INSPIRED BY TRUE EVENTS. CHARACTERS AND EVENTS HAVE BEEN ALTERED FOR STORYLINE PURPOSES.

✋🏼 TRIGGER WARNING: INTIMATE PARTNER VIOLENCE: SOME PASSAGES DESCRIBING VIOLENCE BETWEEN INTIMATE PARTNERS MAY BE UPSETTING FOR SOME READERS. PLEASE PROCEED WITH CAUTION.

✻ CHAPTER 8 ✻

I never understood what my mom meant by “choose your battles” or what “the art of war” meant until I met Rob. Loving him was an ongoing conflict, and you never knew what set off the bombs until after you sorted through the rubble. Anything could set him off. That’s what my mom says about me and my sister. Sensitive little grenades she and I are, popping off easily and rapidly by any tiny trigger. But what kind of parent would turn a child into a grenade?

“You ready to go?” Rob asks me. He’s waiting by the front door, grinning from ear to ear, my packed lunch already in his hands.Watching him patiently wait for me to get my bag ready seems hella suspicious. It’s almost like he’s trying to catch me slippin’. But I won’t get caught up in his games again. The best way to play this out is stick to the facts. I know he likes waking up early, I know he like to be outdoors, and I know he’s trying to turn a new leaf. Maybe he really is excited to walk me to work. Maybe Rob has really changed.

“It’s so cold and foggy outside, wouldn’t you rather stay indoors?” He may have changed, but the very thought of a potential run in with Manny makes my heart sink.

“No way! I love this weather,” he responds without hesitation. “Plus, I think it’ll be nice to walk my girlfriend to work.”

And there it was—that word, that position, that expectation—girlfriend. It was the inevitable step I was afraid to take. What did I think this was? Just a friendly situation where two old friends sleep in the same twin size bed and occasionally make out? Of course he thinks I’m his girlfriend, I’ve been playing the part.

This is a charade after all though, isn’t it? The niceties, the chivalry, the romance. My heart sinks, but I continue with this painful charade anyway.

It reminds me of how my mom trained me and my sister to “act right.” Once when I was about four years old, my mom booked a photography session for me at JC Penny. She spent all morning curling my hair and fixing me up. I wore a blue dress covered in sunflowers and a matching hat with a big sunflower on the center of it. She was so proud of how I looked, like a little doll ready for display. I fell asleep on the car ride over to the mall and when she woke me, I cried and I cried and I cried because all I wanted to do was sleep. But she got me out of my stroller, propped me up on a stool before a backdrop, and whispered in my ear “If you don’t stop crying right now, I’m going to give you the biggest ass whoopin’ when we get home.” So, I stopped crying and smiled.

I gave the photographer the smile little four year old me could muster, and the photos turned out beautifully. No one would have guessed I was crying just minutes before that photo was taken.

My mom was pleased and I was spared.

Rob opens the front door and holds it open for me, something he’s never done. I walk through the threshold, feeling like I’m in a movie and Rob and I are the main actors, except it’s low-budget, and the actors aren’t that good. I am trying hard to stay present in the moment and act natural, but I can’t help but analyze my facial expressions, movements, and speech.

I finally decide on what to say and land on, “Oh my, so gentlemanly, thank you!” I pretend to be oh-so impressed by the basic act of a door being held open for me.

“It’s not every day you get a second chance to make things right,” he responds.

“You’re right,” I agree, turning around and throwing my arms around him. I kiss him on the lips but quickly withdraw my arms after reliving a memory. A recent memory. A Manny memory. Just 12 days ago, I was kissing Manny right here on this same apartment balcony.

I grabbed Rob’s hand tightly and pulled him quickly towards the staircase. “Let’s go, I’m running late.”

The apartment I was subletting for the summer was a brisk 5-minute walk to campus, but it wasn’t the extra bonding with Rob that worried me. It was the fact that Manny was on his way to work at this very moment, too. It was the worry that I would have to see the look on his face if he saw us together. It’s the worry of disappointing him more.

I walked to work as fast as I could, almost doubling my strides, which I’m used to doing with Rob who’s almost a foot taller than me. But Rob was walking a little slower this time, attempting to put his arm around me and hold my hand while we walked.

When Rob and I were together in Los Angeles, he rarely held me, kissed me, or caressed me in public. I always felt like he was ashamed of being seen with me, or being seen as loving.

Over the years during our relationship, I learned to accept that I would never find someone who held me like I wanted to be held or kissed like I wanted to be kissed—that I would only ever have Rob, and I accepted that that was what life planned for me. Rob was it and I accepted that my needs would go unmet.

