Catch Me When I Fall

Blood painted the floor of the downstairs bathroom. A disturbing stench was in the air. The tortured body of Marina laid with her bloodshot eyes wide open and the tip of her tongue touching the ground. Loud footsteps. Her stomach churned as the man she once knew as her husband returned to the room.

A stinging pain emerged as he grabbed her by her hair and pulled her to her feet, slapping her on the cheek, shoving her back first against the wall. “Please! Please…just…stop…”

He wrapped his hands around her neck. Started to choke her. She gagged. Coughed. Gasped as the air failed to make its way to her lungs, and she shut her eyes thinking that it was all over. Thinking this was it. Death. Dying. She was dying.

Her life was about to end.

A sudden shift in the wind occurred as desperation whelmed her. She grabbed Dave’s hands and grasped them off her neck, kicking him in the shin several times. She tried to run but he pulled her hair once again, slipping his hands underneath her neck, her back facing his chest.

Dave grunted as Marina fell to the floor, a blunt object flying through the air and striking him square in the head. He fell to the ground. Marina darted out of the bathroom, nearly slipping in her own blood. She found her twelve-year-old son Daniel in the hallway. The two of them sprinted out of the house. Into the car.

Dave busted through the front door. But he was too slow. Marina sped off with Daniel in the backseat, before he could so much buckle his seatbelt.

“What the hell were you thinking?” Marina asked Daniel once the two of them were checked into a hotel. “You threw a Gameboy at him…? Are you serious? Why are you so stupid?”

“It was the DS you got me for Christmas,” Daniel explained, his breaths still heavy, his heart still pounding. “Look. Mom. Let me call the police.”

“No!” Marina scoffed, shaking her head back and forth. “We talked about that. You call the police, and mommy has to go away.”

Daniel folded his arms. “Uncle John says that if anything happens to you, to call the police. He tells me that every time I see him.”

“God, John. You stupid prick,” Marina muttered under her breath. “The only thing faker than your attitude are your girlfriend’s boobs.”

“We’ll stay here tonight and see if your father is calmed down tomorrow after school,” she added, walking over towards open a window, letting a shivering breeze inside the hotel room. “Everything will be fine. Besides. It isn’t you he hurts. It’s me.”

The twelve-year-old boy pouted.

The very next day, Marina was surprised when she received a call from Daniel’s middle school, requesting that she pick him up in the office. When she got there, she was met with a condescending look from the secretary, who greeted her with a startling snarl.

“You are?”

“Marina.”

“Ah,” the secretary said. “Head back through the hall and speak with our vice principal.”

Marina nodded, although she had no idea which room she was supposed to go in. She stepped through the neighboring hallway regardless, reading the small plaques carved next to each door, eventually managing to find the one leading to the vice principal’s office.

The room was small and cozy, although the menacing glare of the bald man behind the desk made her feel anything but. Daniel was already seated in one of two chairs stationed behind the desk. “You must be Mrs. Marina. Good afternoon,” the man said. “Take a seat next to Mr. Daniel. I’m Mr. Moglino, by the way, the vice principal here at Casper Middle School.”

Marina forced a smile, shutting the door behind her. “Good afternoon,” she said, brushing her hair out of her eyes and taking a seat beside her son. “Is something the matter?”

Mr. Moglino sighed. “Daniel here got into an altercation today.”

Marina gasped. “A…what? D-Daniel, are you—”

“He punched one of his classmates,” Mr. Moglino explained. “A female student, actually. Daniel, why don’t you repeat what you called her?”

Daniel gulped. “Are…are you sure?”

Mr. Moglino nodded. “Please, Daniel—”

“I said she was a stupid prick,” Daniel admitted. “And I told her that the only thing more fake than her attitude are her boobs.”

Mr. Moglino clasped his hands together and nodded. “I’m going to be blunt,” he said. “I have never had a boy hit a girl inside of this middle school and the idea of it makes me sick to my stomach. If I was allowed to for a first offense, I’d have Daniel expelled.”

