13 Kierra
13
Kierra
I hated flowers.
My husband’s apology of choice was always flowers. Roses, to be specific.
Henry grew up in an unstable home. Sometimes, I wondered if that was why he was the way he’d been toward me. So hot and cold. His father was abusive toward his mother and beat her until the day he died. During a night of drinking, Henry once told me he was happy his father was dead so his mother could finally live a happy life. He told me he’d lived his whole life being afraid of the man who raised him. It wasn’t often that my husband shared his emotions with me. He hardly talked about how he grew up. His most tender moments came when he was drunk, as if he didn’t even realize he was letting his shields down.
His father, Jack, never laid a hand on Henry. He never understood why, but I knew the moment I’d met Jack Hughes. That man adored other men; it was women he found fault in. Jack thought his gender was the smarter of the two and that a woman’s place was in the kitchen or on her knees—Jack’s words, not mine. If misogyny was a person, his name was Jack Hughes. I’m not saying Jack was attracted to men; he just didn’t like women that much. He looked down on the whole sex in such a demeaning way. As a therapist myself, I could’ve gone into all the reasons why he was the way he’d been, but just because people had reasons for the way they were didn’t mean that they had excuses.
I had the firm belief that if we excused people from their actions due to their personal traumas, we’d end up with a domino effect of passing on trauma to every single person. Even with his reasons, they didn’t excuse Jack for his harmful ways.
When I first met him—the first and last time before he died—he told me I was a wasted seed unless I gave Henry another child. In his head, the only reason for a woman’s existence was to bear children for the man to raise. Jack called me a weak, stupid woman when I mentioned I wasn’t certain I wanted to have children. Henry cussed him out for the comment, yelling so loudly that his veins were popping out of his neck. I’d never seen a man so angry, and a part of me felt protected in that moment. He stood up for me to the man who raised him, the man he’d always feared. That felt important. It made me feel safe.
Henry apologized to me the whole ride home. He told me he never wanted me to see him lose his temper like that—where rage met the deepest forms of heartache. That was the first time I’d seen him cry. I remembered him falling apart once we got to the house, and him wrapping me in his arms, telling me that he never wanted me to see him in such an angry state. That he never wanted to raise his voice toward anyone, like his father had done Henry’s whole life.
Oddly enough, Jack seemed proud of his son for standing up to him—for shouting the same way Jack seemed to shout at Henry’s mother, Tamera. He smirked as if thinking, “That’s my boy.” That’s why I figured Jack never laid a finger on Henry—because he held a part of his DNA. His poor wife, however, was a punching bag.
We didn’t go to the funeral for Jack. All Henry did was light a cigar and smoke it on the back patio the night of his father’s service. “I hope he burns down there,” Henry muttered before putting out his cigar.
It took years for Henry to lose his temper again.
We started visiting his mother a lot more. To this day, Ava still visited with Tamera every weekend. The two were as close as close could be, and I loved that. I loved Tamera. Even with everything she’d been through, her heart never hardened. If anything, after Jack’s passing, she found ways to give more love away.
Over time, I’d noticed during our visits that Henry began to nitpick things about Tamera’s home. How unorganized it had been and how old-fashioned the property was. He offered time and time again to buy her a new house or to renovate her current one, but she wasn’t interested. That only annoyed Henry more. Tamera didn’t think much of it and waved off her son’s demeaning comments. Sure, Tamera was a bit of a hoarder, but she seemed comfortable with her collections. She knew exactly where everything was, too.
I think after Jack’s passing, she went out and bought everything that her husband told her she could never have. I thought it was fine and brave to live fully as herself after years of being a shadow to a man’s wrath. Who was I to tell her how to live her life? I figured women who lost so much of themselves to a man deserved happiness more than most—no matter how it looked to others.
One night Henry asked me to come over and help organize Tamera’s home. He said it wasn’t safe for Ava to be staying over there when there was so much junk.
What he called junk, Tamera called treasures.
The two ended up in a big argument, and I saw Henry explode at his mother, leaving her in tears. I’d never seen him blow up at a person like that, not even when he shouted at his father. Even when he saw her crack, he kept yelling, bringing a newfound fear to me. He broke one of Tamera’s vases in his fit of rage and told her he didn’t understand how his father put up with her.
“There’s no space to even move in this death trap!” he shouted. “ Fucking A, Mom. Get your fucking shit together! ”
We rode home in silence.
My mind was swirling with a million scattering thoughts.
At one point, he reached his hand over toward mine.
I held his hand.
It felt wrong.
I felt sick.
The next morning, I woke to a bouquet of flowers beside my bed and a note that said he was sorry for losing his temper toward his mother. He sent her flowers, too. Later when he came home from work, I quietly asked him if he’d ever do that to me—lose control and batter into me the way he had with his mother. If he’d keep yelling even when I broke down.
The look of pain in his eyes showed me how much my questions shattered his heart.
“Never, Kierra. Never,” he swore as he broke down. “I’m not like that. You know me. I’d never hurt you or Ava. You know that. You have to know that.”
He cried.
I cried, too.