That was what I accepted until I met Manny—until I met someone who wanted to kiss me like I yearned to be kissed and wanted to show me all the public displays of affection he could think of. Oh how I yearned to be loved in that way. But not by Rob. Not anymore, at least.

I shoved my hands in my front pockets, pretending not to see Rob’s hands flailing by his sides, desperate to hold onto me.

We were halfway to the University, and we had not spoken a word since the staircase. The silence between us was not normally this loud, but I could feel a rising tension. I decided to test it.

“So, how’s the job search going?” I inquired plainly.

An inner voice nearly screams: Fuck! Did you have to ask that?

Another voice interjects: Keep cool, okay? You’re genuinely concerned, that’s all. It’s just a question.

Rob furls his brows at me. “I’ve literally been here for a week! You expect me to have something lined up already? I told you—”

“Yeah, okay, you’re right, I understand,” I started and Rob nodded with me in agreement. “I know you’re doing everything you can.”

In all fairness, Rob was right, it could be a while for someone like him with no high school diploma or college education to get a job. I guess I had expected him to have more hustle, like me, or like Manny. But there’s no use trying to turn a spoon into a fork. Rob is who he is.

“I still have some money saved from working with my dad,” he continued, “so we’ll be good this month as long as we don’t go out or buy dumb shit.”

More than enough for a ticket back home—

“Yeah, we should be good then,” I agreed. I wasn’t expecting to go out and party—where would we do that in this small town anyway? “Just wanted to see how things were going.”

“Well, I’m doing everything I can but no one wants to fucking hire me,” he snapped.

Yeah, because you’re a whiny piece of s—

“Have you tried the grocery stores? I know Safeway is always hiring.”

“I’m out here every fucking day looking for a damn job. You think I haven’t checked Safeway?” By now, his face turned red and he’s spitting every other word. “I swear sometimes it feels like you think I’m a dumb piece of shit. Maybe I am. Maybe no one wants to hire me because I’m a fucking low life who doesn’t even have a high school diploma.”

I don’t disagree, instead I walk the last minute in silence, biting my inner cheeks, pretending to ignore the sourness that filled the air between us. It’s easier to get along when I don’t call out his nastiness.

We get to the parking lot, and I do a quick scan for a hunter green 4 x 4 truck before kissing Rob goodbye. It’s a small peck on the cheek, but he notices how I miss his lips.

“I really do fuck things up all the time don’t I?” he acknowledged.

I pursed my lips. “I know you’re trying to do better. I see it.”

“I really am trying.”

I nod in agreement, kiss him on the lips this time, and hug him goodbye. We part ways and I breathe a sigh of relief.

I feel like I’m the main character in an episode of Mujeres: Casos de la Vida Real. I’m the battered woman convinced her boyfriend is going to change because he keeps promising he will after every flip out. And we believe him because we love him, and a good woman always believes in her man and support them regardless of what he does. The main character eventually realizes that she’s delusional and it’s usually because she meets a kind, loving, and supportive man who shows her she deserves better. I feel like such a fucking stereotype, it’s gross.

And after managing to avoid bumping into Manny at work for 5 whole days, we finally meet face to face at the entrance of the Housing + Dining building. The Universe couldn’t be more obvious at this point. Fate has a loud way of talking and if you’re not listening, you’re one dumbass.

“Hey.”

You’d think I could muster up something better after ignoring most of his messages, but I was fighting every bone in my body not to run into his arms and kiss every inch of his face. I couldn’t even look him in the eyes for too long—then I’d really see the enormous mistake I was making.

“Hey,” he reciprocates in a low voice. His eyes look sunken, like he hasn’t slept in weeks. I desperately hoped it wasn’t because of me.

“You look good,” I lied.

“Yeah? Well, I feel like shit.”

“I’m sorry, I never wanted to hurt you.”

“Well, you did anyway.”

“You don’t understand—”

“What’s there to understand, Lola? You left me for him!” His tone wasn’t sharp or angry, he was clearly upset, but not taking it out on me. He covered his face with his hands and took a seat on the stairwell.

“You ended us,” he added softly. “Just like that. No warning. No real explanation.”

He waited for me to respond, but I couldn’t. I kept my head low, biting my bottom lip, holding back 10 days worth of tears.

“I can’t be late for work, Lola.”

God, I love it when he says my name.

I look up at him, this Brown young man with beautiful brown eyes and it’s like we’re seeing each other for real for the first time. He’s looking past my mistakes and directly into my soul. He lingers for 30 seconds, giving me a chance—another fucking chance—to say something. Anything. But I don’t.

He walks ahead of me, and I let him go. Once again, my world shatters.