Chapter 3. Jasmine
CHAPTER 3
Jasmine
The Day of the Flight
It was a long morning waiting at the airport. First, I grabbed a breakfast sandwich and some coffee and tried to catnap in my seat for a while, but the caffeine plus adrenaline made it impossible. Checking my phone over and over, I waited to see when that first text from Glenn would come in. As predicted, it was shortly after eleven.
Where the hell are you?
My stomach tensed up to the size and density of a golf ball, but I had a plan for this. Figuring I could buy myself a little time, I texted back.
We were out of milk and a few other things. I walked to the store
He didn’t know that I had dumped the milk down the drain the day before in case he opened the fridge to check.
That’s a fucking long way. It’s cold. You know I don’t like you walking alone. I’ll come get you
No, I need the exercise. You told me to lose a few pounds, remember? I’ll pick up stuff and make dinner. I’ll see you after work around 5:30. I’ll make steak
Medium rare. And potatoes too
This lie about walking to the store would buy me some crucial time, really all day, before he got home at 5:30 and saw I wasn’t there.
I pictured him throwing off the sheet now, standing up and letting out one of his giant yawns, maybe adding in a belch or a fart too, then walking naked to the bathroom to take what he liked to call “my morning pisser.” Shuddering at the image, I distracted myself by looking around at the other passengers in the airport. Such a mix of humanity, so many of them appearing happy. It wasn’t fair that they got to experience joy and a carefree trip while my stomach was in shambles, my head jumbled with images of a boyfriend I was trying desperately to get away from.
Keep your breathing steady, Jasmine , I told myself. Don’t look nervous. My hand went to the baseball cap on my head. It felt reassuring now, but I decided I would take it off when I walked down the jetway to the plane. That would be the moment the new, confident me was boarding, not the old, meek me. I wanted to present to the world a woman on a trip, flying with confidence and spark, a twinkle in her eye. A woman who fully knew herself and her place in the world, not the truth, a woman running from a tattered past that extended all the way to childhood.
Instead, I let the fantasies zip through my head. I could be going on a girls’ trip or a business trip, depending on who I was talking to. I had already fooled the Uber driver and the double-eyeshadowed woman at the ticket counter.
But even as I tried to inject my body with self-confidence, seeds of doubt prickled at the corners. I was the stupid one of my mom’s three kids, the dumb waitress who needed a man to support her, a chick in her forties who had never really done anything in her life, never had a chance to be truly free, to get outside of Madison and experience life—real, vibrant, exciting, adventurous life.
I felt myself teetering between joy at getting away on my own terms, fear of the unknown, and depression over how little I had accomplished in my years. My hands felt cold, and I stuffed them into my jean pockets, wiggling my toes in my tennis shoes. My toes were chilled too.
Deciding I needed to take a walk, I pulled a premade sandwich from one of those grab-and-go coolers in the gift store, glancing briefly at the MADISON mugs, hats, and sweatshirts they sold and promising myself I would never return, ever.
There had been no other texts from Glenn. I pictured him at the job site—he was helping to tear out carpet and move furniture for a big corporation that had relocated its headquarters. He had to be there for about five hours and would then be home, expecting the steak dinner I’d told him I was making.
It was the start of my normal midweek break from the bar, which I had planned so that I could have at least two days before anyone at work questioned where I was. When I didn’t show up Friday, they would wonder—maybe get worried—but Anna would soon help my cause and buy me some time. She was the only one I trusted. Heck, she had even loaned me extra getaway money when I knew I didn’t have enough. She promised she would lie to protect my whereabouts, and I promised I would repay her the $500. Anna had smiled in a sympathetic way when I had asked her to help me figure out Uber the previous night. She patted my arm. “You know I have a couch you can crash on if you want for a few days. Are you leaving anytime soon?” she whispered.
“I don’t know yet,” I lied. Some things needed to remain secret. The flight and Denver were things I held close to my heart. I would tell her soon, once I was established and had a job with money to repay her. For now, it was enough that she knew I was going somewhere at some undetermined time in the future to escape Glenn.
Everyone at the bar was aware that he had a temper. He had been in several fights, and his previous girlfriend left him when he pushed her so hard against his pickup truck that she broke a rib. Months later, she took out a restraining order. Of course no one bothered to tell me any of this when I started working there. Maybe that’s because he also had a charming side, the side I first saw when he began walking me to my car at night. He could make the whole bar laugh, and he had a way of getting people to loosen up. I had seen him break up fights too. That was the enigma. His protective side and destructive side co-habitating. It was the unpredictability of the latter that finally broke me.
Now, as they called us to board, I was mere steps from full freedom. Letting my hand slip down into my fringed purse, I just wanted to touch the wad of cash that was wrapped in rubber bands. A lot of twenties, some fives and tens. Nothing larger than that. A year’s worth of escape money. Feeling it there comforted me. There was close to $2,000 even after paying for the flight. Tightening my grip on both the handle of the rolling bag and my boarding pass, I pulled my elbow in to my side to keep my purse firmly in place. The line moved slowly ahead.
“Welcome,” the gate agent said as I handed her my boarding pass. She had no idea how that one word was like a salve to my soul.
Entering the jetway, I felt a rush of excitement. About halfway down the ramp, I took the baseball cap off, shook out my long blond hair, and put the cap in my purse. I was the new me.