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  "Have a safe night, Arianna. Tell Jake I said hi," Jim called in his rumbling voice and gave me my wink.

  "I will. Goodnight, Jim."

  "See you next week, Ari," Janet called from the kitchen and I couldn't help but smile. Janet is who I should have been today. Smiling, funny, full of cheery sunshine with rainbows and unicorns prancing around me.

  Needless to say, I was the most serious one out of us three waitresses. Molly was a step down from Janet and slightly insane, but they were both exactly the kind of friends I needed and they reminded me a lot of the ones I had left behind.

  I took a deep breath before walking out into the chilly darkness. My feet hurt from pulling a double shift and my face felt like it was about to snap in two from all the fake smiling I had been doing for the customers.

  I loved it.

  Not because it reminded me that I was still alive, but because everything I did, I did for me. I made the decision to smile or work a double or walk home. I made the decision to stand in front of the pub for a moment looking up at the stars instead of hurrying home to get a dinner on the table that wouldn't be appreciated.

  I had my freedom.

  That's why the pain in my feet felt glorious.

  I turned toward the street, my apartment just yards away, took a deep breath and decided to go home and change before I went to Jake's.

  Why? Because I could.

  Because I can.

  Those days and nights in the hospital were more than just a wakeup call. They were the very strike of lightning my mind and heart needed.

  It was a miracle that I survived.

  "One more hit to the head," the doctor declared, "and you would have become a vegetable. You're lucky."

  Lucky.

  It's another fucked up word with an even more fucked up meaning.

  Luck has nothing to do with it. If I was lucky, I would have never met the bastard who almost killed me. If I was lucky, I wouldn't feel so bitter when I'm lying in bed at night just trying to breathe, just trying to close my eyes and deal with the nightmares. Just trying to survive the chaos in my head. Faking my way through life.

  Margaret had no reason to help me. I never even acknowledged her presence even though she always greeted me with a smile. I couldn't bring attention to anyone around me when Roger was around.

  For a long time, she was one of the people who always kept her head down, which I had been grateful for at the time. She never commented on the bruises she saw or the sound of breaking glass and drunken shouts in the middle of the night. If she had, it wouldn't have mattered. It would have just been a waste of breath, a waste of words and it would have probably killed us both.

  But it was her voice I heard that night. Her words that changed everything. Simple, unexpected words that gave me the strength to decide.

  "Take it back…"

  It doesn't matter to me why people are the way they are. It doesn't matter to me that no one ever interfered. No one could save me because I needed to be able to save myself.

  And I did.

  Three years.

  Three years with that worthless piece of shit - the only man I had ever given everything to. Three years of losing the girl I once knew, the Arianna that always smiled, always laughed, and never worried over the trivial.

  Two years and six months since I saw my family. My brother, my parents, my friends.

  I shook my head and started up the stairs to my apartment, trying not to remember the hell I had to go through to get here. Doesn't matter how hard I try, though. I always remember. Every moment, every manipulation, and every breath that I thought would be my last.

  The man was a dick and I wanted to rip that very part off of him. Violent? Maybe, but it would be the only way to feel better about myself.

  The first six months with Roger were different. Almost peaceful. Roger was romantic and spoiled me rotten. It had been a trap. I know that now. I was the fish nibbling at the delicious worm. He was holding the rod that would take me. He paid attention to me, listened to me, pampered me. It was him I had given my virginity to. That night had been beautiful in my eyes, but everything changed the next day. It was no longer the romantic relationship I thought I had been living in.

  The first time Roger hit me was the first time I realized the blinds had been shut over my eyes the entire time. His long nights at the office, his frequent phone calls to check in on me, his need to keep me from his parents. From my parents, my family and friends. I thought it was because he wanted me to himself in that sweet way some boyfriends do. Now it all made sense.

  I had been celebrating my 21st birthday with my two girlfriends, the only friends I still had left from high school. Finals were over, I had my Bachelor's degree in the bag early, and the girls and I wanted to make it a night to remember. We went dancing, we drank, we laughed, danced some more. I missed five calls from him and responded back to the text that said he wanted me to come home with a 'having fun, will be home in an hour', and never in a million years thought my world would be stripped from my hands.

  I can still remember the sting in my cheek from his massive hand crashing into it the second I walked in the door that night.

  "Where the fuck have you been?"

  The question had sounded like a swarm of bees with the buzzing that ensued from that initial blow. The metallic taste of blood in my mouth was nauseating and for a moment, I thought I was having a very vivid nightmare.

  But it was the shock that had felt like an elephant was sitting on my chest.

  The man I had come to love had struck me in anger. Anger I still didn't understand to this day. Anger that almost killed me, eventually.

  "I asked you a fucking question, Arianna. Where have you been and who were you with?"

  "R-Roger, I-I already told you I was g-going out with Amy and R-Rachel." My stumbled words had grated on my ears. It was the first time I realized how much I hated being afraid.