“Fuck you then,” Marina responded with a scoff. She rose to her feet. “My son is a good kid, and I do all I can for him. You don’t care what happens to him, do you? You couldn’t care less if he was expelled and had to move away from all his family and friends. You don’t have any idea what it means to be a parent.”

“Ha!” Mr. Moglino laughed. “I have five kids at home, and five-hundred more kids here in this school.”

“Do you care about them?” Marina asked, to no response. “Just tell me you care about your kids! Look into my eyes and tell me that! Of course not. Of course you just sit there and don’t say a word. Five-hundred-and-five kids. And you can’t even say you give a damn about a single one of them.”

Marina grabbed Daniel by the arm, storming with him outside of the school.

“There are no excuses for that,” Marina said to Daniel, her muscles twitching angrily as she gripped the steering wheel, frantically making her way back home. “You don’t hit people. Ever. Especially not girls.”

“But dad hits you all the time,” Daniel said.

Marina froze. “Okay. Look…your dad does…things to me, but that’s only because he can’t help it. He’s still a good man. And he loves you. And he loves me too.”

Daniel shook his head. “You have Stockholm Syndrome.”

“Stockholm Syndrome? Where did you learn what that is?”

“From Uncle John.”

Marina scoffed. “Uncle John doesn’t ever know what he’s talking about. Your father had a terrible childhood. Did you know that his mother and sister are buried in the cemetery without even a tombstone? Just a withering old plaque…no flowers or anything. His father was a drug dealer who never gave a single care about him. What's going to happen if I leave him alone? He needs me.”

She pulled the car into the driveway. A mortifying feeling set into her stomach when she saw that Dave’s truck was already parked outside.

Daniel tried to put his hand on her arm, but she swatted him away.

“You’ve been talking to him, haven’t you?” Dave asked Marina, the two of them locked inside an upstairs bedroom.

Marina shook her head. “I haven’t been talking to John,” she said in an assuring voice, trying her best to keep her abuser calm. “I haven’t. Okay? I haven’t.”

“I don’t like John,” Dave reminded her. “He’s a bad influence on you.”

“Okay. Whatever you say.”

Dave scoffed, anger creeping into him. “Whatever…? Why are you talking to me with that kind of attitude? You’re thinking of calling the police, aren’t you?”

Marina gasped. “N-no! I’ll never. I promise.”

The mere thought of having to go to jail terrified Dave. “If you call the police, I’ll kill you!” he said. “I have relatives who will kill you. You…you’re not even scared of me anymore, are you? You're probably cheating on me. Out there with some athlete or something. I’m going to make sure you stay in line. That’s what women need to be taught. To stay in line.”

He hit her. Then he hit her again. And again, and again, and the horrifying beatings continued until the early hours of the morning.

“Did he hurt you last night?” John asked Marina over the phone the next morning in an annoyed tone of voice.

Marina looked at her mangled face in the bathroom mirror, still covered in cuts, bruises and dried up blood as if she’d been in a horror film. “No…no…” She lamented. “Yes. He…he hit me.”

John cursed under his breath. A victim of domestic violence himself, the thought of losing his sister any day sent chills up his spine. “I’ve been in the same situation you have with Beverly,” he said, referring to his ex-wife. “It always ends two ways. You get a restraining order and hope he goes away, or you wait until he one day murders you, Marina.”

“Restraining orders don’t do anything!” Marina shouted. “That won’t work! It can’t work. You don’t understand. You and that stuck-up, stingy girlfriend of yours. Neither of you can understand that there’s no way out. I can’t do anything except keep him happy.”

***

One month later. 

“Thirteen already,” Marina said with a smile. “How could you be a teenager today…it still feels like yesterday I was still holding you in my arms.”

Daniel smiled. “What are we doing today?”

Marina shrugged. “I haven’t thought about it that much. You want to go get pizza? Or maybe we'll see a movie.”

“Can I invite my friends over?”

