An Unkind Light

At first there’s no one there when I answer the telephone at two in the morning on a winter New England night.  I’m about to hang up when I hear ragged breathing and something that sounds like crying. 

I’m at the ER, my old friend Gerry whispers, Can you come?   

I’m on my way, I tell her.  There’s no point in wasting time on frivolous questions that have no answers.

Like any small city ER, Mt. Auburn is a cheerless place, not as bad as Mass General or God forbid, Boston City, but bad enough with its sterile, harsh lights and overworked staff.  Gerry sits in a corner, head down and collar up as if she could hide her red-rimmed eyes and conceal the fresh bruises on her throat.  A Cambridge cop sits beside her with a small notebook open on his knee but she isn’t looking at him and when he quietly asks if she wants to press charges, she shakes her head stubbornly and starts to cry.  He sighs and looks at me, asks if she has a safe place to go and I nod.

Not the first time, is it, he wants to know and when I say no, he shrugs.  Press charges and maybe it’ll be the last, he suggests but Gerry isn’t listening.  He sighs again, closes and pockets his little notebook and walks slowly off.   I take his seat and slide an arm around her trembling shoulders, noticing her fists clench and unclench.   We’ve been here before and I’m torn between wanting to give her comfort or a good shaking.

A nurse appears and gently but firmly leads her out of the waiting room.  The unkind light makes her look fragile and defeated and she shuffles like an old woman.  This is what abuse looks like, I think wearily, this is what abuse does.   I’m young and still think it’s clear cut and simple.  I can’t grasp why she won’t just leave the bastard.

I learned some things later in life, useful but sad lessons.

What it’s like to feel drawn and quartered by conflicting emotions. 

What it’s like to be threatened into submission and shamed into silence.

What it’s like to reach blindly for the hope of empty promises and false apologies.

How pride and fear join forces and make you paranoid about appearances and what people will say.

How you come to believe every ugly and vicious thing he tells you.

How you become desperate that no one finds out.

How impossible it becomes to give up.  Even if he kills you.

The feeling you had the first time he hit you.  Worse, the feeling you had when you realized it wouldn’t be the last.

The growing suspicion that you’ve brought it on yourself and are a failure because you can’t fix it.

The lies, the pretending, the constant anxiety, the betrayals, the desperation, the guilt.

Seeing the worry on the faces of friends and family.

The panic as you plunge into survival mode.

The way you embrace denial as if it were a shield.  And the way it finally breaks.

It’s a long time later when all these things and many, many more race around in my mind, slamming into each other like an avalanche.  I may understand more but it doesn’t make things easier to see it happening again with someone I care about.

My old friend Gerry, damaged but intact, eventually got out.  I watched her break free and rebuild her life piece by piece. 

Light, even when it’s unkind, is better than darkness.