Three Decades Later: A Legacy of Domestic Violence

By L. M. Montgomery

Domestic violence is the willful intimidation, physical assault, battery, sexual assault and/or other abusive behavior perpetrated by an intimate partner against another.

It is an epidemic affecting victims from every community regardless of age, economic status, race, religion, nationality or educational background.

Violence against women is often accompanied by emotionally abusive and controlling behavior and is part of a systematic pattern of dominance and control. Most cases are never reported to the police.

Domestic violence results in physical injury, psychological trauma and sometimes death.

The consequences of domestic violence can cross generations and truly lasts a lifetime. An estimated 1.3 million women are victims of physical assault every year.

-Facts from the National Collation Against Domestic Violence- A riveting and timeless true story with a powerful message for women everywhere.

• Language: English
• Publisher: iUniverse
• Release date: May 18, 2015
• ISBN: 9781491752982

L. M. Montgomery

L. M. (Lucy Maud) Montgomery (1874-1942) was a Canadian author who published 20 novels and hundreds of short stories, poems, and essays. She is best known for the Anne of Green Gables series. Montgomery was born in Clifton (now New London) on Prince Edward Island on November 30, 1874. Raised by her maternal grandparents, she grew up in relative isolation and loneliness, developing her creativity with imaginary friends and dreaming of becoming a published writer. Her first book, Anne of Green Gables, was published in 1908 and was an immediate success, establishing Montgomery's career as a writer, which she continued for the remainder of her life.

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Copyright © 2015 M.L. Montgomery.

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ISBN: 978-1-4917-5297-5 (sc)

ISBN: 978-1-4917-5298-2 (e)

iUniverse rev. date: 3/19/2015

CONTENTS

FOREWORD

ONE

TWO

THREE

FOUR

FIVE

SIX

SEVEN

EIGHT

NINE

TEN

ELEVEN

TWELVE

THIRTEEN

FOURTEEN

FOREWORD

Most names are changed, or omitted and locations are changed or withheld. Recollections are to the best of my memory and this is not intended to be a poor me book. I hope it will help teenage and young women AVOID the life changing mistakes that I have made, that have also deeply affected my children.

Thank you

ONE

When I came to, I was not sure of where I was and was in horrible pain. My neck hurt so much that I could barely breathe. The trailer floor had lime green hi-low carpet that was old, stained and faded. I hated the color and having it directly in my face, made it even uglier. The only light was from a 40w bulb over the stove, and silent except for the hum of an antique copper clock that was my grandmother’s. It sat in a revered space on the end table beside the couch where I was laying. It was 10:45 p.m.

All the life had been drained out of me, both body and soul. I slowly lifted my head off the floor. I couldn’t move my neck without experiencing a stabbing pain, so I turned my torso to glance around the living room and woefully, I remembered where I was and was surprised that I was still alive.

I did not see my husband, at first. I was mortified as to what I might find. On the other hand, a fleeting sense of finality came over me, a hope that my life as I had known it was finally over.

It was a chilly, blustery Friday in the fall, a payday and Evan had come home from work over five hours late. He got off work at 5:00 p.m, but he rarely came home afterwards. Sometimes he didn’t come home at all until dawn. I wished he never came home again. He went to a neighborhood bar, the Happy Hour with his pals from work. When he came home after spending hours snorting coke or shooting heroin, drinking beer and doing shots of Wild Turkey I never knew what to expect.

Like clockwork, every evening at 5:00, while I would wait for him to arrive home, I would get a terrible stomach ache. This night had been no different.

Occasionally, he would be in a good mood. Sometimes he would bring me flowers or surprise me with a bracelet or a necklace that he had saved for. He could be a very nice and funny person sometimes. When I was pregnant with Roxanne, he treated me like a queen. He did all of the housework and cooking and even gave me manicures and pedicures.

More often than not, he was paranoid and belligerent. He always accused me, drinking or not, of cheating on him with practically any man in sight and planning to run off with them. Just a random man driving down the street could enrage him. If all else failed, he would bring up an old fight that happened long ago, and use that to pick another fight.

His father had died a month ago, and he had really gone off the deep end. He got drunk every day. His mercurial personality quickly alternated between crying spells, and fury over his abuse at the hands of his cruel disabled father. Evan said often he was innocent of what he was accused of and could have run when the belt came out, but he said he never did. To make matters even worse, his psychotic mother had shipped him a sizable gun and rifle collection that his father had amassed over his life. On this night, he was very drunk, sullen and said nothing to me when he came home.

We sat in uneasy silence for about ten minutes.

I was sitting on the couch holding our six month old daughter. She was sleeping, and unaware of my panic and the growing terror that filled the room. I sat like a statue and could feel my heart pound faster and faster, climbing its way into my throat. I felt like it was surely going to burst. He acted differently tonight, crazier than usual.

I held the baby tight as he rambled and ranted louder and louder, angrily, almost incoherently. He felt sorry for himself; ranting that everyone in his life had hurt him, including me.

He was always hungry growing up. There was never much food in their house. Once he had told me he was so hungry when he was little, he had eaten powered chocolate milk mix. It gave him an excruciating stomach ache. Whenever his stomach would hurt, his father’s cure was to make him run up and down the street.

