He came
hammering on her door for the second time in a week, drunk out of his
mind. The loud hammering was giving her
a huge migraine and she wouldn’t answer the door. Instead, she called the police, in grave fear
for her life. When the police arrived,
they could see clearly that her husband was drunk and they decided to take him
to jail for the night so that he could cool down and get sober. They knew what he was like. They also told her, in no uncertain terms,
that she either had to have him charged with spousal assault or take out a restraining
order against him. History, they said,
has a way of repeating itself. She
resolved to think seriously about it overnight, since the attitude of the
police was such that they did not treat incidents of domestic violence
lightly. They as much implied that if
she didn’t lay charges against him, she might find herself on her own when he
came calling again. And, he would
come calling again, they said. Their
warning greatly alarmed her, as it was meant to.
It had all started when she had come into the bar on that fateful day to
meet him. She had sat down first and
ordered an ice tea before saying anything to him. Then she had said quietly to him, “I can’t
stay long – I have things to do at home this weekend.” In reality, she hadn’t been at all certain
what his reaction to her news would be and she had wanted a way out, just in
case he freaked out on her.
When her drink finally arrived, she had hesitatingly told him, “I just
found out that I’m pregnant – about 6 to 8 weeks along.”
Aghast, he had responded in kind, “I can’t believe it! This is
the news you have for me?!” It’s perfect! he thought. This was how
he was going to finally keep her at his side and it had all worked out perfectly,
without any problems! Now, she can’t leave me, not with a child on
the way. He reflected back on how
they had met so long ago, fallen in love, and eventually gotten married.
Caroline and Mark had met in high school and had gone together from
Grade 10 onward. It seemed obvious that
they would get married one day and have a family. They seemed so well suited to each other, as,
they were a very loving couple. Mark
would do anything for Caroline and she, in turn, loved Mark very much.
So, when graduation day arrived a few years later, they were both full
of optimism for the future. Caroline was
planning to go to McMaster University in Hamilton, Ontario and Mark had decided
to stay here in town and attend the University of Toronto (U of T). Caroline wanted to be a teacher more than
anything and Mark was aiming to be a civil engineer. They were attractive, bright and full of
promise. Once they had both finished
university, that’s when they decided that they would make a full commitment to
each other.
Caroline would commute to Toronto every other weekend to see Mark and,
on alternate weekends, he would commute to Hamilton to see Caroline. She didn’t mind commuting, as, it gave her
time to reflect on her life and gave her a chance to miss Mark during the week
between visits. He, on the other hand,
did not like commuting very much, as, he was already traveling a fair distance
daily, just to go to school and then to his part-time job as a bartender. He wanted her to move back to Toronto, but
she really liked being in Hamilton. She
had no desire to attend U of T, like Mark.
McMaster is a very beautiful campus and it was a lot nicer living on
campus there than it would have been living at home in Toronto when she didn’t
really want to live with her parents full-time anymore.
Mark, for his part, was patient for a while, but because he wanted
Caroline very much, he resolved over time to get her to change her mind. The fact that she didn’t want to move back to
Toronto just now to be with him disturbed him greatly. He felt that if she really loved him as she
had said she did, she should acquiesce to his request so that they could be
happy together. He felt that her goal as
a teacher was less important than his own goal as an engineer. After all, engineers make a whole lot more
money than teachers ever would and he could make enough money for both of them
to live on. There were more teachers
than engineers in the world anyway, so what chance did she realistically have
of getting a decent job nearby? Somehow,
he couldn’t stand the idea of having her living away from him for very much
longer. He resolved to do something
about the situation.
The next weekend that Caroline was in Toronto, Mark knew what he had to
do. He took her out to a very posh
restaurant at the lakefront – the Harbour Castle Westin’s Lighthouse (revolving)
Restaurant. This restaurant was very
expensive, but Mark wanted to set the stage properly for what he was about to
suggest to Caroline. It was a lovely
place to spend an evening for dinner, as, it sat on the edge of Lake Ontario
and they could see for dozens of miles over the water, even as far as Niagara
Falls on a clear night. He was intent on
creating a very romantic ambience for her.
