Bent not Broken

by Lisa De Jong

  I escaped into my bathroom—my safe haven—with paper thin walls. I could already hear Alexis crying through the closed door. Oh god, she hates her life. She hates us. I’m her mom, but I think she hates me.

  I ran the bath water and splashed water onto my face to camouflage the tears. I thought I wanted to be a mother. It’s all I had ever wanted. I wanted to hold and snuggle a sweet baby in my arms, weeping tears of joy while my heart burst with pride and love. I had a fantasy of my husband and I working together to raise this perfect little miracle, taking turns changing diapers and trading nights of sleep. My experience was quite the opposite. I did most of the work myself while my husband sat at his computer, seemingly clueless about how to help and too self-absorbed to care. Most of the time, I held a hysterical, flailing baby in my arms, weeping tears of regret while my heart burst with resentment and guilt for feeling that way.

  I clicked the radio on in the bathroom and cranked the volume of the classic rock station until it almost hurt my ears. I just needed to drown out the crying, and at the moment I wasn’t sure if it was her crying or my own that I was trying to escape. I can’t do this, God. I’m not cut out to be a mother. I hate this whole parenting thing more than I’ve ever hated anything. I’m not who I thought I was. I’m not the woman I thought I’d be.

  It seemed like no matter how loud I turned the volume, I could still hear Alexis’s screams. I held my breath and slipped deeper into the steaming, hot water. My face was just barely below the surface, but the hollow sound in my ears from the pressure of the water soothed my frazzled nerves. I held my breath until my lungs burned for oxygen. The more my lungs burned, the more determined I was to hold my breath. I just need to drown out the crying a little bit longer.

  Just then, Graham burst through the door. I could hear his panic-filled, muffled voice under the water. “I don’t know what she wants. I can’t get her to stop crying.” I squeezed my eyes tighter. No, my nightmare hadn’t ended yet. I just needed to hold my breath a little longer. “Salem?”

  I didn’t answer.

  “Salem!” Graham reached down and grabbed my arm, pulling me out of the water. Instinctively, I gasped for air. “What the hell were you doing?” He glared at me.

  “Nothing. Just rinsing my hair,” I lied.

  Graham eyed me suspiciously, but didn’t say anything else about it. “Like I said, I can’t get her to stop crying.”

  I sighed. “Just put her in her swing. I’ll be down in a minute.”

  “Good. I’m going to grab a pizza. I’m starving.”

  “Okay. I’m getting out,” I grumbled and stood up, dripping wet.

  Can’t even get five minutes to myself without Alexis ruining it, just like she’s ruined everything else.

  Immediately chilled by the cool air, I grabbed my towel and wrapped it around myself, shivering as I stepped out of the tub onto the plush, beige bathmat.

  Graham kissed my cheek, trying to butter me up. “She just wants her mommy. I’ll be back in a few.”

  I didn’t want a kiss on the cheek. I wanted my worthless husband to get up off his ass and do something!

  “Okay,” I said sullenly, wishing I could be the one to hop in the car and leave. I watched him leave the bedroom, glaring daggers into his cowardly, retreating back.

  We didn’t exactly mean to get pregnant, but when it happened, he seemed genuinely excited. He had helped me pick the nursery bedding, assembled the crib, and hung the valances. He had even attended a baby shower with me, but nothing prepared us for the shock of actually bringing a child into our lives. It was emotionally challenging, physically draining, and mentally exhausting, but at the same time our hearts filled with so much love for our sweet baby and for each other. That is, until the weeks turned into months of sleepless nights and constant wailing. Peaceful meals and movie marathon date-nights were a thing of the past. We knew our lives would never be the same. Nine short months weren’t nearly enough to prepare ourselves for the total upheaval that having a child would bring. So by the end of the second month of Alexis’s life, our nerves were shot.

  I slipped into some pajama pants and a tank top and traipsed downstairs to Alexis who had screamed herself into a peaceful slumber. She looked like a sweet little angel laying there in her swing. Her pouty lips methodically moved in a sucking rhythm, soothing herself while she slept.

