Growing Pains

 

The Waiter

 

Although she’d been expecting it since they left the restaurant she hadn’t expected the first strike to come so suddenly. But the first punch landed cleanly on her cheekbone, she felt that all too common dizziness as her brain took the shock of the blow. Typically there was some discussion regarding her particular wrongdoing. Tonight however he had decided to dispense with the pleasantries and settle straight into knocking her out for the night. A couple more strikes hit her head and chest until she began to fall, then a handful of hair dragged her back to her feet, holding her against the kitchen wall, as the blows continued to fall.

All the while she stood there, not moving to protect herself, not turning to cover her face, not cowering up a corner. As much as every bone in her body screamed at her to just lift her arms, she stood, hands at her side, because he wanted her to cower, he wanted her to hide herself. So she stood there, staring at him, defying him to carry on. For the simple reason that she knew it pissed him off.

After a while they stopped, and she dropped to the floor, unsure as to whether the blood in her mouth had been coughed up, or was just inside her mouth. Suspecting it was in her mouth as he had put most of his effort into her face tonight. Why had she mentioned she was going for coffee with Cheryl tomorrow, as her consciousness slowly seeped away, her mind brought back the face of the waiter, the cause of tonight’s beating, she probably shouldn’t have smiled at him but then, he was rather cute.

She woke up in the early hours of the morning, went and had a bath while she took stock of the damage. After she’d cleaned the blood from her face, the skin had split across her left eyebrow, the familiar tint of black eye were coming through. A large bruise was beginning to spread from her left eye to her left ear. Some large sunglasses, and a good dose of hair mousse should make her mostly presentable. However she was rather more concerned with the sharp pain in her chest, she suspected she would need to get an x-ray. As she brushed her teeth, she realised that there was a large chunk of a back lower tooth missing. Simply uttering ‘bastard’ to her toothbrush.

By the time she was cleaned up, it was too late to bother going back to bed, so she cleaned the kitchen and started to prepare his breakfast. She took his tea up, and gently woke her husband. Over breakfast he went through his post-beating ritual of tell her that he forgave her, accepted her apologies – even though she never offered them – and that he was sure she would remember to be more respectful to him in future. What would people think of him if his wife continually flirts with waiting staff? She nodded and agreed at the appropriate places.

‘you broke one of my teeth last night, and I think I might have a cracked rib’

‘did you sweetpea? Want me to take you to hospital at lunch?’

‘am more concerned about my tooth, is annoying me already, the rib will be fine it just hurts’

‘you said you needed to go for a checkup, sounds like good timing’

‘There’s that new place by Sainsbury’s, Harry knocked a tooth out a couple of weeks ago, abseiling down that building, said she got it sorted real quick.’

‘Maybe it was his wife that knocked it out really, and that’s just the story he has to tell’

‘careful sweetpea, careful’

‘I’ll call later, see if they can fit me in, what time can you make it?’

‘one, two O’clock’

‘I’ll text yo…’

‘shit, no I can’t have got that meeting this afternoon, not going to have time to get away, guess you’ll have to go on your own, but let me know what time you’re going, text me when you get…’

‘yes, I know what to do’

‘am only thinking of you sweetpea, you know how you need protecting’

Amy answered this with a smile, and carried on eating her muesli, which considering the gaping hole in her tooth, probably wasn’t the best choice for breakfast.

 

After he’d gone to work, she took some painkillers to try make her chest a little more comfortable, sent a text to Cheryl telling her she couldn’t make lunch, waited until 9, called the dentist, made an appointment for 4pm and went to bed.

An hour later the pain in her chest woke her up again, she sent a text to John asking if she could go to the hospital, and made a cup of tea, then thought that she probably shouldn’t drink it, in case she needed an anaesthetic. The taxi driver spotted the bruises she had around her eye and started asking about them. In an attempt to avoid the standard lecture, she often blamed them on a rough sex session with her lesbian lover. Which usually succeeded in shutting them up, however on this occasion before she had chance to respond, Cheryl called,

‘hey hun’

‘so I’m guessing you’re too battered and bruised to be coming to lunch?’