Dinner started out perfectly with wine, bread and salad and progressed
to exotic filet mignon and baked potato, followed finally by a luscious dessert
and coffee. When Mark felt the mood was
right, he popped the question. Not the
question that you would have thought though.
He said to her, “Caroline, come back to Toronto and move in with me. I
need to have you with me.”
But she was resistant. She
replied, “I want to get married first, Mark, and I’m willing to wait for the
right time for that to happen. Besides,
school’s very important to me and I want to graduate, which will only happen in
two to three more years.” In their
heated discussion, she put forth her argument that it would only be a few more
years of being apart and then they would both be finished school for good. At that time, she would be more than willing
to move in with him wherever they wanted to live.
Mark was starting to get very desperate.
He needed to have Caroline by his side, where he could control her
movements and keep her all to himself.
School, from his perspective, was becoming secondary to his need to have
Caroline. Of course, his own schooling
was going to progress as originally planned.
He just did not want Caroline to continue her own schooling in Hamilton
any longer. According to his plan, she
could take her schooling anywhere else, if at all. She could even abandon the whole idea if she
wanted.
After dinner, they retired for the night to a room that they had
reserved in the hotel and spent the next few hours making passionate love
there. She was pretty tipsy with the
wine she’d been drinking and he was also fairly intoxicated, but feeling
frustrated at her refusal to cave in to his wishes. But, he was determined to get what he wanted
from her eventually – total capitulation.
When they left the hotel the next morning, Caroline headed for the bus
depot. She said she needed to study for
an upcoming exam and he realized that there was nothing more that he could do
right now. So, he reluctantly watched
her bus leave for Hamilton. His plan to
keep her at his side was not working out very well at the moment.
About two to three months later, they had been continually commuting
back and forth to see each other, when Caroline called Mark up at home one
night. She said that she had something
to tell him and he instantly dreaded what she might say to him. He thought that she must have met some other
guy and was going to dump him for the other guy. He didn’t have enough faith in himself
anymore to feel that she still loved him and only him. They made arrangements to meet at an
anonymous bar in downtown Toronto. Mark
arrived early so that he could have a strong drink or two before he saw her and
had to face the bad news. That’s when
she dropped her bombshell – she was almost 2 months pregnant! And, that’s when he expressed his ardent wish
(again) to have her stay with him.
The discussion did not stop there, however. She was more determined than ever to finish
school in Hamilton, and to do that, she had to have an abortion. But, Mark wouldn’t hear of it. He wanted them to get married right
away. He assured her that she could finish
school after the baby was born, but he wanted her and the baby, both. There was no way he was going to allow her to
have an abortion, if he had any say in it.
Finally, she succumbed to his wishes and agreed to marry him, only on condition
that she was going to be able to finish school somewhere after the pregnancy
was over. He, desperate to settle the
matter once and for all, agreed. Later,
she would see things his way and change her mind, he thought. Finally, he had her right where he wanted her.
They were married the following weekend in Niagara Falls, Ontario, by a
Justice of the Peace and stayed at a lovely little motel overlooking the
falls. Their honeymoon was spent at the
falls for the weekend and then they returned to Toronto to start their lives
together. Caroline had left her
education studies in Hamilton temporarily, but resolved to return there as soon
as she could. She felt that Mark loved
her enough not to stand in the way of her goal to become a teacher. After all, it was a well known fact that
every modern woman these days should work on her career and not depend solely on
a man, even her loving husband, to support her through life. Having a child was a significant factor in
the equation, but it did not have to become a major impediment to her future
progress. Being pregnant, in her mind,
was merely a temporary setback. She
would somehow cope with having a baby, in her own way. She knew Mark could be a loving husband and
father, regardless of her goals in life.
Time passed and Mark graduated as an engineer. Caroline had yet to graduate, however. At home, things started happening little by
little. In fact, it was so gradual that
Caroline hardly noticed the changes. At
first, Mark was very attentive and loving towards his new little family, but
then she started to notice small, but subtle changes in him. He would go for a drink after work once a
week or so with his co-workers – nothing to be concerned about. Going
out for a drink once in a while is certainly not a bad thing, she
thought. But then, he started staying
out later and later. One drink turned
into two, three, four, and so on. Still,
she didn’t read anything into it.
