Anicka lay on her back in her old room, her head throbbing. She had not imagined that love could disappear so quickly, but she no longer loved him. Love had turned to hate.
She still didn't know why he had hit her. Perhaps the blow to the side of her head with his fist had blocked out the memory. She should have listened to her Mexican mother, her mother had told her that he was bad news but she was so full of love that she didn't believe her. All through their courtship, all through their honeymoon he had never raised his voice to her, never lifted a finger.
But now she knew.
Downstairs she could hear the knocking at the door and someone came in whose footsteps had a heavy tread. She could hear the crackle of a radio, and a young male voice speaking into it.
Go away, I don't want to do this now, she thought, but knew that now was the right time to do it. The cop was acting like he'd never taken a domestic violence call before, but he could read the truth by looking at her face.
"Now, you're not going to tell me that you hurt yourself when you ran into a closet door," he said, shaking his head.
Now why would you say a thing like that, she thought, then realized that battered women often made excuses to cover for their men. Well, not her, not now, not ever.
"No, I want him arrested," she said, "I hope he has to go to jail, no man should be allowed to beat on a woman, especially his wife."
"Now," he said, "Tell me what happened, everything that you can remember."
She couldn't remember much, but what she could remember came tumbling out. She couldn't recall why, or what she had done, but he had hit her on the side of her head with his fist, then drawn his foot back to kick her when she fell. She had grabbed his foot and pushed, then he lost his balance and fell over. It was then that he had hit her on the side of her face.
She grabbed an afghan, and wrapped it around her, not daring to get up from the floor, or even sure she should. Exhaustion had set in, mingled with the fear and she passed out. When she woke. she saw it was three a.m. She put her pregnant cat in her carrier, and left the house as quietly as she could. n ran down the street in her bare feet, pounding on doors. She hoped that at least one person would hear her, but it wasn't until the fifth house that someone opened the door.
An older woman opened the door and stared, then pulled her by the arm and locked the door behind her. She unwrapped the afghan, then replaced it with a heavy blanket. She found heavy socks for her cold and bleeding feet. She had the sense to not ask her if she was all right, only saying, "I'm going to call the police."
"Can you take me to my mother's instead? She lives a couple of miles from here. I'd rather call the police from there. I promise I'll call. I need my mother," she said by way of explanation.
"What's your mother's name and number?" she asked.
"Paola Lansing," she answered then rattled off the number.
"I'll call her right now. I'm going to put on some water so I can make you some hot tea," she said then disappeared.
Anicka pulled her cat out of her carrier and held her close. "I couldn't risk letting him hurt you," she told the cat, "You've got babies coming, too."
The woman reappeared, holding a cup of tea on a saucer. "Well, Anicka," she said, "Your mother is coming to get you. You're lucky I'm a light sleeper, though I imagine there weren't many who were willing to answer their door at three in the morning.
"My name is Patsy Wilson, and I'm in charge of the Domestic Violence hotline here." She looked at her then seemed to notice the cat. "She looks like she's expecting kittens."
"She is," Anicka answered, "She's all I took with me. Couldn't leave her to him." She put the protesting cat back in the carrier.
Ten minutes later her mother arrived. Paola Lansing was tall, but she carried herself in a way that defied her age. Her hair had been jet black when she was young, but she was letting it grey naturally. Her daughter resembled her, but her hair was a dark honey, the color of her Anglo father's. Her eyes, though, were a dark brown, so dark they were almost black, just like her mother's.
Paola hugged her daughter, "Mija!" she said, "I'm so sorry I was right. Thank you for taking care of my daughter, Patsry."
"I'm happy to help," she replied, "Keep the blanket, and I'm going to find some slippers for her feet." She went down the hall, then came back with a pair of worn, but serviceable, slippers. "Here, here's my card. Call me if you need any help."
Paola bundled Anicka into the car, "I'm going to take you home, then we'll call and report this."
The young cop finished taking his report. "She needs to go to the hospital and make sure she doesn't have a concussion.
Her brother Ramon, not dressed for work but wearing jeans and a sweater. "I'll take her, I can keep an eye on her. She may be in danger."