‘am just on my way to the hospital, think I’ve a broken rib’

‘wanker! When you going to cut yourself lose of that jerk, why do you let him do that to you’

‘cause I’m a stupid masochistic bitch, and I love him, how’s that?’

‘cause you’re a stupid cow! Is more believable’

‘yeah that too’

‘so you’re going to the hospital now? I’m on my way up there to see the dermatologist about that rash, want me to come now, keep you company in A&E?’

‘sure! I could definitely use the company, hate that place’

 

Patching up

 

At the hospital, she stopped outside, to take a photo on her phone, and send it to John, and went inside to sit around for a few hours. While someone got around to seeing her.

 

Cheryl arrived shortly after she was put into the waiting room, this was always the worst part of the relationship she was in. it always made her exceptionally uncomfortable having to explain her injuries to other people. She had spent many hours talking about it to Cheryl, largely in an attempt to understand it herself, so she was perhaps the only person she didn’t feel ashamed in front of and as angry as it made Cheryl she respected the fact that she didn’t want to split from her husband. so today, after shock at seeing the state of her friend, and giving her a half hearted telling off for putting up with it. They both settled into gossiping about all and sundry.

 

Midway through the conversation, the phone in her pocket vibrate, as it auto answered itself to allow her husband to eavesdrop on her conversation. This was something he would do a couple of times a day. However he believed that the call was without her knowledge and that the phone was locked so she couldn’t change it but she was always a cleverer girl than that and had figured out the PIN code with in an hour of being given it. so as soon as he went out, she would put it on vibrate or ring once, so she knew when he was listening in. so she made an eye gesture towards her jeans pocket and carried on talking an old friend who had just had a baby. At this gesture Cheryl rolled her eyes and shook her head.

 

Eventually her name was called, by a doctor that had become quite familiar with her history. She always felt a mix of guilt and relief about it being him. On the one hand she didn’t have to explain herself, or her injuries again a thing she hated doing, although she had never actually told him what was happening to her, he had figured it out the first time she saw him, on her second visit to the hospital. Apart from the occasional leaflet he left lying around while he went out of the room, he had never actually said anything about.

 

‘Looks like this is an anniversary for you today Amy ‘

‘pardon?’

‘you mean you don’t know your anniversaries?’

‘maybe you should stop raiding the medicines stores a little doc! What are you talking about?’

‘this is the 30th visit to hospital now, over what’ he looked through the clipboard of papers in his hand ‘nearly two years, and getting considerably more frequent lately too, 15 of them have been in the last six months, you’re not even given chance for the last bruises to heal anymore’

‘don’t remind me eh’

‘the guildelines that I work to tell me I should be involving the police when I suspect somebody is being subjected to habitual spousal abuse’

It was such a shock to hear him saying those words to her, that she felt tears welling in her eyes, it had always been such an unwritten rule between the two of them, that these things weren’t mentioned.

‘but you don’t strike me as a particularly unintelligent woman Ms Amy, So I’m not sure of what the best thing is to do’

‘Doc, I really appreciate all that you do for me, neither of us are stupid people, we are both fully aware of the situation that I’m in, but I’m not ready to change that just yet, I just need time to sort my life out’

‘and what are you going to  be using that time for? Do you know?’

‘at the moment, no I don’t, but when I need your help, I’ll let you know’ after a slight pause, continuing with ‘sorry, I’m feeling a little cranky, I didn’t mean that to sound quite so harsh’

‘don’t worry, I doubt I ever catch you at your best’

‘that’s for sure, just do me a favour, keep patching me up, and I promise one day I’ll get my life sorted’

‘That’s my job, you get it broken, and bring it to me to fix, come on, we’d better get you down to x-ray’

‘thank you Doc’ giving him a light kiss on the cheek as she rose from her seat ‘thank you’

‘I’m Doc Brown, or Andy Brown, my granddad was Doc! Though there was a time when I was often called Emmet, but you’re probably way to young for one’

‘well I like calling you Doc, is kinda cute’

‘how can I argue with that, Doc it is, now get yourself to x-ray’

‘say hello to Einstein for me then’

 

After a few hours of sitting around at hospital, it turned out that she was simply rather bruised and there was nothing broken at all. So she went and sat around with Cheryl to see her Doctor. Then nearly got caught talking about how cute he was by the spy phone, as Cheryl had christened it, so they sat in silence until she heard the bleep of it hanging up, and carried on talking.