Marina heard the slam of a car door and turned her head towards the window. She looked out and a horrible feeling overcame her as she saw Dave heading towards the front door. “Is he…is he here?” Daniel asked.

“Yeah. He’s here,” Marina admitted. Her heart was pounding. Thundering. She gulped. Started to sweat. Not today, she pouted to herself. Not on his birthday…

Each beating took its toll. Each punch added gasoline to the fire that was burning deep within Marina for so very long. Her tolerance turned to frustration and her frustration turned into flat out anger. And at long last, she finally said the four words that Daniel wanted to hear for so long.

“Go lock the door.”

Daniel darted downstairs. Locked the door shut. Ran to the back door and locked it as well, then ran back towards his mother.

Marina had a phone in her hands when she heard the sound of shattering glass. They both gasped. “I think…I think he just broke a window!” Daniel said.

Marina pressed the nine on the phone. She stopped. “That…okay. Just…go to your room. I’ll…I’ll try to calm him down.”

Daniel shook his head. “Screw that. Give me the phone.”

“No!” Marina said. “You can’t make him upset. It’ll be…it’ll be…Daniel!”

Daniel hurried out of the room and went into the kitchen. Grabbed a knife and ran over into the living room where Dave stood.

Dave turned his head. Suddenly, he found himself petrified by the reality of the monster he had created.

He stared sorrowfully at Daniel wielding the knife, realizing that his young son was now a teenager. He’d missed his entire childhood. They’d never once played catch like every father and son should do. He’d never gotten to buy him a remote-control car. He would never get to take him fishing, hunting, or even teach him how to ride a bike. They’d never get to spend time together. His unfounded anger had cost him his one son’s love.

“Get out,” Daniel said, the knife shaking in his trembling hands.

Dave tried to say something, but no words would come out. What was wrong with him? What was happening?

Marina stepped downstairs. “Daniel, into your room,” she said.

Daniel looked at his father, then at Marina, whose face was still covered in bruises from a recent bloody beating. He hesitated. But then it was too late.

The swelling anger of a realized lost relationship came to blows, as Dave punched Daniel in the head. Marina gasped as Daniel fell to the ground, crying in pain. Dave had never hit Daniel before, and for Marina it was the last blow she could possibly take.

Dave’s muscles twitched in anger. His face was a torturous shade of red as he picked up the knife off the ground, cuffing it menacingly in his blood-soaked palm.

And he darted after Marina. Marina fled, outrunning him and making her way into the bedroom. She locked the door and listened as he pounded it again and again and again, each thunderous pound sending shocks to her heart.

They didn’t stop as she picked up the phone and dialed her brother John. “John, John, he punched Daniel and he has a knife. Call the cops. Please!”

Six months later.

Marina sighed as she stood in front of John, an average-sized man with short gray hair, a trimmed beard and pale skin. “Is all the custody work done?”

John slowly nodded. “You don’t have to do this—”

“Stop,” Marina said with an exhale. “It has nothing to do with how he treated me. When he was coming after me with a knife on that day that feels so long ago…I ran away. Daniel was right there and I ran away from him. He could’ve died. I can’t forgive myself for that. I’ll never forgive myself for that. It's weird, because there are tons of people who have gone through the same thing I did, and they're still great at what they do. I'm not. I’m just not a good mother.”

Light footsteps bounced off her eardrums as she turned around and saw Daniel approaching. Her brushed right past her, continuing into another room of his uncle John’s house. “He’s always been closer to you than me,” Marina admitted.

“Where will you go?” John asked.

The question sent fear to Marina’s mind. “I’m not sure. I fought like hell to get him out of my life. I emptied every secret, every dirty detail of my life in front of that judge, all for a restraining order. All to get rid of him and Dave…he’s finally gone now. I feel like for the first time…I feel like for the very first time, I’m free. I can do things. I can do things I couldn’t do before. I can do whatever I want, and I don’t have anyone on this planet that I have to answer to.”

John smiled. Daniel returned into the living room. Stared at Marina with a blank look in his eyes.

The two of them embraced, before they both started to cry.