One week after escape
Last night, I found an old note archived in my phone.
I was freeing up memory to avoid yet another monthly subscription, and nearly cleared the entire archive without checking.
Thankfully (if that’s the word), something pulled me to start skimming through countless grocery lists, passwords, gift ideas, and snippets of my own relentless stream of consciousness. I had no expectation about how far back it would go, or what I might find.
The note was originally created on September 7, 2020, barely a week after we’d finally broken up. Just weeks after I’d, yet again, called his friend in the middle of the night to talk him down from the pistol he held to his head. The same week I’d told his mom, sobbing but certain, that if I stayed he’d be what killed me.
But he’d never consider himself a violent, gun-obsessed, narcissistic thug with a badge. No, no, how could he be?
He opens doors for women. Calls them ma’am (to their faces). Buys them flowers (after disappearing to someone else’s bed for days at a time). He even loves his mom (some may say a bit too much).
After five years of threats, invasive surveillance, and coverups by his well-trained flying monkeys and Good Ole Boys Club, this list is possibly the most tangible evidence I have of his many abuses.
Not that he’d remember it that way. He wouldn’t even recognize himself here. But maybe the next woman will, even if she can’t fully see it yet. And that makes it worth the risk.
So here’s just a few things I knew, even then, that I wouldn’t miss (unchanged save for names and punctuation):
- Having to tell him where I am every second.
- The way his anger could suck the air out of the room.
- He NEVER trusted me, even though I was faithful every fucking time.
- The fact that he hated my friends for no reason, especially [my best friend].
- He pointed guns at me multiple times. Once when I saw him reach for it I picked it up first, and he pushed me up against the wall by my neck and slammed my wrist until I dropped it. Then he didn't let go. I thought I was going to die.
- "You've been mad at me before" was his reaction anytime I was upset with him, no attempt to change his awful behavior.
- CONSTANT sexual innuendos to the point they weren't funny.
- Guilt/anger when I wasn't in the mood.. or straight up refusal to accept "no" and take what he wanted anyway (Call it what you'd call it if your friend told you that: Rape.)
- Trump supporter. Really all I needed to know.
- Broken bedroom door he never really fixed.
- Holes in walls.
- Uncomfortable living room couch.
- I literally bought anything that was actually useful to us. The downpayment on the house, all of our food, cleaning supplies, appliances, etc. All of his money went to guns, alcohol, and dumb impulsive bullshit like comic books.
- Disgusting, and often racist, country music. Ugh and that "she only bitches when she breathes" song, what a fucking loser.
- Thinking about how he cheated on me with women old enough to be his mother.
- Constant accusations of infidelity.
- Stupid, hideous, poorly thought out mishmash of tattoos that mean nothing.
- Playing video games all night and getting wasted.
- Denial about alcoholism.
- Guns all over the fucking house.
- Those stupid comic books he's going to keep buying and never sell.
- Him following me places and needing evidence that I was with who I said I was with.
- Everyone I know but my family hated him, and that was only because he manipulated them.
- The fact that he only ever cleaned/went grocery shopping if I specifically asked him to, and even then would expect a fucking prize or bitch about it for weeks.
- Loud. Chewing.
- How anytime we kissed he always wanted to shove his WHOLE tongue in my mouth. Sometimes that can be sexy, but sometimes a bitch just wants a smooch!
- That time he was drunk and pushed [my dog] so hard she flew across the room in front of his parents and I was somehow responsible for it.
- I never have to see fucking [his grandma] or the rest of his shithead, going nowhere family ever again.
- The feeling of walking on eggshells around his parents.
- The way he treated feminism like it was a bad thing.
- Having to try to convince him to give up his guns when he was drunk.
- The way he would smack my ass, hard, ALL the time even though I told him I didn't like it.
- The way he would clench his fists at the most minor of inconveniences.
- Buffalo. Wild. Wings.
- How dismissive he was of my feelings anytime I wanted to talk about him cheating.
- His super short Nazi buzzcut. Your weirdly greasy head is gross, bro.
- That one position he liked where my legs were in the air and he was on his side and I couldn't really do anything and it just wasn't pleasant or comfortable.
- UGH when he would scratch the bottoms of my feet with his toenails because he knew it made my soul cringe.
- That weird snapping thing he would do with his toes.
- When he would tell me I was hollering anytime I remotely excited.
- That he would chastise me anytime I didn't take a gun with me at all times.
- I knew he was talking to other girls behind my back.
- He carried multiple guns on him at all times, like sometimes 3 at once plus knives. What the fuck did he think was going to happen?
- Just a really scary person.
- Nasty teeth.
- He wore disgusting underwear with holes in them.
- Shaving my vagina bald at his insistence and getting razor burn.
- How hard he would hold onto a grudge.
- Literally any change I made in my routine or any new person I met I was cheating.
- Any interview I had I felt like I had to disclose and defend his actions the night he nearly shot me.
- Drinking and driving and throwing his fucking beer cans out of the window.
- SHOOTING AT RANDOM out of the window when he was drunk. Fuck. What the fuck.
- So. Manipulative.
- He would complain about being hurt or sick but refuse to take any medicine for it.
- The switch that flipped when I knew he had switched over into too drunk, when he started talking nonsense out of nowhere, and I knew I needed to be afraid.
- I don't remember the last time he did anything actually romantic? Not even like spending money, but like leaving me a sweet note or doing something just because, without expecting a reward.
- Watching cop videos constantly.
- Snoring.
- Possessive to the point of violence.
- Absolute refusal to admit I'm right.
- So much fucking anger.
- Constantly talking about policework/weapons.
- Mansplaining.
- Not feeling like I can talk to my male friends or even have male friends.
- His friends are not even fun or personable. They're gross, egotistical, violent, and misogynist.
- Everything was always twisted to be my fault.
- The reputation I got from staying with him after he shot the trashcan (nearly me).
- "I can't change the past" cop out.
- He hated [my best friend] and [she] hated him and it SUCKED being in the middle.
- Oh my god he sucked.
- And he drank so much it made him fat and disgusting.
Discovering this list after all these years has, of course, been triggering; I’m sure it’ll continue hitting in waves, as trauma tends to do.
It’d still be nearly another year after writing it before I’d finally break free financially. Only then would I be able to flee my hometown and begin rediscovering what it felt like to not constantly see his damned truck out of the corner of my eye. Maybe one day I’ll even believe I can stop checking over my shoulder.
But right now? I’m busy feeling wildly validated in my recollections I’ve shared in the years since my escape. In my sharp as hell memory, and the foresight he’d tried to twist into madness.
In my instinct to document what I couldn’t while we were together; things I’ve been working to make sense of in my art and writing ever since. My claims haven't deviated a bit from my freshest memory, written down just after I’d found enough safety to believe he wouldn’t find it.
Even if I never get retribution for these scars, I can’t describe the pride and love I feel toward my past self for being able to see through his manipulation to that truth.