 

She had wondered while Cheryl was being seen whether the last six month’s rise in beatings was due to him getting more aggressive or her being more willing to push past the boundaries she knew existed with him. She suspected it was largely a mixture of her own independence showing through, and spite towards him.

 

After the day of sitting around at the hospital, the complete lack of a queue at the dentists was a great relief. She was in seeing him within five mins of walking through the door.

 

‘So, errm’ looking at the form she had just filled in ‘Amy! What can we do for you?’

‘shockingly enough, I’ve a broken tooth’ removing her glasses to reveal two fully blackened eyes.

‘Well sit yourself down, let’s see if we can repair the damage he’s done’

‘he? What makes you think it was a he? Perhaps it was my les…’

‘you really looking for an answer to that? Want to know how I know that, or was that a rhetorical question?’

‘you don’t know shit, jumping to conclusions, same as every other fucker’

‘you’re right, I don’t know anything, but I do know some things. For instance, you’re are married to a Norwegian guy I’d guess for a couple of years’

‘and how do you know that?’

‘by the fact that you’re wearing a wedding ring on your right hand, and the very slight twang of Norwegian in your pronunciation’

‘and the couple of years?’

‘the scar on your eyebrow, next to that fresh one, and the one on your forearm they are nicely settled, but not old yet, I’d say a couple of years’

‘so you presume my Norwegian husband is beating me?’

‘no, I’m pretty sure it’s a fact, the cut on your eyebrow has the look of a wedding ring, signet rings etc tend to rip the skin, a wedding ring splits it against the bone, also, the lack of bruises to your forearms suggest that you stopped trying to defend yourself a while ago, which is something that we do very naturally, something I’m suspecting has something to do with that fire in your belly. Finally, it takes quite a punch to knock a tooth out, not many women can manage that, certainly not many who wear wedding rings on their right hand’

Silence.

‘anyway, make yourself comfortable, let’s see what we can do to get you fixed up’

‘so, is there a Mrs dentist that you beat and inspect the wounds of afterwards?’

‘no, but I have had occasion to split an eyebrow, not to mention breaking a bone or two’

 

‘I teach martial arts and self defence at that health club on London Rd’

‘isn’t that supposed to be non-contact stuff’

‘sometimes, accidents happen, sometimes we have our little battles, both of those cause split eyebrows, and broken bones. You get to recognise the damage that one body can do to another’

‘considerable, isn’t it’ as she brought her hand to her bruised cheek.

‘so why not do something about it? come and take a few lessons, learn to defend yourself against him’

‘somehow, I don’t think he’d go for that, hey honey I’m going to take up martial arts so I can beat the shit out of you to – somehow I can’t see him dropping me off there every day.’

‘that’s ok, we have a ladies night on Wednesday we’ve a pool and a gym there, he couldn’t be there so would have no idea what you were doing inside’

Amy was silent as she considered the holes he would try to find in an interesting idea.

‘tell you what, I’ll give you a couple of free passes, come and have a look around, in the meantime we’d better get that tooth looked at.’

 

With that she got a temporary fix for her tooth, and made an appointment for a permanent fix a couple of weeks later. She took the passes, but even as she accepted them she knew she wouldn’t use them. He was waiting for her outside, they went home and things settled into pretty normal husband and wife stuff for a few weeks.