  The first eight weeks of her life, we’d tried everything to pacify her. We tried getting her to suck her thumb. Didn’t work. We tried every single pacifier on the market. Didn’t work. We tried getting her attached to a certain blanket. Didn’t work. We tried letting her sleep with us at night. Didn’t work. We tried letting her cry it out. Didn’t work. We had tried everything. Nothing fucking worked. So after two stressful, nerve-wracking months of trying, Graham seemingly gave up and mentally checked out. While at times I hated him for it, I really couldn’t say that I blamed him. I just had the strong, maternal instinct inside of me that wouldn’t allow me to do that.

  I lay on the sofa across from her swing. Maybe I could catch a quick nap while she slept. Even though it was late in the evening, my body craved sleep so badly that it didn’t matter if I napped so close to bedtime.

  Almost as soon as I closed my eyes, Dixie jumped up on the recliner and barked at the kids riding by on their bicycles.

  “Dammit, Dixie,” I hissed. “Shut up!” I threw a pillow at Dixie to get her to stop barking.

  That worked momentarily, but within seconds Alexis was stirring in her swing.

  “Stupid dog,” I groaned and threw another pillow at her head.

  Dixie just looked back at me as if to say, “But did you see those kids, mom? That looked like fun! I wanna go outside! Can I go? Can I go? Huh? Can I go? Please!”

  Her wagging tail, hanging tongue, and innocent eyes made me not hate her so much, but I was still pissed.

  Despite being disturbed by Dixie’s barking, Alexis awoke in a great mood. She cooed and watched her toys hanging on the mobile above her swing with awe. I watched her eyes twinkle with wonder. My beautiful, angelic picture of perfection.

  Sometimes I sat in awe, remembering those precious moments when I carried her in my womb and felt her kicking. I knew I should be thankful. Many women never got to experience such a precious miracle. Thinking of those nine amazing months while I grew another human being inside my body, I traced the fine lines of the stretch marks she’d left on my stomach. I really did love her, no matter how exhausted I felt. I just needed to get a few hours of sleep under my belt, and I knew I’d feel much better.

  I finally dozed for a few minutes before Graham arrived with the pizza.

  Chapter Five

  CHRIS

  The only redeeming factor of going back to that woman’s office was to get out of this damn bunk, where the silence was maddening. Thoughts of Kaitlyn crowded my head, and I was losing my fucking mind. I walked down the hall toward Mrs. Honeycutt, dreading, yet appreciating every step.

  “Good morning, Chris.” Her voice was far more chipper than I cared to hear.

  “Mornin’,” I grumbled as I plopped down on her sofa. I didn’t wanna sit in that stuffy office with that woman staring at me like she expected me to open my heart and pour out my secrets. Whatever. Ain’t happenin’ lady.

  I wasn’t saying shit. Even if she did smile at me with that cute grin of hers.

  Dammit. Don’t look, Chris.

  I stared at the floor.

  Her smooth tone broke the silence. “I get it. I know you don’t want to be here. None of you boys do. But let’s just make the best of it, shall we?”

  I rolled my eyes. “Whatever.”

  This woman didn’t know me. She had no idea about the hell I’d been through. She didn’t get me at all. She had no fucking clue that my whole world was shattered the night Kaitlyn drove away from my house. I couldn’t have cared less about what happened to me from there on out. I just wanted to be back at East Jenkins with Kaitlyn. I was just going to do my time and
then get the hell out of there.

  “So, how are you today?” She grabbed her stupid-fucking-notebook off her desk and daintily swept her skirt under her thighs while she sat opposite of me in a chair.

  “Fine,” I grunted. I didn’t even want to fucking be there, and yet there sat adorable little Mrs. Honeycutt, trying to get me to talk—trying to get me to hash out thoughts and feelings that I had no desire to divulge.

  Screw that.

  “So, we don’t have a lot of time together, as usual, but I’d love to spend a few minutes talking with you about home.”

  Home? Damn.

  She grinned and tucked a strand of hair behind her ear, poising her pen to take notes. “So, can you tell me a little bit about your family? Mom? Dad? Siblings?”