  "Yeah, your fellow sluts. I'm positive they made sure you had a grand time. Did you have fun fucking every guy in sight?"

  My eyes had widened and my stomach rolled at the thought of being unfaithful, of him ever thinking I had done something so awful in my eyes. "No! Roger, I would never do that."

  His hard gaze never softened. He never believed me, never let me prove it. He heard what he wanted to hear and believed the scenario he had conjured up in his head, no matter how ridiculous it was. The bitter scent of alcohol on his breath was still so ingrained in my mind.

  He had walked away that night, left me alone to clean up and go to bed. I had cried myself to sleep and when morning came, my birthday was no longer the celebration I had been planning for.

  It was when he walked into the room with breakfast and a lone cupcake with a candle, that I made my first mistake. The broken look on his face was the first nail in the coffin of the most careless decision I had ever made in my life.

  He begged my forgiveness. I gave it. He said it was the stress from his job. I said I understood. As the youngest lawyer in his father's firm, he was at the bottom of the totem pole. He wanted me to himself, wanted to get away from the people who could tear us apart.

  My head wasn't clear enough to tell him to go to hell. The shock was jumbling everything up and there was no time for me to push through it.

  Two weeks later, I moved away from everything and everyone I had ever known to be with him. Believing the promise that our lives would be filled with happiness was the second nail in the coffin.

  A month after settling in, I had gotten my dream job at an up and coming marketing firm. Roger took me out to celebrate. Our waiter paid special attention to me.

  Roger noticed.

  The next morning, I woke with a black eye and a cut lip.

  I gave him my forgiveness again, but this time was different. I didn't want to give it. I didn't even honestly give it. I just didn't want him to hit me again. It was fear that made the decisions for me.

  Time passed. Nothing changed. He manipulated
, lied, conned… anything to make me stay another day. Then he forced me to quit my job. Got his own promotion and I was suddenly convinced that it would be easier if I just stayed home. Easier to walk on the egg shells scattered around me. I played the game, learned to shut my mouth and I was hanging on by a thread because I had no pieces left to move, no strategy, no plan. Nothing.

  He knew it, but it didn't stop me from trying to get the hell out. That's when the game changed completely. It was no longer my well being that was in the toilet. He had been keeping something close, something that would keep me on the short leash he had around my neck. The threat that he would destroy my family, my brother… it was bigger than the threat of getting knocked around. I couldn't let it happen.

  That was the final nail. The one that would keep me locked and buried in his world.

  It was the one that kept the real Arianna West outside and left the shell of her to rot somewhere along the roadside.

  I wondered if I could ever get her back. Probably not. Not after I had changed my entire being in order to survive.

  "Doesn't matter now, Ari," I whispered to myself and stripped out of my clothes. "It's over. There's no going back."

  I glanced at the clock and groaned. I needed to be at Jake's soon or he would come knocking. Then I smiled because it wouldn't matter. I could be late if I wanted to be late. I could wear pajamas if I wanted to wear pajamas. Jake would check up on me, but it wouldn't be the same thing. It would be because he actually cared about me and he would tell me to do whatever the hell I wanted. And he would probably laugh at the pajamas because every single one of them had a kickass picture on the front of them. His current favorite was the Austin Powers top with Dr. Evil and Mini Me on the front of it. "A little glimpse of the Ari from the past," he had said.

  I dressed quickly and washed my face, waking up a little more with each step. Tonight was going to be the start of the new Arianna West with the best parts from before sprinkled right on top. The Ari that wouldn't let anyone else control her life. The Ari that would finally be able to take a breath.

  "Tonight, you start over, Ari," I said to myself, looking in the mirror and seeing my face truly back to normal for the first time in three months.

  Feeling that calm before the storm.

  A knock at the door was the only warning I had. I should have listened to the voice in my head that told me to hide, to pretend I wasn't here, but I ignored it and shook off the nervousness before I moved to open the door. Jake had every reason to check on me. I was already ten minutes late.

  I shouldn't have come to my apartment first. I should have covered my tracks. I should have just let him kill me the first time.

  All these thoughts raced through my mind when I looked out of the peephole and felt my heart drop to the floor before the door crashed against me, knocking me to the ground. Pain exploded in my head as it smacked against the hardwood floor. A groan reached my ears and it wasn't long before I realized it was me making that sound. My vision went black the second I saw him stand over me, arms folded across his chest and a grin on his face that could only mean one thing.

  Punishment.

  Roger Dayton, the dick I told you about? He had come for me

  ***

  My head was filled with static and my limbs were heavy as the fog lifted. My eyes shot open and I found myself in my bedroom on the floor with Roger throwing clothes around and stuffing my few possessions in my suitcase. I tried to stifle a groan of pain as the pounding quickly assaulted me. My vision quivered around the edges and my limbs were heavy. Roger whipped his head around and glared at me.