 

 

Conception

‘I’m getting concerned that you’re not getting pregnant sweetpea, maybe it is time you went to see a doctor’ came suddenly out of the blue, while they were sat eating one night

‘Sure it will happen when the time is right hun’

‘the time is right, when could it be a better time, work is going great, the house is sorted, what more do we need’

‘maybe this isn’t quite the right environment to be bringing a child into though’ escaped her mouth, with a venom that shocked even her, this was not entirely how she had rehearsed this conversation going when it had occurred in her head many times previously, never mind, she could try to drag it back on track, side track it into something else. as the last word escaped she looked up to see him quite clearly shocked at the sudden outburst.

In a quiet, almost timid voice, without meeting the gaze being thrust towards him, ‘and maybe you need to go sit in the other room for a while, before you…’

‘before I what? Before you give me another beating for not wanting to see my child being brought up to watch its mother being hospitalised by its father’ “shit, this is going to hurt” her mind told her as the venom continued to flow.

He pushed his dinner aside, and stood up, Amy sprung to her feet to face him.

‘So what now? Is this where you prove my point for me? How bad are you going to beat me tonight sugar?’ ”really, really going to hurt”

‘I said, you should go and sit in the other room for a while, and think about what you are doing wrong’

‘I’m doing nothing wrong, you arrogant piece of shit, I’m standing here, thinking about the welfare of my child, I’ll stand here and take whatever you decide to do to me, but I will not stand by and let you do the same to my children’

‘they will be my children too, so don’t…’

‘you think I am going to let you father my children? What are you going to do? Make them stand and watch while you beat mummy up? Or maybe you’re going to let them help out, or will you just decide we all need to learn our lesson and beat us all up’

‘I will not have you speaking to me like this, this is your last warning sweetpea’

‘then raise your fucking fist and shut me up, show me what a man you are, put me in my place in the only way you know how, what are you waiting for? Hit me, put me back in hospital, but it won’t change the fact that I’m right and you’re wrong. No matter how hard you hit me you will never change that you’re a coward who hits his wife to make up for the fact that you have no control over anything else in your life’

‘I’m going to forget this conversation took place, tomorrow you will go the doctors and find out why you’re not getting pregnant’

‘no, you will never forget this conversation, as much as you try, as much as you want to, these words will stick in your mind for the rest of your life’ her mind was screaming at her to just shut up now, before she went and let the cat out of the bag, and got herself into real trouble ‘so piss off to bed, try to forget it’

‘I don’t need to try, it’s already forgotten. You can stay here and clean up. I’m going to sleep’

As he opened the door, in her softest voice came, ‘hey baby, maybe you should come to the doctors too, maybe you’re just impotent’ she watched the anger build in him at the words, but didn’t move the gaze she had held throughout, and wondered if that would push him over the edge, he slammed the door behind him, she listened as he climbed the stairs and closed the bedroom door.

At which point she sat back down, and softly sobbed to herself.

 

She sat and she sobbed to herself, up until the moment she realised she was doing it, at which point the reason she was doing so became rather more important to her. She wasn’t normally the sort of girl that cried over every occurrence in her life, over all of the years of mental and physical beatings that her husband had administered she had always held her head high because she knew it was her choice to do so. Whatever her husband did to her she would always ensure that even her very last glance before she passed out would be looking into his eyes. It was her way of telling him that she was not scared of what he did.

 

But today’s outburst had been something entirely different, today she had stood up to him, as she started she quite expected to be waking up in hospital again. She wanted him to start hitting her because she was scared that she was about to tell him things he should not be hearing. As she sat and replayed the scene in her head she realised just how far removed he had been from his usual self, she found herself intrigued by this slither of power she had discovered over him. She suspected that it wouldn’t last long and that he would soon develop a defence mechanism to deflect it. She felt empowered by this knowledge she wondered how far it could be taken before he cracked and did her some real damage. She knew these were dangerous thoughts she was having, but probably no more dangerous than the contraceptives she was hiding from him. The contraceptives had been different though, they were done out of necessity. This was done through nothing more than spite, this was spitting in his face and laughing as he wiped it off. Except she didn’t laugh, she sobbed, again the tears came, harder and more stinging this time round, and amongst all those feelings of intrigued and power, she felt lost.

