Page 130 of Maybe You

“I got married when I was nineteen years old,” she says. “I was born in Mississippi, the youngest of nine. Dirt poor. I resented my life and my family’s financial situation. I resented that once I was out of high school, I couldn’t go to college but was expected to go work at a poultry processing factory like most of the rest of my family. I resented the lack of prospects and the expectation that I’d settle down with the boy I was messing around with in high school and start having babies, because my dreams were chock full of big city lights and glamour. So I packed my bag and left for New York. I was young and pretty with a head full of unrealistic dreams. The fall to reality was swift and harsh. It became clear quickly that it was one thing being a big fish in a small pond and a whole other thing being a tiny fish in a huge pond. Imagine my surprise when after the first few days nobody still hadn’t offered to make me a star? I started working as a waitress and found a crappy room in a crappy apartment that I shared with seven other crappy people, and you know what?”

She looks at me expectantly like she actually wants me to guess.

I just shake my head.

“I was miserable,” she says. “Still poor as ever. Still working a job I hated. And now, on top of everything else, lonely. I had this idea that New York was going to be a fairy tale. I’d come here, and it’d mean instant success because this is where dreams come true. Six months in, I was ready to quit.”

She looks into the distance, eyes fixed on some point on the wall just above my shoulder.

“And then I met Everett.” The glass keeps twirling between her fingers, and she glances at me. “You know how sometimes a situation seems too good to be true, so you shouldn’t trust it? That was Everett. He set his sights on me and used every play in the playbook and every weapon in his arsenal. Flower deliveries of dozens of long-stemmed red roses became a daily occurrence. At one point I had to bring them to work, where they decorated tables with them because there were so many that I couldn’t physically fit them in my apartment. Then gifts. Expensive handbags. Jewelry. Designer dresses. Trips. I had to go get a passport for the first time in my life. We flew on a private jet, and he took me to Vegas and Italy and Paris, and I pinched myself early in the morning each day because I was sure it was a dream. How did I get so lucky?”

She takes a drink and sets the glass down with a soft thud.

“In four months, we were married. The first time he hit me was three months into our marriage, when I wanted to apply to college.”

My heart is already too loud, and I suspect she’s just getting started.

“He bought me diamond earrings the very next day. Tiffany. And I forgave. The next time it was a Cartier bracelet. And I made excuses.

“He started calling me names, and I called it just a fight. Everybody has fights. Everybody has bruises. And besides, I was living the dream, wasn’t I? I had a handsome husband, we lived in a luxury apartment, and I was dressed to the nines. An occasional backhand to the face… I could swallow that down. He was stressed, after all. Working hard to provide for us. Well, his team lost a football game. It was my own fault I wasn’t a good enough wife. All I had to do was try harder. I gave him every password and every code because I wanted to give those to him. And suddenly there was a calendar on the wall, and I marked all of my comings and goings there because I chose to do that. And when I was eating lunch with my girlfriends, and he just happened to step into the same restaurant and join us, it was because he loved me so much.”

She takes another sip of her water and dabs her lips with a napkin. Almost daintily.

“I didn’t tell anybody. Shame is an extremely powerful incentive to shut a person the hell up. I knew something was very, very wrong, and I was ashamed. So I told nobody. Instead, I cut people out of my life and learned how to apply makeup so that it’d hide the bruises, and always, always answered on the first ring when he called.”

She falls silent for a little while. Lost in memories, before she looks up sharply.

“I thought about leaving once. Then I found out I was pregnant. And a child has to have a father, doesn’t he? A child wants to live in luxury and have all the toys he can imagine, right?”

It’s not a question, so I don’t even think about answering.

“The fancier the penthouse, the darker the deeds behind the doors,” she says. Wistfully. With the look of somebody who’s been through hell and back and knows what she’s talking about.

“Sutton was five the first time he called 911 by himself. And then I smiled at the two police officers who came by and told them everything was okay. That my child was just playing around. And nothing changed.”

She takes a deep breath and closes her eyes.

“The first time he hit Sutton was the first time I left. We went back to Mississippi because I had nowhere else to go. He found out where we were probably an hour later. He followed us the next day. Then more long-stemmed red roses and jewelry. It was a hell of a contrast to my parents’ trailer. I was back in less than a week. I went back twice more after that.” She meets my gaze again. “I took Sutton back, even though I knew what I was getting him into. There’s very little in this life that’s more heartbreaking than a child who’s decided to save somebody who cannot save themselves. Whenever my son visits us here, he doesn’t sleep. He can’t. Even the slightest thump or creak anywhere in the house and he’s up, because when he’s near me, every noise means I need to be saved.”

She clutches the glass between her fingers until her fingertips turn white. “Sutton was fifteen, and he was late coming home that night. It had happened more and more often. He had new friends. Quinn and Rubi. The rest of their family. I encouraged it. The less time he was here, the better. We were supposed to go to a cocktail party that evening, but I had a migraine. I could barely stand up from the pain. Everett wasn’t having it. Sutton walked in to the sight of his father’s hands around his mother’s neck. Something snapped. He was taller than Everett by then, and he just… pulled him off me, and started hitting him. Again. And again. And again. There was blood everywhere. On Sutton. On the floor. On me.

“I finally managed to pull him away. He staggered out the door and ended up on Remy’s doorstep.”

She takes a deep breath and pushes the glass away.

“That was the last time I left. That was the time that stuck.”

Silence falls over the bright, sunny kitchen. The story is done.

“He thinks he’ll hurt me,” I say slowly, finally, finally getting what he meant when he said it.

Amy’s eyes snap up from where she’s been studying her fingers. She opens and closes her mouth like she’s looking for words.

“Sutton looks a lot like his father,” she says slowly. “People have commented on that a lot over the years. ‘You’re just like your father.’ Over and over again. Year after year.”

I rub my hands over my face and stare at the polished wood surface of the table.

We’re both silent for a long, long time. Remembering. Digesting.