His drunken mother slept all day, then drank and terrorized him, and his brothers and sisters at night. Slapping and punching them awake, screaming about the five kids messing up the house and eating food. He was sleeping once and she stabbed in the arm with a steak knife. It left an ugly scar.

This night was different than the other times he had drunkenly bared his soul to me. Tonight he was holding a loaded shotgun.

Evan slowly walked up to me, got about six inches from my face, and in a low eerie voice said, I’m going to shoot everything in the house, then I’m going to blow my head off, and you’re going to watch me do it.

I said nothing, but thought to myself, I honestly thought, Do it, I’ll clean up the mess.

This was not the first time he had said he would kill himself. He now had the gun collection, and I just knew something was going to happen like this when he got it. Once on his day off, he had taken one of the guns and told me he was going out to the desert. I envisioned a blast to his head that would send blood, brains and bone flying, quieting the demons in his tormented and demented mind would free me from the prison he had built around me.

I didn’t know if he would shoot me, but I was holding the baby, and my motherly instinct screamed at me to get her the hell away from this bedlam. I told him that I needed to put the baby to bed. She had somehow blissfully slept through his tirade.

Slowly, I got off the couch and went into her bedroom. My mouth was bone dry and I broke out in a cold sweat. My hands and legs were shaking. I sighed as I put her to bed and quickly planned how to get out of the house until he cooled down or killed himself. He followed me closely and was standing in the hallway still holding the shotgun. I closed the door, and told him that I had to go to the bathroom.

He was only a few feet away, but I lunged for the door that was on the other side of the hallway. It was not locked and I tried to run down the trailer’s wooden steps that led to a side yard that led to the front gate that led to the street that led to the store about five blocks away that had a payphone. I wanted to call my dad to help me.

I gave it my best shot, but I only made it down a couple of the steps. Evan threw the shotgun aside and with lighting speed, grabbed me by my hair with one hand, bunching it up into a fist. His free arm went around my throat, and he dragged me back inside by my head. I went limp, trying to make it more difficult for him to pull me back inside. In one split second I was maimed forever. I didn’t know it then, he ruptured two discs in my neck.

For my effort, I had only succeeded in making him very mad. A long, dark muscular forearm tightened on my throat, and he pulled my head back towards him by my hair with his free hand. He hissed angrily in my ear, Where do you think you were going?

His panting breath stank of whisky. He was sweating profusely and the side of my face was wet against his.

He was furious, choking me and I was gasping for air. I tried to say that I was sorry and that I wouldn’t do it again but I couldn’t talk, except for a weird croaking sound. His forearm was across my throat, an awful, crushing pain that made tears stream from my eyes. He pressed tighter and tighter and wouldn’t let go. I saw my life flash before my eyes. I was sure I was going to die. I struggled in vain to get free, but I couldn’t breathe. I thought of my children and my mother and everything quickly faded to black.

I slowly sat up on the floor and he was sitting behind me, about five feet away beside the gun cabinet. He blended into the dark brown overstuffed chair. With his skin and hair from his Apache descent, he was almost invisible. The whites of his eyes glowed, as did his teeth in the dim light. A wicked grin was on his face. He looked like the Cheshire cat in Alice in Wonderland. The shotgun leaned upright against his leg.

I could have killed you. I knew you would try a stunt like that? You don’t have anywhere to run now, do you? Go ahead, try it again.

Leave me alone. In exasperation and pain, I groaned loudly and laid back down on the floor and started sobbing. I had hoped he was dead.

You screwed up my neck. What did I ever do to you?

As soon as I started crying, he started with the sarcastic sweet talk.

I’m sorry baby, you know I love you. Don’t you?

He got off the chair and crawled over to me. He put his arms around me tightly and started kissing me. Just a few seconds were all it ever took him to change his mood.

I love you. I’m so sorry. he cooed.

My God, you’re crazy! Stop it, leave me alone dammit!

He ignored my plea. This was the last thing in the world I wanted.

I tried to push him away, but it was no use. I was too exhausted and weak. My neck was stiff and felt like I’d done the exorcist thing ten times. I had a pounding headache and shooting pain ran down my arms into my hands. He was six feet tall, and weighed one hundred and eighty pounds, compared to my five six and one hundred and thirty five pounds.

He pushed me down and started pulling off my sweat pants. This was the worst part. After the fights, he always wanted to have sex.

After he was finished, he said nothing. A satisfied sadistic grin was on his face as he staggered to bed and passed out. Lying on the floor, I was wounded and humiliated, and felt like a piece of garbage.

Waiting until I heard his drunken snore, I slowly put my sweat’s back on and put my shoes on to walk up to the store. He took the phone with him to work every day, so that I couldn’t call my boyfriend.

I quietly checked on the baby and hoped she would not wake up. I carefully closed the front door.