Until one night, Mark came home at midnight, woke Caroline out of a
sound sleep, and demanded angrily, “Wake up and make me my dinner right now –
I’m hungry!” This time, he was
out-and-out drunk and was definitely in the mood for some kind of argument with
her.
But she, still groggy with sleep, asked him, “Don’t you think midnight
is a little too late to be cooking food?” And, besides, she was way too tired
from looking after the baby all day by herself to be able to get up or do
anything except sleep.
Mark became enraged at her seemingly uncaring attitude. With a vicious yank, he pulled her lovely
long hair and yelled at her to get up.
She screamed and he slapped her hard across the face. Now, she was wide-awake and suddenly
terrified of her husband. She had never
seen him like this before. It was like a
demon had possessed him. He was not going
to rest (or, God forbid, pass out) until she cooked him dinner. So, she went into the kitchen and started
looking desperately through the cupboards for food. She racked her brain trying to think of how
she could stop him from beating her and demanding the impossible from her.
She cooked him his dinner in silence.
He ate it in silence and finally passed out on the living room
couch. The next day, when he had sobered
up somewhat, he realized, with horror, what he had done to her and tearfully
begged her to forgive him. Because he
assured her that it was an isolated incident, which would not happen again (she
felt sure about that!), she forgave him.
She was not sure what was behind the incident (other than that he’d
gotten drunk), but she was too frightened to think about the alternative if she
didn’t forgive him this time.
However, the next week, it happened again. This time, he came home reeking of liquor and
demanded that she give him sex. She
refused because it was obvious that it was not her loving husband who was
asking her for sex, but some stranger who needed to abuse her for the sake of
his own pleasure. He lost his temper and
angrily threw her onto the bed, tore off her clothes and proceeded to rape her
viciously. She screamed loudly and the
baby woke up too and also started crying loudly, in distress. He then punched Caroline full in the face and
gave her a black eye and a bloody nose.
She continued screaming while he raped her; he was getting more and more
violent. She was horrified at this
monstrous demonstration of animalistic behaviour on the part of her husband,
but she could not stop him.
The next day, when he woke up from his drunken stupor, he saw the
serious damage he had caused her and again begged her for forgiveness. But, this time, she was not about to forgive
him. She told him to move out and leave
for good. After a fervent discussion,
he very reluctantly packed up his bags and left sullenly. He yelled at her that this would not be the
end of it. She, for her part, was both
relieved to see him go and yet frightened of him, for she knew that he could
come back. She was too afraid to call
the police and lay charges yet, but she was determined not to forgive him. At the moment, she did not know what else to
do except throw him out of the apartment.
Finally, after months of confrontations with Mark and attempted
interventions by the police, she decided that the best course of action,
besides having him charged, was to leave town, change her and the baby’s
identities and disappear. It was almost
like being in a witness protection program of her own making, but she did not
know what else she could do to protect herself and the baby from unwanted
harassment and bodily harm. Charging him
was essential, as far as the police were concerned, but would that be enough to
keep him away from her for good? Perhaps, they’d said to her, but only if he was tried and convicted and
sent to prison for a good long time.
However, she did not think that would happen and even if it did, she thought
that he might still find her anyway and maybe kill her. That possibility was too terrifying to
ignore.
Caroline and Cathy (a.k.a. Jessica and Janet) have had to move and are
now living in a small city (name is withheld).
They had to change their identities to avoid detection. Mark would have been able to track them down
without any problem, otherwise. They’ve
had to keep to themselves as much as possible in this new place. The police, of course, are aware of their
past circumstances and have promised to protect them as much as possible. Somehow, Caroline (now Jessica) had found the
courage to testify against Mark, however, she was deathly afraid of him,
especially after the trial was over. As
a result of his conviction, Mark is now serving three years in prison for
spousal assault. But, after his release,
only then will she know whether and when he will track them down and take out his
final deadly revenge on her.
published by Authorhouse, copyright 2011, Anne Shier. All rights reserved.
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