  I stared at her, unmoving. I’ll be damned if she’s gonna talk shit about my family in that fucking book of hers.

  “Anything?” she asked expectantly. She stared at me with those piercing green eyes, and for a moment I found myself crumbling, but I quickly regained composure.

  “What’s there to tell?” I murmured, sliding my feet out in front of me, slouching in the seat.

  She looked up thoughtfully, “Oh lots of things, like how many siblings do you have?”

  I stared at the floor. “One.” That’s all I’m giving her.

  “Brother or sister?” she asked curiously, tilting her head a little.

  Ugh. I caved. “Brother.”

  She scribbled it down and returned her gaze to me. “See, this is getting easier, right?” Her warm smile caused one corner of my mouth to quirk upward despite my efforts to stop it. There was a softness in her eyes that I tried to ignore.

  She looked at me as if I would suddenly spill all my secrets just because she got me to answer one simple question. “How old is he? What’s he like?”

  “He’s ten, and he’s a brat. Are we done here?” I quipped.

  She glanced at the clock. Shaking her head, her soft curls bouncing around her face as she said, “No, sorry. You’re stuck with me just a little bit longer.”

  Dammit.

  She looked down at her notebook as if she were reading from a checklist. “How about your mom and dad?”

  Refusing to look her in the eye, I grumbled, “What about them?”

  “Can you tell me a little bit about them?” she asked, leaning toward me, eager to hear what I had to say.

  I cut my eyes at her. “Why? Why do you care?” I folded my arms across my chest and turned my head to glare out the window.

  She put her pen down and closed her notebook, laying them both on the seat beside her. “I care, Chris,” she said softly, but with fierce intensity, “because I want to help you.”

  I glanced down at the notebook, realizing for the first time since I’d been there that I was ‘off the record.’ I looked back up at her as she watched me, soaking me in, and thought for a minute she might have been telling the truth. Something about the look in her eye, and the sincerity in her voice—it felt so fucking real.

  ****

  SALEM

  I watched him as he squirmed in his seat, readjusting his arms and sliding down against the back of the sofa. We both sat in silence for several seconds.

  One of the first rules I’d learned in counseling was in order to get people to talk, fill the room with silence. Silence is awkward. At some point, to make things less awkward the client will speak. So, in this case, stubbornness was a virtue.

  I patiently waited for Chris to speak. I could hear the ticking of the clock above my head, but I didn’t let it distract me. I was going to get him to talk today.

  ****

  CHRIS

  “My dad’s in prison,” I blurted. Damn. Why the fuck did I just do that? Now she was gonna ask me all kinds of questions about it when I really didn’t want to talk about it at all.

  She looked at me sitting there, contemplating her next move. And then, as if she heard my silent plea she said, “I’m sure it’s hard for you to talk about it, so I’m not going to force you by asking you all kinds of questions you don’t wanna answer. So when you’re ready, I just want you to know that I’m here to listen if you need to talk about it.”

  I couldn’t move or speak. I really think this woman gets me. I sat there, staring at her and trying to figure her out. She was so different than the last counselor who sat behind his desk, barely making eye contact with me while he made his judgments and told me, in his own words, what a fuck-up I was. But Mrs. Honeycutt…it’s like that woman heard my fucking thoughts. She didn’t glare at me over her glasses behind her desk. She sat right there across from me, leaning in, genuinely interested in what I had to say.

  “My brother’s name is Mitch,” I said, surprising myself.

  She nodded. “So your ten year old brother, Mitch, is a pest?”

  I chuckled, relaxing a little. “Yeah, the day before I came here, he wanted me to play basketball with him in the driveway, but I was too busy doing my own thing. And then—I swear he did it on purpose—his basketball bounced back to the front porch where I was sitting and knocked over my soda, so I yelled at him.” I suddenly realized there was a hint of sadness in my voice. I feel really bad about yelling at him now.

  “You feel guilty about that, don’t you?” she asked, nodding.

  I sat there for a second. Did I just open my big mouth and let this woman inside my head? Fuck. “A little.” A lot.