As I walked, I wondered how I was going to ever be able to get away from him. I had tried for years now. He would always find me and coerce me to go back. Threatening to kill me and then himself, taking the baby to Mexico and I would never see her again or setting the trailer on fire. I had fled in the night three times with Brian, my son who was now five, hiding in different motels while I was working and he found me every single time. One night I left was in a torrential thunder storm, and he threw most of my clothes in the mud. He once told me he had killed a man in a fight and never got caught. I called the police in his hometown, hoping they would arrest him and put him away forever, but they said they had no idea what I was talking about, and since we were married it didn’t mean anything anyway, spousal immunity. He would not let me work, and he never let me have any money.

I called my dad collect. My step mother answered the phone.

I need to talk to my dad. I started shaking and crying. My neck hurt so much that I could barely hold the phone. She sounded annoyed as she told me to hold on in an exasperated tone. She put her hand over the phone, and I heard what she said. I felt like such an idiot asking for help, I almost hung up the phone.

What does she want? I heard him ask.

Hell if I know.

Sobbing, I told my father what had happened. I wanted him to tell me he was going to come over, and beat Evan up, and that he would protect me and kick him out of the house. All he said was, I don’t know what to tell you, you’ll have to figure it out. You got married you know, you just can’t run around and get divorced all the time.

The bottom line was that he did not want to get involved. My dad said it was late and he was busy now, but he would drop by soon. He only lived a block away and never came over anyway. I mumbled that I was sorry for bothering him and hung up.

I did not want to call my mother. She would have come over and got Roxanne and I. Brian was spending the night at her house. But she was in her late sixties and had a bad heart and it would have scared the hell out of her if I called her and told her what had happened. Evan would know I was there anyway, and show up and make a scene. Once, when I had tried to leave him, my mom tried to stand up to him and he pushed her on to the floor at her house.

I had nowhere to go except back to the trailer.

It was cold and windy but, I walked at a turtle’s pace. I quit crying. I clenched my teeth thinking of how and why our relationship constantly turned to some stupid unfolding drama.

On my birthday, fifteen months earlier, we had gone out to eat dinner. We were having a very nice evening and he surprised me with a beautiful charm bracelet. On the way home, he stopped at a busy convince store to pick up a six-pack of beer. He came out of the store with the beer and got into the car, and his demeanor suddenly changed and said that there was a guy in there who said he had slept with me. He told me I was in big trouble. We were miles from the apartment that we rented at the time, but I was not going to listen to this crap on my birthday. I opened the car door and he grabbed me tightly by my left arm. With my free hand, I took one of the beers and hit him in the head with it. It exploded and white sticky foam was everywhere. He was enraged; his face contorted in anger.

He started his decked out black Mustang and I got out and started to walk home. I slammed the door shut and then I remembered my purse was in the back of my seat behind me on the floorboard. My pay check for two weeks was in it. I reached in for my purse, and he suddenly threw the car into reverse, and then into drive, and squealed out into the street.

I was half way in and out of the car. He was going very fast until he slammed on the brakes and did a quick u-turn. I lost my grip on the seat and door, and flew off onto the pavement. As he roared off, I skidded onto my back and the street dug into my skin. The entire upper right side of my back was covered with road rash and asphalt. My hands, my elbows, and the bump on my right wrist and ankle were black and bloody. My new bracelet was gone. I had hit the back of my head hard when I smacked onto the ground. I saw a house across the street from the store that had big bushes, and I ran and hid behind them. I sat dazed and unbelieving in the dirt. Then two police cars pulled into the store and talked to people and drove around for awhile.

I don’t know how long I sat there, but it was quite awhile. The police cars had come and gone, and some people were still standing around the front of the store wondering what all the commotion was about. My purse was in the car, and I had lost one of my sandals. The front of me was still damp and sticky, and I smelled like a brewery. I was so thirsty and I wanted to get something to drink. I limped back to the store and wanted to call my mom.

An elderly black man, who had a very kind face, saw me and rushed over and asked me if I was ok. I thanked him for his concern and acted like nothing happened. I was so embarrassed that I wanted to crawl in a hole and die. I asked him for some change to use the pay phone. He handed me a couple of quarters, and told me he had seen the whole thing and had called the police. I really dreaded calling my mom to come and get me. For her sake, I never told her most of the stuff that went on. The man said that he would be happy to drive me any where I wanted to go.

Just then Evan roared into the parking lot. He got out and ordered me into the car. The man told him to go away and leave me alone.

Evan growled, Mind your own business if you know what’s good for you.

I didn’t want him to hit the nice man. So when he came around to me, grabbed my arm and shoved me into the car, I didn’t fight him.

He didn’t say much on the ride home except that I was going to run off with the man at the store if he had not caught me and telling me what a tramp I was. He said he couldn’t take me anywhere without running into all of my old and current boyfriends.

We got home and then he was sorry, he cried and said he would kill himself if I ever left him. My back was red and bloody, raw and burned like fire. I was filthy from rolling around on the road and sitting in the bushes. He said over and over how sorry he was. I just wanted to lie on the couch and relax. I was exhausted, and my head pounded. Somehow, I had to go to work the next day.

He then started pulling me into the bedroom.

Stop it, leave me alone! I gasped Look at me, you almost killed me, get away from me!

I sat on the floor and refused to budge. He took my right arm and put it behind my back, and told me to go get on