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Then the door opened.
And I died.
Okay, I didn’t die, but it sure felt like it, because the person on the other side of the door was death incarnate. Wearing a scythe, a black hooded cape, and Louboutins, Becca Riley was the last person I expected to see. Quickly, I double-checked the room number. Did I have the right room? Yes, I did. Riley looked almost as surprised to see me as I did her. I was about to say something when I heard Law’s voice.
“Who’s at the door?” Who’s at the door? I’m at the door, the woman you supposedly loved! I couldn’t stop staring at Riley. I had knocked on Law’s door expecting him, expecting the man I might love. Instead I got the Devil’s girl Friday. My brain was short-circuiting. The wires were fraying.
It all happened so quickly I couldn’t control it. I felt nauseated and then the bile rose up, stinging my throat. Then the bile exited my mouth, landing all over Becca Riley’s thousand-dollar pantsuit. I couldn’t even appreciate what had happened, because I was too hurt. Too betrayed.
“What the fuck?” Riley screamed, looking at her now soiled suit.
How had I let this happen? I had known from the beginning he was working for Morris, but I had let him convince me otherwise. I had been swayed by his pretty words, and maybe a little by his pretty face. Fool me once, shame on you. Fool me twice, shame on me. Fool me three and four and five times? Well fuck.
“What’s going on—Nami?” Law came up behind Riley, looking like a deer caught in headlights. I could see the cogs turning in his head as he prepared some kind of explanation for me. I didn’t want to hear it. I put my hand up, signaling him to stop.
“She fucking threw up on me!” Riley bellowed, making obnoxious hand gestures at her suit.
My brain told me to run away, to sprint from this horrible revelation and get as far away as possible. I was done running, though. I turned and walked away from them, refusing to go any faster than normal. I was through running away from bad people. They were the bad ones, not me. I had done nothing save exist.
“Nami, wait!” Law called after me. I nearly stopped, turned around, and ran back to him. His arms offered the only comfort I’d known in months and I wanted to feel that. Lifting my foot to continue on my way was one of the hardest things I’d ever done. It felt like gravity was conspiring against me.
When I reached the stairway, I pushed the heavy metal door open and let it clang shut behind me. Then I fell to the floor and cried.
Tears hadn’t stained many pillows since my rape. I kept them locked tight inside of me. It had been the same way after my parents died. It was as if crying acknowledged their death. To me, crying was acknowledging the pain and giving credence to the event.
Now I lay on the couch, not even giving a fuck that it reminded me of Law. Everything reminded me of Law. Everything reminded me of Morris. There was no running from reminders when the people who had planted the memories walked around in broad daylight, proud of their ruination.
Staring at the ceiling, tears flowed freely from my lids. I was broken. Congratulations, Mitch Morris, you broke me. Congratulations, Nick Law, you stomped on the broken pieces. Sara Bareilles and Ingrid Michaelson’s “Winter Song” played quietly in the background, the melancholy tune and lyrics a match to my soul.
Some days I wished I believed in God. I figured if I believed in God then I could ascribe some kind of purpose to the pain. I could believe that there was some person out there watching me and thinking “Yep, this is all for a reason.” Without God, I didn’t have that safety. I didn’t have that security. I had to navigate the waters on my own.
And it totally sucked.
I imagined the people who had faith could relinquish some of the pain. On days when it became too unbearable, they could say “God has a plan for me” and the pain would lessen. I couldn’t do that. I had to lie on my couch and stare at the ceiling, knowing that beyond the chipped plaster there was nothing watching me.
And that totally sucked.
I had tried to believe in God, I really, really did. When Christianity didn’t work out, I tried to be Jewish. I went through all the Judeo-Christian religions: Catholicism, Protestantism, Judaism, and even Islam. When none of them felt right, I read the Bible. Because maybe the Bible held all the secrets that the pastors and priests and imams just couldn’t grasp.
Did you know there’s a section of the Bible where a rape victim gets cut up into twelve pieces and sent to the twelve tribes of Jerusalem? That was the punishment for the rapist, to cut up the victim. Yeah, well, suffice it to say, after that story I couldn’t keep reading the Bible.
After the Bible failed, I tried other religions. Wicca, Buddhism, and the like. Nothing stuck. I just didn’t feel that moment that people feel. That “a ha” moment where they know someone is out there. When you talk to a person of faith there’s a resolute and unwavering dedication that can only come from some kind of certainty. I never got that. Not with Christianity and not with Satanism.
So now I lay on my bed and stared at the uneven grooves in my ceiling, wondering what could possibly be the purpose for a person like me.
I drove home from my weekly trip to Tony’s feeling queasy. The tears had stopped but I still tasted them on my lips, a salty reminder of how far I’d sunk. Law had been texting me non-stop. On more than one occasion I readied my finger to block him, but then stopped. So my phone sat in a cup holder, buzzing like a wasp.
Now, I stared at a green light, knowing I needed to drive. Cars were honking and I was causing a traffic jam. I couldn’t bear to go home, though. It was so empty. Raskol wasn’t there to greet me. I couldn’t afford heat so it almost felt colder inside than it did outside. I hadn’t gone to work in weeks. Paychecks had stopped coming because they don’t pay you if you don’t work; go figure. My house was not a home, it was a prison. I was locked inside with my thoughts. I was trapped with my demons. I was jailed with my memories.
“What the fuck are you doing?” someone yelled out their window as they zoomed past me. I was still stopped at the light.
“Bitch!” another yelled, their middle finger jutting out. Just as the light was about to turn red, I zoomed through. I quickly pulled into the parking lot of a yogurt shop, about to hyperventilate. Even though I was parked, my car was still on. I knew it was bad for the environment, but I couldn’t focus on anything.
My phone was buzzing, a reminder of the b
etrayal that was still fresh like a knife in my side. I had always suspected Law…but I would have been lying if I’d said I hadn’t started developing feelings despite that. My head fell on the steering wheel as the weight of everything became too much to bear.
A knock sounded at my window and I jumped, turning to see who it was. My heart fluttered, the traitorous thing, as I thought it could be Law. Even though his knife was still firmly in my back, I wanted to see him. How pathetic was I?