  She leaned on her elbow on the armrest of her chair. “Do you regret it and wish you could call him up and apologize?”

  I looked toward the door, suddenly feeling the urge to bolt. “Kinda,” I shrugged. Kinda a lot.

  She nodded thoughtfully. “Is there anyone else you’ve hurt in the past that you wish you could apologize to?”

  I thought back to the night before my dad got hauled off to prison. I didn’t realize it then, but he was under a lot of pressure. He owed a lot of money to a lot of people, and one wrong deal could get him killed. I was sitting in my bedroom when he burst through the door. He yelled at me over something stupid—chores probably. I didn’t even remember what it was about now, but I screamed back at him. He got in my face, pointing a finger in my chest, backing me into a corner. And like the moody preteen that I was, I told him I hated him for the first time ever.

  I would never forget that look of disappointment on his face. He backed away and left my bedroom without another word. We didn’t speak for the rest of the night or the whole next morning. I was still reeling the next day when I left for school, and when I came home, he was gone. The cops had come and arrested him around lunchtime.

  Knowing she’d been waiting patiently for my response, I couldn’t look her in the eye when I said, “Nope.”

  She eyed me suspiciously. She knew I was lying, but she didn’t push me for answers and ignored my glassy eyes. She just nodded and said, “Well, we all make mistakes. We just have to learn from them and move forward, not beat ourselves up for something we can’t take back.”

  How the hell did she know I was beating myself up for something I couldn’t take back?

  But the gleam in her eye told me she understood, and that was all that mattered. I managed a crooked smile, and she glanced at the clock. A flash of disappointment crossed her face, realizing how close she had come to getting me to crack. “Our time is up,” she said sorrowfully. With as many kids as were in cell Block-A, we only got to spend about ten minutes at a time with her.

  I stood to my feet. “See you next time,” I said with a hint of enthusiasm that I tried to stuff down.

  She grinned. She knew she was getting to me. Dammit.

  “See you soon, Chris.” A little wave from her sent me out of her office to the awaiting guard who escorted me back to my cell.

  I crashed on the bunk. What the fuck just happened?

  ****

  A couple of days had passed since my last meeting with Mrs. Honeycutt. I’d spent that time adding reinforcements to the bricks that she’d chiseled on t
he wall around my heart. She wasn’t going to get to me this time. I wasn’t here to make friends. I was here to do my time and get the hell out. There was no sense in dredging up feelings to some woman who couldn’t change a damn thing about them anyway.

  I sat down on her sofa, boring holes through the floor.

  “Good morning,” she cooed, her voice sweet and spritely.

  “Hmph,” I grunted. I didn’t even want to use English today because she’d already proven that once I opened my big mouth she could see every fucking thing about me.

  “I hope you’re having a good day so far,” she said, jotting something down in her notebook.

  “Hmph,” I repeated, refusing to look her in the eye.

  She could try all she wanted, but she wasn’t getting me to talk.

  “So, I looked at your file.” She glanced up at me, out of the corner of her eye.

  Did she just fucking smirk at me?

  So, she’s read my file? That means she’s seen all the stupid shit I’ve done. Yay.

  She sat there, poised to write all about it in that damn notebook of hers. So, what? I’d burned down some abandoned barn? So I’d stole some old lady’s Buick? So I kicked the shit out of Trevor-douchebag-Kent? He needed someone to put a bullet between his eyes for what he did to Kaitlyn. No, I did the world a favor.

  I watched her. Her soft hazel eyes. Her long, silky brown hair. Her lips that curled ever so slightly into an innocent smile. I didn’t want to believe it, or think it, but something about her seemed safe…trustworthy.

  Just then, she glanced up at me.

  ****

  SALEM

  When I glanced back up, Chris’s eyes were on me. His dark eyes pierced mine. The pain and turmoil behind those eyes was startling. We looked at each other for another moment before Chris finally broke the silence.

  ****

  CHRIS

  “I’m not who you think I am,” I said without thinking. Dammit! Those innocent eyes beckoned me to speak, and I’d completely lost my resolve.