Unapologetically Misunderstood

By Michelle Angelo

Michelle Angelo's captivating novel "Unapologetically Misunderstood" grasps the reader with a drama-filled plot. Being a successful entrepreneur and owner of a freelance design company, Jonae has the world at the palm of her hands. After a family secret gets revealed, Jonae begins battling demons. From old

• Language: English
• Publisher: Michelle Angelo
• Release date: Jun 5, 2021
• ISBN: 9781735884813

Michelle Angelo

Michelle Angelo is a United States military veteran. She initially began writing as a hobby that later served as a coping mechanism from a rough breakup. She is a proud mother of two beautiful daughters and a wife of an incredibly supportive husband. Growing tired of the constant separation and emotional impact due to her absence, she decided to resign from government contracting in Afghanistan and return home to be with her family to focus on her writing career. Michelle Angelo enjoys writing urban literature and looks forward to publishing more books in the future.Michelle Angelo grew up a military brat in the town of Killeen, Texas. Following the footsteps of her parents, she enlisted in the United States Army to serve her country after graduating from high school shortly after 9/11. During her nine-year career enlistment, she had multiple deployments; one of which was to Iraq. She went on to continue serving her country as a government contractor where she worked overseas in Afghanistan for over seven years. She now lives in the Kansas City area and often describes writing as being her "happy place" and a way to escape feeling despondent. Michelle Angelo quoted, "Some write because no one listens, some write because it sets their hearts free, while others write for the pure enjoyment of imagination."

Book preview

1 Eyes Of A Child

Jonae

I can remember lying in bed late at night as a child with many thoughts running through my head. One of which, was wondering if I had a white mother, would she treat me the same way as my black mother does? This thought usually crossed my mind after taking a beating from my mother for something. I would get beatings for things that now, thinking back as an adult, seemed so trivial at the time. I would often go to sleep praying that my mother would be nicer to me or treat me the same as she did my brother. One year, I remember getting a Barbie boat for Christmas. My mother let me play with it in my room. She filled my baby brother’s portable tub with water and allowed me to play with it, and I pretended the baby tub was an ocean. I played for hours, splashing my Barbie boat around in the baby tub. When I finally finished playing, I tried to be a big girl and show my mother that I could clean up my own room. The baby tub filled with water was heavy to me as a young child. While attempting to pick it up, I accidentally spilt the water all over my bedroom’s carpeted floor. Instantly panicking, I tried to clean it up before my mother found out because I knew she’d be furious. Picture a child at the age of 6 years old. In my mind, the quickest way to clean up the spilt water was to get a vacuum and suck up the water, so I thought. My mother came to see what I was doing after hearing the vacuum powered on in my bedroom. I suppose because it was unusual for me to be vacuuming, it grasped her attention. I couldn’t hear her calling out my name over the loud vacuum, but I felt her hand as she tapped me on the shoulder, which of course startled me. Once she realized that she was standing on damp carpet, she became so angry that she started yelling and punched me in the stomach. She punched me with such force that the wind was knocked out of me. It wasn’t until years later that I came to understand that her fear of me being electrocuted at that moment caused her to react violently towards me.

What happened afterwards, Jonae? my psychiatrist Dr. Nelson asked.

My father came to see what happened, and the two of them started fighting after finding out my mother had punched me, I answered.

Would you say that your father acted as a shield between you and your mother? Dr. Nelson asked.

Pausing for a moment while thinking about the question she just asked, I answered, I guess I’ve never really thought of it like that, but yes. 

Were there ever any good times with your mom? Dr. Nelson asked.

You mean like moments when she wasn’t beating on me? I asked. 

Well, that, and just good times in general, Dr. Nelson answered.

Sure there were, but they were so far and few in between that I would definitely say that the bad outweighed the good, I answered.

So, are you saying that you had more bad times than good? Surely there were some good times, right?

You may find this hard to believe, but she always looked for reasons to scream, yell, and beat on me. Trying to rationalize and think of what would trigger her to beat on me was comparable to a shark that loves blood. In other words, it was inevitable. It was going to happen regardless because she hated me—or at least that’s what I believed to be true.

Think of a time when you felt safe or relieved when around your mother, Dr. Nelson said.

 Well, there was this one time, I started off saying.

Dr. Nelson shuffled in her seat as she was preparing to hear something positive roll from my tongue, and sure, I could play into it by telling her exactly what she wanted to hear. It doesn’t take much for a pair of lips to tell someone something, but how is this session that’s supposed to be therapeutic going to be beneficial to me if I am not honest? The truth is something that most people say they want but often can’t handle when it’s told. Although I knew exactly what Dr. Nelson was asking, I shifted the direction of the conversation because in order for me to give her a clear understanding of what type of monster I grew up with, I needed her to have the full picture. I like to refer to this time period as better him than me.

