Where the Streets Have No Name

Chapter 44

"Carmen!" Edward called out again loudly as he returned to the bedroom with the two pill bottles. The evidence of Carmen's deceit, he thought.

"What do you want?" answered Carmen groggily, sounding annoyed for being disturbed, but she did reluctantly sit up on the bed.

"I want to know what the hell are these doing in your purse," Edward said as he showed her the pill bottles.

If he was in the right frame of mind he would know that confronting Carmen in such an aggressive manner would not bear fruit. Furthermore, he could very well trigger an extreme response from her which would not be good for anybody concerned. But at that very moment he wasn't in the right frame of mind.

He had been deceived.

He was angry.

He lashed out.

He soon came to realize his mistake.

Carmen's eyes froze on the articles in his palm. She sat paralyzed for nearly a minute as if processing the question that Edward had just posed to her.

Edward was beginning to get impatient. Just as he was about to call her out again, she responded.

"You went through my purse?" Carmen asked in a steely voice, completely overriding the matter at hand. "How dare you, you bastard! Hijo de perra, you fucking jerk! You... you sneaky motherfucking, son of a bitch. You... pinche puto, you filthy worm. Get out! Get out of here!" She hurled the nearest thing her hand could reach - a book from the bedside table - at Edward as she screamed barely coherently at the top of her lungs.

Edward was taken aback by the sheer force of her wrath. In the time it took for him to recollect his thoughts, Carmen had thrown several other things at him; the last one, the small bedside lamp, missing his head by mere inches. He hadn't seen her act so violently since their wedding night, though he hadn't actually witnessed her episode inside the bathroom first hand.

He now deeply regretted not following up on his intuition and investigate Carmen's behavioral history.

"Carmen, stop," he tried, all the anger gone from his voice. He approached Carmen as she struggled out of the bed to get her hands on more articles to smash and throw. "Please, sweetie. Calm down, we can talk about this later, okay? I made a mistake, I shouldn't have looked in your purse. You're right. Please, just lie down and relax," he spoke softly, recalling how his psych professors calmed down patients when they suffered a break with reality or had violent episodes.

Carmen was not to be dissuaded easily. She still managed to throw several more picture frames and books before Edward could restrain her by wrapping his arms around her protectively.

"It's all your fault. You ruined my life. I never should have listened to you." Carmen sobbed into his chest as he carefully maneuvered her toward the bed.

"Yes, yes. I know. It's all my fault," Edward agreed sorrowfully, tucking her under the covers. "I'm so very sorry."

*Hijo de perra (son of a bitch)

*pinche puto ( fucking asshole)

Thank you Lulabelle98, HeidiJoVT, and Dinx.

Thanks to BlueSkies0825 and dag21 for the stellar help on Spanish swear words:)

A MASSIVE thanks to writtenbyabdex for being my 2000th reviewer. You have no idea how happy you made me! ((((HUGS))))