintain our project funding, but I just didn’t care about it anymore. I excused myself and left the room. I left them behind and ran to the elevator. I stepped onto the street. The early sunny skies of the morning gave way to the cloudy grays of a rainstorm. I called for a taxi and told the driver to take me to Jenny’s. When we got to her apartment, I paid the driver and ran into the apartment building. I was soaked by the rain, but there were more important things on my mind. I needed to be there for Jenny and I needed to be with her.
The door was ajar. As I saw this coming from the end of the hallway, I began to worry and I ran through it. The apartment had been abandoned. There was trash and garbage everywhere. The furniture, pictures, and life of the apartment were gone. Jenny was gone. I was confused. Where was she? What happened? Everything happened so quickly. I took out my phone and tried calling her. No answer. I searched room to room for some clue of what had happened. I knocked on her neighbors’ door but no one was home. I found a letter that she left behind. I opened it and sat down to read it.
It was the end. She left me. Jenny wrote that she didn’t want to hurt me and bring me into the mess she was in. She confessed that she wasn’t as strong as she hoped she was. Jenny went back to him. Max threatened to kill himself again if she didn’t talk to him and go back to him. She didn’t want anyone to get hurt, so she obliged and she moved her stuff out when I was at work. Jenny told me she loved me, but that she never wanted to talk to me again. It would be too painful for the two of us.
The letter dropped from my hands and landed quietly on the floor. I sat there on the floor until night fell and darkness consumed everything around me. I left her apartment and closed the door behind me. It was raining hard outside and from the hallway, I heard the muffled sounds of the rain falling on top of the roof. I walked out onto the streets and managed to find my way back home. I couldn’t help but wonder what Jenny was doing at that moment as I walked through the quiet streets feeling like I was the last person on Earth.
***
Jenny cut me off from her life. In the following weeks, I tried everything I could to reach her and talk to her. I tried her cell phone, but I always got her voicemail. I would always leave a message asking and begging her to call me back, but she never did. That phone line eventually got cut. I tried her friends, but they didn’t know how to reach her either. She was disconnecting me completely. I held hope that she would come to her senses and come back to me. Or even call me. I rushed to get home after work and hoped that she would be there by the doorway or sitting on my couch, waiting for me and waiting to tell me that she was coming back. I ran to answer the telephone hoping it was her on the other end. As the weeks went on, my hoped waned.
The door bell pierced through the stillness of the night. It had been four months since I had last seen Jenny. I was having another sleepless night as I was laying there staring at the ceiling fan. The light from the full moon was coming through the window to highlight the empty walls. The door bell rang again. Was I dreaming? I looked at my clock. It was 3 am. I quickly got out of bed and turned on the lights. As I made my way through the door, the memories of four months ago came sweeping through my mind. Could it be her? I looked through the door hole; it wasn’t her. It was a police officer.
I opened the door.
“What do you want?” I asked.
“Hi, I’m Detective Wong. Sorry for waking you up so early in the morning, but we need you to do something for us.”
“Do what?”
“I think it’d be best if I told you on our way.”
“No wait. You’re telling me what’s going on right now. It has to be fucking important to wake me up in the middle of the night.”
“Yes, I know that, and I apologize once again. We need you to come down to the hospital.”
“What for?”
“We need you to identify a body.”
“Oh my God…” I was surprised. A body. Whose body? My stomach sank as I began dreading who it might be. The officer told me to get changed and that another officer would tell me more details when we arrived. My mind raced as I managed to find a pair of jeans and a shirt to wear before following the officer out the door. Who could it be? I thought. The streets were so empty and quiet as I looked from inside the police car. I couldn’t stop thinking about who it might be. The worst case scenario popped into my head, but I couldn’t believe it. Please don’t be Jenny. It was impossible. She must be somewhere far away from here. I became lost in my thoughts as we finally arrived in the hospital.
I was taken into a patient room. Another officer entered the room. He pulled out a small, wallet photo from a file and looked at me and then the photo. He then turned the photo and asked me, “Do you know who this person is?” I looked at the photo. It was Jenny. It was a picture that we took together at a carnival. My knees buckled and I dropped to the floor in disbelief. I asked him what had happened. Tears began to roll down my eyes.
“It can’t be her.”
“Son, it’s her. Do you know the woman standing next to you?”
How could it be her?
“Yes or no?”
I looked up at the officer. There was a cynical look to his eyes as though he had seen this scene play out over and over again. I collected myself. I tried to summon up all the energy that I had left. “Her… her name is Jenny.”
The officer handed me some tissues, but I nodded them away. “We need to take you to a body. Are you going to be able to handle this?”
I nodded yes, and he took me down a corridor. Questions began popping in my head as I tried to piece together what happened and what went wrong in the last few months. Did Max do it? Did she kill herself? How did it happen? What did I do wrong? How could I have stopped it? My God, she’s dead, I thought. I was being escorted into a morgue. There was a body on the table with a drape covering it.
The detective turned to me and said, “You may want to brace yourself. It might be… a little disturbing.”
“I’m okay.”