"I remember being lost in my thoughts as I stood at the kitchen sink staring out the window after washing the dinner dishes. I must have been standing there for a while because my fingers were wrinkled from soaking my hands in the soapy bleach water. My daydreaming was interrupted by the sound of my mother yelling. I put the dish away and walked a little closer to her bedroom so I could hear a little better. Unable to make out what she was fussing about, I suddenly felt myself tensing up, hoping that she was not mad at me about something. My mind started to race and quickly went over a checklist in my head of everything I was told to do that day. Yeah, I did all of the chores that she told me to do, so she can’t possibly be mad at me. Sometimes she still managed to find an excuse to be angry at me though.

I walked nervously into the living room and saw my little brother sitting on the floor fixated on the television. If she’s not yelling at my brother, then I haven’t the slightest clue as to what she’s upset about now. I walked into the hallway where her bedroom was and saw her spanking our little chihuahua hard. I heard her yelling, Why can’t you fucking listen, you hardheaded fuck? She was spanking him so hard that the poor little thing pissed on the floor. She literally scared the piss out of him with how hard she was hitting him. She became extremely infuriated when she realized that he had wet her carpet. What in the hell did she really expect though? I could see him shaking with fear. All of a sudden, I saw her grab him by the neck and start choking him. As she’s choking him, she smashes his nose in the pissy carpet. I hear our poor chihuahua gasping for air. I stood in the hallway dazed at her behavior. When my mother finally noticed that I was in the hallway witnessing her abuse on our fragile and helpless puppy, she kicked the door shut. 

As much as I wanted to stop her from beating on him, I couldn’t help but feel relieved because it was him instead of me. I turned around and walked back to the living room where I sat next to my little brother and started watching television. My brother was so into the cartoons that he was totally oblivious to all the commotion coming from our mother’s room. After her ranting and raging continued for what seemed like thirty or more minutes, she finally stopped. I heard her open her bedroom door, and she walked past my brother and me. I tried not to make eye contact with her as she walked into the kitchen. I heard cabinets slamming shut, then she walked past us again holding a trash bag and walked back into her room. 

I assumed that she must be cleaning up the carpet where she made our puppy pee. Moments later, she walked back into the living room holding the trash bag and tells me, Go grab my keys so we can drive to dump his dumb ass because he made me kill him. Shocked at what she just said, I jumped up so I didn’t anger her by moving too slow. Still to this day, I don’t understand why she wanted me to take that ride with her other than to show me what happens when you’re disobedient because she kept repeating how he should have listened and he’d still be alive."

I could see from Dr. Nelson’s facial expression that she was mortified by me telling her that story. Clearing her throat, she said, I am so sorry that you had to go through all of that as a child. 

I wiped my eyes from watering. Even after all of this time, now that I am a grown woman, I still get choked up no matter how hard I try to fight it.

How is your relationship with your mother today? she asked. 

Well, she’s not physically abusive with me anymore, if that’s what you’re asking, I said sniffling.

Annotating some notes down on her notepad like she’d been doing during most of our session, she looked up at me and asked, Have you forgiven your mother for how she treated you as a child? 

I was relieved in that very moment that the timer went off, ending our session – because that wasn’t a question that I was prepared to answer. 

Okay, let’s pick this back up at the same time next week, she said. 

See you next week, I said as I stood up from the couch and walked out the office.

***

Burying myself in work after my therapy session, I worked all day and night creating brands, logos, illustrations, and images trying hard to keep my mind off of things. It was midnight, and I was finally leaving my graphic design office after closing a major deal with a wealthy fashion designer client who wanted his brand reinvented. I typically don’t work late, but I wanted to finish this project as soon as possible. My team and I had been working with this particular client for the past few months. We should have been done months ago, but this client was difficult to pitch ideas to. Feeling quite accomplished now that this project was finally complete, I planned to go home, pour myself a glass of wine, and take a nice bath to relax. 

Making my way out of my building, my phone started ringing. Instantly assuming that it was a member of my team calling me to return back upstairs, I ignored the call and kept walking towards my car in the parking lot. Once inside my car, I crank the ignition and started making my way out of the parking lot towards my home. 

My phone rang again, but this time I saw the caller ID on my Bluetooth in my car. I realized that it was my mom calling. We don’t talk that often, and I’d like to think it’s because of the time difference with me working overseas. But with our sketchy background with one another, I know precisely why we don’t talk much. In fact, it’s been over six months since she and I spoke. She barely calls me, and when I do call her, it's only because I’m trying to be the bigger person. 

I answered hesitantly, thinking that something must be wrong.

Hey mom.

Hey. Am I waking you? she asked dryly.

No ma’am, I’m actually just leaving the office, I said.

Why so late? What time is it there? she asked. 

I rolled my eyes at the fact that she’s never taken the time to find out what I actually do. 

I closed a pretty big deal with a client tonight. But what’s going on mom? Is everything okay? I asked.

She got quiet for a moment. I almost thought I had lost reception. I don’t know why I would expect her to congratulate me on any of my accomplishments. After all, she’s never taken an interest in what it is that I do.

"An attorney called this morning for