"Yes, you're right," the cop answered him, "Abusers don't like their victims to escape. You need to get an order of protection, for all the good that will do, and she needs to file divorce papers."
"All of which I am going to take care of, I'm an attorney," her brother answered, "Then we've got to see about getting her into hiding. I don't trust that bastard."
"Neither would I," answered the cop, "Take good care of your sister, and young lady, I wish you luck. Listen to your brother, and be careful. Get far away if you can." She nodded and watched him as he went out the door.
"Change into some warm clothes, unless you want to go to the hospital in your pajamas," said Ramon.
"Don't talk to me like I'm a child, I'm twenty-two," she said, trying to hide the irritation in her voice, "Give me two minutes and I'll be ready to go."
They gave her a CT scan at the hospital and told her she was lucky, she only had a mild concussion, no more. They took pictures of her face, the bruises now starting to become more prominent. They gave copies to her brother, then kept the originals for themselves.
"What do you want to do?" Ramon asked her, "Your marriage is over, or it should be."
"I'm going to recoup and leave, do you think I'll be safe at the house?" she didn't need to say who she needed to be safe from.
"If he tries to get past Mom and our sisters, he's a fool. We've got to get a vehicle together for you, would you mind driving Dad's truck?"
"No, not as long as you have Antonio go over it first. I'm going to have to leave my cat here," she said wistfully.
"Where do you want to go?" asked Ramon.
"Well, I thought I'd go look for Benito," she said, "The last we knew, he was working for some outfit called 'The Yellowstone'. I thought I'd start there."
"What are you trying to do, go from the fireplace into the fire?" her brother asked, "That place has a reputation, and it's not good."
"But that's the last place he was before he disappeared. Mom even has the letters he wrote, and she kept the texts he sent her. People just don't disappear, Ramon, they get disappeared. I want to find out if these people had anything to do with it. A year has gone by with no word from him."
" I don't think they're going to welcome you with open arms." her brother said.
"Well, we lived on a ranch. Dad couldn't afford to keep cattle, so he leased the pastures. We have friends with horses, so we learned how to ride and I used to help muck stalls. Thanks to Mom I'm a good cook. They're ranchers and ranchers always need help, maybe I can work my way in.
"If you want to do something as crazy as this, you better do it under an assumed name. I'll get you fake ID's. Tell you what, your name is Amy and your last name is Perez. You're from Austin, that's not so far from where we live. If you show up asking for work as Anicka Lansing they may suspect you."
When they walked into her mother's living room, she was suddenly nauseous and had to run into the bathroom to throw up. Paola helped her clean up, then put her to bed.
"Ma, she wants to go and look for Benito. Talk her out of it, that's crazy." Ramon looked at her, hoping she'd agree.
"Well, what you've been doing hasn't helped, mijo. The last we jheard from him was when he told us he was working at the Yellowstone ranch. After that, nothing. Now, if she can just talk to someone there, maybe someone knows something. I'm going to give her some money, can you afford to help?"
"Thank god your father left us that life insurance policy. I can give her about ten thousand, but I think she needs a bit more."
"Well," he said, "it's obvious that she won't be safe in Texas. I'll see if I can get some more to help her out. She's going to have to recover first, no matter what, and the state may want to press charges against her husband, which may mean they'll want her to testify. The order of protection won't do any good, but it's important to file it. I'll get her divorce papers going, too. No matter what, as soon as she is well enough to travel she needs to get out of her."
As if to emphasizes his point, Anicka's ex showed up on the door step the next evening. He was greeted by three women holding guns, their weapons pointed straight at him.
"Get lost," Paola said, "The courts say you're allowed nowhere near my daughter, you are to stay at least five hundred feet away. Harm one hair on her head and you're a dead man. That's a promise, not a threat."
Anicaka's sister Maria managed to snatch the gun from his hand when he let his gun arm drop.
An ugly look ran across his face, "I've got more where that came from."
"Good," her other sister Chela answered, "We'll tell the cops and they're relieve you of them. Don't even think about trying to harm my sister, didn't anyone ever tell you not to mess with Mexicans?"