  He slowly stalked toward me and crouched down so I could see his face clearly. A face that was still so beautiful, but now held a shadow of evil. "You think I'm stupid? You think I wouldn't find you? You are mine, Arianna! Until the day you die, you are mine." His rancid alcohol coated breath blew in my face as he bit out the words I had heard a thousand times before. The thing he didn't realize or just didn't care about was that I would be dead sooner than he thought if he kept this up. Being his had an inevitable ending.

  I didn't have time to respond before a harsh hand wrapped around my upper arm and hauled me up to my feet. My head was spinning and I felt bile rise in my throat. It didn't distract me from the sharp pain that flared in my cheek when his knuckles crashed into my face. The vile taste of blood didn't make me cringe this time, but I never for a second thought I would taste the rust-like substance again. I thought those days were behind me.

  The breath I took to stabilize myself was painful, but welcome. I was still alive.

  "Get up!"

  My mouth hurt, my eye throbbed, but I had already made my decision. I wasn't going back to that life. I wasn't going to live another minute wondering if it was my last day. If my last breath would be painful when I had prayed so many times to just not feel it.

  I stared up at him, digging for courage and wishing the man had been born ugly. It was his beauty that had pulled me to him in the first place. His fierce jaw and full lips, the dark brown eyes that hypnotized me the first time he looked at me. I thought he was a prize and he had been until he convinced me to move away with him and I discovered how blind I was. His beauty hid the darkness inside. Funny how that happens so much in the world.

  "Fuck you," I rasped, my voice deadly calm while my heart nearly leapt out of my chest. I wanted to laugh because, damn, that felt good.

  "What the hell did you just say?" he shouted before quickly moving towards me and hitting me again, this time in my newly healed ribs. The pain took my breath away and I fell against the nightstand. The blows kept coming, sloppy and careless. He was too drunk to kill me tonight, but he would certainly try.

  The shiny metal lamp sitting on top of the nightstand I was desperately clutching nearly toppled over, but by some miracle, it stayed within my reach and my mind raced with the possibilities.

  I had to get out of here.

  I watched my hand reach out and grip the thick metal just under the bulb, then my wrist twisted and my body turned, raising the heavy lamp above my head. It was instinct. I don't know how I did it, I don't even think I had meant to do it, but it felt like I had taken a step in the right direction. The thick base of the lamp somehow connected with Roger's head and knocked him down. Pain vibrated through my arm and fingers with the impact, but it was nothing compared to the pain in my head and ribs. I didn't stop to see if he would stay down.

  I ran.

  Faster than ever before.

  The adrenaline coursing through my body was potent and my lungs ached with every breath I took. I was out the door before I heard his shout.

  "Arianna! You can't run from me forever! I'll destroy you!"

  There was no time to get far enough away. Even drunk he would catch up to me before I made it down the street and my lungs were already burning, my side was aching, my head spinning.

  I hurried down the steep metal steps, the only way to my front door, and instead of running straight to the street, my body turned itself and squeezed behind the stairs. For once in my life, I was grateful for my absent mindedness. My body knew what it needed to do without me telling it. Hide.

  It was dark enough outside that no one would be able to see me without a light and I realized I had prepared for his arrival in some ways. When Jake brought me here the first time, the brief thought of whether or not I could fit in the tiny space behind these stairs flashed in my mind. At the time, I had laughed at myself for even thinking it.

  My head pounded harder and my lungs screamed at me as I tried to quiet my gasping breaths. He must have only bruised my ribs because the pain wasn't near as much as it had been three months ago, it still nearly dropped me and every breath brought me closer to blacking out. That's when I noticed that my ankle was screaming at me, too. It must have twisted when I fell or he must have dragged me pretty violently to my bedroom. Either way, I had to ignore it.

  I curled my body into itself and waited in the dirt and gravel, tryi
ng to hold my breath so I wouldn't gasp from the pain. His footsteps pounded across my apartment to the broken door and I watched the back of his legs move down each step through the open spaces between the grated stairs. He was definitely drunk, but lucid enough to only stumble twice. His arm hung at his side and the blood on his palm was thick and dark and for the first time in a long time, it wasn't mine. I had made him bleed.

  "I'll find you, Ari," he said loudly and my chest felt ready to burst open with the vigorous pounding of my heart.

  He didn't stop to look around and my eyes frantically searched for a path to get away. Instead, I found a truck, Roger's truck, with the driver's door open. The headlights illuminated the ground just inches away from me. Inches that would save me.

  Roger climbed in the cab of the truck, grumbling about the whore that wouldn't listen, and quickly drove away. He must have thought I had neighbors close by, but I was the only tenant. The other apartment was empty and the entrance was on the other side of the building and the closest neighbors were across the street. No one would have gotten to me in time.

  The red taillights from the truck disappeared down the quiet street and I was finally alone. Shaking and cursing myself.

  I wasn't ready. I had never been ready to face this again and I hadn't expected to, but I would be, eventually.

  I crawled out from under the stairs and looked up at the open doorway to my apartment. I couldn't go back in there. Roger would come back soon if I did, I could feel it in my gut.