Who Will Help Me
"Bella, where is my dinner?"
"James, I've been feeding Hale I'll make it as soon as I can."
I knew I would be in some unfathomable trouble if I didn't go and make James dinner. James was my boyfriend of four years. We had been high school sweet hearts. After Abbey came along, James became abusive not wanting anything to do with the child.
His way of dismissing anxiety triggered by the children was to beat me. His punches gave me black and blue bruises for days. His unclipped fingernails dug into my skin leaving undesirable, and surplus scars. This had caused me to be in the hospital more than obligatory.
I tucked Hale and the other two children into their beds. We lived in a small trailer that only had two bedrooms. I had three children, Abbey, who was three, Alexa, who was two, and Hale who was just barley one month old. I turned out the light, and slowly made my way into where James was sitting on the old worn-out lazy boy.
"Bella, you know you did wrong, and now will have to pay the price."
"Yes," I said shyly.
He got up from the lazy boy and swung at my stomach. It hurt terribly. The pain made me collapse to the floor, I couldn't hold myself up. He kicked me several times, while tears streamed down my face. I made no sound, not wanting to wake my babies. He finally stopped after what felt like hours, but was only twelve minutes.
"I'm going to the bar, I'll be back in three days," he replied. He threw clothes around, and shoved them into a duffel bag. After breaking a lamp, he left slamming the front door shut, resulting in a screaming baby.
James was tall and scrawny. He had an uncared for beard making him almost look hillbilly. His eyes were a dark blue, and his hair was sandy blonde. He wore Salvation Army clothes, as did the rest of my family, because that was all I could afford. His temper was the worst thing about him. He was always screaming, and yelling. He would beat me for no reason, right in front of the kids, it was horrible.
He sat all day at the bar, while I worked at Subway, and the kids went to daycare. He couldn't even watch the kids for one day. All I could afford was a two bedroom trailer. The kids never got new clothes, or toys. James just got wasted at the bar while I worked my butt off to support my family.
I walked into the kid's cold room. James punched the window, when Hale wouldn't stop crying. I did my best to repair the window with the provisions I had, but the cold still entered through the window.
"Shh Hale, Shh," I tried to rock him in my arms but his fussing wouldn't stop. I took him into the living room so he wouldn't wake his siblings. I held him close to my chest singing softly to him, before his eyes drifted closed then replaced him in his crib.
Another one of James' rules was to give him my paycheck. He would keep most of it and give me one hundred dollars of it. This was barely enough nowadays. I had saved my money in a secret spot, so James didn't get to it. I had a good two-thousand dollars saved, in a floor board.
My bones ached now from the beating I received about an hour ago. I iced my bones, and took a couple aspirins for the intolerable pain, and went to bed, hoping there wouldn't be bruises in the morning.