I didn’t really get time to think about the nightmare. Momma and King’s raised voices drifted from downstairs. I couldn’t make out all the words, but I knew King was trying to convince Momma to do something that she was adamant about not doing. I adjusted myself in the bed to hear better. The springs in my old mattress creaked. They both stopped talking then I heard someone coming up the stairs. I clicked off the lamp and pulled the covers over my head. Something told me not to let them know that I’d heard them.
When King came into my room, I pretended to be asleep. I heard him take a seat. I maybe pretended for about ten minutes before I was pulled back under.
***
I could feel it when I woke up. Something bad was about to happen. I thought about King. He had awakened me earlier to tell me that he needed to do something important and would be back in a day or so. I had a feeling that whatever it was had to do with his illegal activities from before he’d gone to jail.
I called him; glad I’d made sure he hadn’t left until he’d added his cell number Momma had gotten him into my phone. It went directly to voicemail.
“Fuck.” I called again and got the same result. I didn’t want to think too hard about what he was doing and work myself up, so I pushed it to the back of my mind. That and thoughts about what happened the night before. Telling King I still loved him had probably been a mistake, especially when I would soon be going go to jail or have to go back with Ellis. Despite King’s promise to fix things, those were the only scenarios that awaited me.
If Ellis was dead, his family would make sure he looked like the victim and I ended up in prison. If he wasn’t, I knew he’d demand I go back with him and I’d have to in order to keep King safe and myself out of prison.
I’d fucked up and told Ellis entirely too much about myself. When I’d tried to leave before he’d used it against me. I didn’t understand Ellis’s obsession with keeping me as his wife. Nothing had been easy about our relationship and he had a mistress he seemed to love a lot more than me. I had a suspicion his family even knew about her.
I wanted to go back to sleep but nature was calling. I got up to use the restroom. While I washed my hands and brushed my teeth the nightmare I had drifted to the forefront of my mind. “Fucking ominous,” I said aloud, but the nightmare also explained why I felt an overwhelming sense of doom and gloom suddenly.
Momma must have heard me walking around because as soon I went to lay back down, she called me.
“Eden, Come down here.” She yelled upstairs.
“Shit, shit, shit.” I stomped my feet like a child throwing a tantrum. I was too fucking tired to deal with her bullshit, but I got dressed, throwing on a pair of sweatpants and a t-shirt I’d bought at Wal-Mart since I hadn’t exactly packed a suitcase before leaving home.
I trudged down the stairs. The whole house smelled like bacon and biscuits, so I figured King was back or would either be back soon since Momma was cooking again. I swear it irked the fuck out of me the way she treated King like he was her man.
I walked into the kitchen. My eyes immediately landed on our guest. I wanted to die, for just a little while.
Sitting across from my momma was Ellis. My hands shook and my legs felt like spaghetti.
What was scarier than him being there in the flesh was the fact that he didn’t have a mark on him. He looked so fucking smug in his expensive suit with not a hair out of place.
I blinked hard, closed my eyes and reopened them. “But I hit you in the face with a blender then stabbed you?” I blurted out.
They both frowned and looked at me like I had grown an extra head.
“What are you talking about, girl?” Momma asked.
“Are you okay, Queen?” Ellis drawled.
I gritted my teeth. He knew I hated when he called me Queen. It was a dig at King and my relationship.
“How are you here? Didn’t I kill you?”
“You obviously didn’t,” he responded snidely, raising his hands.
I dug my nails into my palms thinking I was having another nightmare or maybe I hadn’t woken up from the first one. I winced at the pain that came immediately.
“What is wrong with you, Eden?” Momma asked. I never looked in her direction. My eyes stayed focused on Ellis. His blue eyes sparkled with mischief.
Ellis spoke up. “I can probably explain this. Eden and I got into it. You know how she is. She got out of hand. I had to defend myself, of course. She threw a blender at me. She slipped on whatever spilled from it, fell and hit her head on the kitchen countertop. I went to get help but when I came back, she was gone.”
His heavily rewritten, retelling of the truth brought back my memories.
I had confronted him about having a vasectomy. He hadn’t said anything, just attacked me, not just attacked. He’d beat me so bad I could barely stand, let alone defend myself, and then slammed my head down on the kitchen island like he was trying to kill me. The rest, stabbing him and standing over his dead body I’d probably hallucinated.
But I knew for a fact he’d watched me in pain and bleeding while he’d called his mistress and made plans to take her out.
He threw his head back and laughed. Momma joined him.
Irritated, I cut my eyes in her direction
“Why is he here, Momma?” I was asking her to confirm what I already knew would come, but I still needed to know if he’d come on his own or if Momma had a hand in it.
“I called him.” She shrugged.
I opened my mouth to ask her why she would do such a s thing, but Ellis cut me off. His gaze cut to Momma.
“Mrs. Ruth, do you think I could have some time alone with my wife?” He smiled showing her all thirty of his pearly whites. His sugary sweet tone turned my stomach. I wanted to jump across the table and strangle his ass.
“Of course.” Momma giggled before pushing away from the table. “I’ll be upstairs if you need me,” she said to him. While walking past me, she mumbled, “fix this” under her breath before leaving the kitchen.
Ellis and I entered a staring contest, like we often did before all hell broke loose.
“Sit down, Eden.” His deep baritone was filled with malice.
When I didn’t move to do it right away, he screamed, “Sit down!” I had never feared Ellis even after the beatings started. He would hit me; I’d hit him back. He more fucked up my self-esteem. But for the first time I jumped when he yelled. I guess the last beating had finally broken me.
For some reason I glanced towards the door where Momma exited. I imagined her coming back and being a mother and telling Ellis to leave. But hope for that only lasted a second. I didn’t have that type of mother.
As if he had read my mind, he said, “She’s not coming to save you. Neither is your King. We’ll be long gone before he gets here.” Smugness was thick in his tone. He smirked and gestured for me to take the seat next to him.
I continued standing where I was with my arms folded across my chest. My thoughts were racing a thousand miles per minute, trying to figure out how I could make it so I did not have to go back with Ellis.
“Disobey now, suffer later. I might even call your King’s parole officer and tell them he’s on the run. He’s not supposed to cross state lines and he’s probably already in Georgia, searching for me after he got some false information about my whereabouts.