 

To her relief the following morning everything was back to normal, nothing was said about the previous night’s exchange. In his daily list of things to do, was an instruction to go to the doctors to book a fertility test. This one was going to take a little hoop jumping to get through she thought. But soon an idea came, so she went and chased it up.

 

At the A&E department the nurse on the desk was determined to not let her see Doc Brown without a proper explanation of why, and since there was no way Amy was going to explain her situation to this nosey bag they had reached an impasse. Fortunately, just as she was about to get rather more vocal Doc Brown walked past and spotted her.

 

‘is there something I can help with here?’ as he entered what was clearly becoming a tense exchange

‘this lady was asking to see you, I was just explaining that we are a doctor short today and you are far too busy with A&E cases to be able to see somebody without notice like this’

‘it is ok Jude, I know Amy, I’ll take care of this’ at which he motioned Amy to follow him to a quieter corner of the waiting room ‘causing a ruckus in my hospital now are we, I could have you barred you know’

‘but then you’d miss patching me up, and I’d definitely miss being patched up’

‘well next time, tell them to page me on this number’ he reached into his pocket and handed her a card ‘it cuts through our slightly over-protective front desk staff’

‘cheers doc’

‘so, what can I do for you anyway, you’re looking remarkably unscathed today, quite pretty when you’re not sporting black eyes’

‘thank you’ she smiled ‘well today is a day of prevention rather than patching up the aftermath, which will be great if I don’t get this sorted’

‘ok, well have a sit down for while, I need to go finish patching up a patient who had a bit of a run in with a rather grouchy parrot, should be back in ten fifteen minutes’

‘a grouchy parrot? Do they want to swap for a grouchy husband? see you in ten Doc’

 

When he returned , they went off to a room, and Amy explained her current precariousness.

‘my husband wants me to get pregnant, and is concerned that I’m not doing, he wants me to book a fertility test’

‘well that isn’t entirely the field of your average A&E doctor’

‘the problem is, I had an Intrauterine device inserted the week before we married, which is probably the reason I’m not getting pregnant’

‘I see, well it isn’t my field, but I’d guess that that could be the reason you’re not getting pregnant, so did you know what he was like before you married? You knew him well enough to know you didn’t want his children? Then why marry him?’

‘just say I couldn’t really refuse his wedding proposal, go read my records, the first thing I came here for, just before you started working A&E, read my records and you’ll figure it out’

 

‘the thing is Doc, he is going to want to come get the results of my fertility test, he can’t know what I’ve done, I’ve no doubt that he’d kill me if he found this out’

‘well Amy, that would  be Doctor Deacon that you would be talking to about fertility tests, and it just so happens that Doctor Deacon and Doctor Brown attended the same medical school, and still have occasion to get slightly drunk together’

‘would you ask him to help me?’

‘not sure I really need to do that much, I’m seeing him later, I’ll have a word, but I’m guessing that there is nothing actually wrong with you to prevent you having a baby,  and a fertility test would confirm that, would just be an unfortunate oversight that your UID wasn’t spotted’

‘so what should I do then?’

‘there’s nothing you need to do, I’ll pass your records on, have a word tonight, and get you an appointment for a test booked in, come have a test, then bring him with you to get the results’

‘Thank you Doc, you’ve no idea how much easier this will make things’

‘so how about you repay me by doing something about the situation you’re in, there are people you can see, things you can do about these situations’

‘there are two problems with that Doc, firstly, he would kill me for leaving him, and I mean that literally and absolutely, he would probably bide his time until he could get away with it, but be it a year, five or twenty years from now, he would kill me’

‘And the second reason?’

‘because I am in love with him! And that makes me hope that perhaps one day he will change his ways, maybe one day I will be able to heal the pain he feels, because I stood at an alter and promised to stay with him, through sickness and health, should I leave him now he is sick?’

‘even if that promise means you have to do things like this?’

‘Doc, I don’t make promises lightly, when I give my word I keep it, because people can take everything else from you, people can take your pride and dignity, leave you lying there naked, and the only thing you’ve got left to protect yourself with is your integrity the trust you have in yourself, I will not break my word, I will not lose the only power I have left’