The body was uncovered and I choked back. It was Jenny. She was there, but she also wasn’t there anymore. I saw the cuts on her wrists with dry blood all over her hand. There were cuts all over her arms too. It was recently made. Her face was bruised and there were also dark bruises on her arms. She had been battered and beaten up. I could only think of one person: Max. The coroner replaced the drape over the body, yet I could still see the body lying there lifeless.
“What happened?” I asked as I stared blankly at Jenny’s body.
***
After speaking to the police officers, her family members, and some psychiatrists, I found myself escorted by a police officer into a taxi cab. A priest came to comfort me and told me that everything happens for a reason in the grand scheme of things. I couldn’t believe it. I was shell-shocked. People don’t just go slitting their wrists for good reason. A man does not go beat another person for good reason. The paramedics found Jenny in the bathroom, alone and unconscious, after they received a 911 call. The person who made the phone call was never found and located. Max disappeared and was never to be found. The funeral was held a few days later. Some of Jenny’s friends attended. They all had kept in touch with her and they knew that things weren’t going well for her and Max. They saw the bruises. They saw the cuts. Yet, they never said anything. They thought they should mind their own business. She was dead. She was gone. We all had killed something beautiful. She was never coming back.
I went back to work after a week. I felt like I was dying as I sat there in my cubicle. Everything reminded me of her. I went to my supervisor and handed in my resignation after about an hour back. She told me to reconsider, but I refused and packed up my desk. I spent the next few weeks living off what I had earned and accumulated. I was a mess. Everything I did, I couldn’t stop being reminded of her and the things that we did together. Every day, my friends and co-workers tried to come by and take me out, but I blew up at them. I was angry at them and angry at the world. I kept wondering what else I could have done to stop her from moving back in with Max. I had failed her. I acted too late.
I was drowning in my own misery. My friends stopped coming and gave up trying. I was getting physically and mentally sick. I could see the end of my life approaching. I asked myself, did Jenny want me to be this way?
***
“Have you just ever wanted to break free?” I asked Molly.
She looked puzzled. “What do you mean? Like out of a prison?”
“No, not like that. I mean, just from everything. Your friends, your job, your city, your environment. Or something like that.”
“I guess so. I mean, I’ve been in associations that I’ve hated.”
“But you never left?”
“No. You can’t in these things.”
“Well, that’s what I’m talking about. Everyone says you can’t and you just find yourself settling for something you don’t want. You’re stuck.”
“I see what you’re getting at.”
“And that was what had happened to me in the last two months. Everything around me from my office, to the buildings, to my apartment just reminded me of the past. It was pulling me down, and I felt I was dying and suffocating in self-pity.
“So you quit everything?”
“Yes. It was hard. My work was running my life and it needed to stop. So I left the job. I would go on walks around town and all the sights were tainted. I would remember things that happened in this park or at that plaza or inside the grocery store. I was thinking in the past and not in the present. That’s not a way to live. So I needed to get out. I needed to leave and break free. I wouldn’t have made it if I stayed there any longer. I needed to get away from what had happened to me.”
There was a slight pause as she took this in. She finally asked quietly, “May I ask, what happened?”
I took a deep breath and told her about Jenny.
***
The plane touched down and it was a rocky landing. I looked through the windows and noticed that the morning fog had not lifted. As the airplane taxied to the gate, everyone in the cabin began to groggily wake up from their deep slumber. The seatbelt signed turned off and everyone got up simultaneously to begin stretching and to reach for the overhead bins. Soon afterwards, we all deplaned and headed for the baggage claim.
As we all waited for our suitcases to come around, I looked around at the scene. The airport was busy already at that early hour. College students were gathering their duffel bags from their weekend trip home. Businessmen were already on their cell phones, communicating with their home offices about the latest stock trades. Families coming back from vacation were smiling that they were finally going home. And then there were the visitors taking out the tourist books to figure out where to go first.
I was amongst all the travelers venturing into a new phase of my life. I was anonymous in a city of millions. I could stake a new future without anyone needing to know my background and what had happened back east. I had finally arrived, I thought. A new start. A new beginning.
Someone tapped me on the shoulder. I turned and saw that it was Molly. I almost didn’t recognize her with her glasses on. Librarian glasses.
“There you are. I thought I missed you.”
“Oh no. I checked in some luggage. Hope they didn’t lose that!”
She giggled. “I hope so too. Anyway, I’m about to head out, but I wanted to give you this.” She handed me a business card. “I wrote my phone number in the back. Maybe we can meet up or something. I could show you around the city.”
I took a long look at the business card and then back at her. It was the first time I had seen her clearly with the bright lights of the airport illuminating her face. She had such a great smile that warmed my eyes as I saw them. And she had those librarian glasses.
“I’d like that.”
“Great. Well, call me soon. My cell is on the back.”
“Thanks!”
“I’ll see you later.”
“See ya.”
She turned and began to walk away as I saw her off. Before leaving the airport, she took one last look at me, smiled, and walked into the concourse outside. The baggage carousal awoken moments later and suitcases began to roll out. After ten minutes, I found my large suitcase and walked outside.
The fog was finally lifting and the sun was shining down through the breaks in the clouds. I called for a cab and as we drove away from the airport and into the city, the wind began blowing into my face. It felt so cool and refreshing. I was finally breathing again. I was thinking forward towards the future. I smiled to myself. Everything was going to be okay.