We never talked about the situation again, but it changed me. It made me much more aware of everything we’d done or gone through. I should’ve been wiser. I was a therapist, after all. I was trained in knowing the signs and seeing how they formed. I should’ve known that that wasn’t the last time I’d see Henry explode. I should’ve known the outbursts would become more and more frequent. I should’ve known that the longer I stayed, the more he’d let loose because he was learning just how much I’d allow. Just how much he could get away with.
Then he’d buy flowers.
Then he’d cry.
Then I’d cry.
I always cried longer than him, though. The cuts sliced deeper every time, and the flowers always died.
At least he never yells around Ava.
At least he apologizes.
At least he never hits me.
Those were the troubled thoughts my mind began to create as I tried to lift myself from the effect of his hurtful words. The one that meant the most to me was his relationship with Ava. In her mind, Henry was her hero. The man who would protect her from anything and everything bad that ever happened to her.
As for me, though, my husband became my monster. I was imprisoned in his realm, and I never knew what was going to set him off. I walked on eggshells, and I changed myself repeatedly based on who he wanted me to be in that moment. The problem with abuse and control from one’s partner is that often you can’t see all the warning signs until you look back on them. It started small. Him commenting on my outfit and telling me I should’ve dressed more like a mother and less like a twenty-year-old. Him offering me a gym membership to help me drop a few pounds—pounds I hadn’t noticed. Him mentioning how his work colleague’s wife always had dinner on the table when he arrived after work.
Then, there were the mind games. He’d tell me time and time again how I could just be…better. A better wife, a better friend, a better person. He told me he loved when I wore red lipstick, and other colors looked odd on me. So I wore red lipstick. Then, he’d tell me that he hated the red lipstick, and I’d remind him of what he stated before, to which he’d reply, “I never said that. You’re remembering it wrong.” If I were a client of mine, I’d tell me that I was being gaslit. But that’s the issue with advice: it’s easier to give it to others than to give it to yourself.
Besides, I could handle Henry’s mood swings because I had my Ava. During one of our arguments, when I’d expressed that he was hurting my feelings, he told me I should just leave and let him and Ava move on without me.
He knew that was the quickest way to make me shut up—threatening to take away the one thing that meant the most to me, my daughter. He even cut as deeply as to say that she wasn’t mine. But she was mine. Just as much as I was hers. Sure, we didn’t have the same nose or the same eyes, but our hearts beat in sync. Ava Melanie Hughes saved my life when I was drowning. I’d never known a little girl’s smile could heal the broken little girl within my own soul. I’d never known a love like that.
So I stayed.
I stayed when I wanted to leave him. I didn’t speak up when he hurt me. I didn’t fight back anymore because I couldn’t lose her. I couldn’t lose my heartbeat.
It wouldn’t be forever. One day, Ava would be eighteen. One day, she’d be free to choose who she wanted to be with. One day, I’d be free from the chains of Henry’s hurtful ways and still have my daughter.
***
When the following Friday rolled around, Ava was off to Tamera’s house for a sleepover. I’d had a long day at work and was feeling extra tired. My clients that day were dealing with heavy issues, and even though I tried my best not to take on their emotions, I sometimes struggled. I just needed the evening to recharge and come back to myself. Still, I knew Henry would want dinner, so I put a pizza in the oven when he texted me that he was on his way home.
“I can’t believe Lena quit. All you could whip up was a frozen pizza?” Henry yipped behind me as I was bent over in the oven pulling out the pizza. The sudden sound of his voice made me leap out of fright, causing my hand to hit the top of the oven, pain shooting through me at the searing burn. The pizza pan dropped from my grip, causing a mess inside the oven, which led Henry into a fit.
“Are you fucking kidding me, Kierra? Look at the damn mess you made!” he barked as I rushed to the sink to run cold water over the burn.
“You act like I tried to hurt myself,” I snapped back without thought. My main focus was to make sure my hand wasn’t suffering from second- or third-degree burns.
“If you weren’t so lazy and actually cooked a real meal, this would’ve never fucking happened.” He huffed, walking over to the stove and shutting off the oven. “Now that cheese is burning, and the house is going to smell awful. How do you even manage to screw up a frozen pizza?”
I stood there frozen in place from his words.
He glanced my way and the moment I locked eyes with him, I saw the emptiness that existed there. Maybe he had a bad day at work. Maybe some deal fell through. Maybe that’s why he was snapping. Maybe that’s why he blamed me instead of checking in on my injury.
His eyes fell to my hand, where blisters were already forming on the delicate skin. His brows lowered, and when he looked at me once more, there was a moment of sorrow in his eyes.
Say it , I silently begged.
Look me in the eyes and apologize for snapping at me.
Ask me if I’m okay. Get me some ice.
Do anything, Henry.
Anything to show that any piece of you still cares.
Instead, he grumbled under his breath, turned to walk away, and said, “I’m going out for dinner.” He left the house, leaving the burning smell growing more intense around me.
***
He didn’t sleep in our room that night. He took the guest room. It was probably for the best. He was the last person I wanted to wake up beside. We played the part of being a loving couple as much as we could when Ava was around; yet when she was gone, so was the make-believe love story.
When I awakened the next morning, there was a bouquet of roses on my table side and a tube of soothing cream for burns.
I lay still on my side of the bed that morning thinking about Gabriel, Bentley, and the idea of a life without Henry involved. As I looked at the bouquet, I wanted to throw up.
Roses were becoming my least favorite flower.