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“I got your slippers, your dinner, your dessert, and so much more.”

I sang along to “Cater 2 U” as the music filled the air. I danced around the kitchen, putting the finishing touches on our dinner. It was our ninth wedding anniversary, and Tyson would be walking through the door at any minute.

The last nine years hadn’t been peaches and cream, but we had survived them together. Tyson and I had been joined at the hip since the first day we met in ninth grade. Now, we were celebrating nine years as a married couple. The only thing that could have made this moment better were children. In due time, we would have them too.

I’d put on my favorite jeans because he loved the way they made my butt sit up. The shirt I wore didn’t leave much to wonder about as my titties were perky and spilled out. My toes were painted to match my nails perfectly, and the heels I wore helped to fill out my small frame. The bouncy curls that took hours to perfect sealed my look.

I heard Tyson’s key turn in the door and rushed from the kitchen to meet him. I stopped by the mirror on the way to check my reflection. When he swung the door open, I was there to meet him. A smile tugged at my lips as I ran right into his arms.

“Happy anniversary, baby.”

“Happy what?”

The smell of Hennessy on his breath and the slur in his words brought my attention to the perfume that lingered on his clothes. I couldn’t place the smell, but I knew it wasn’t mine.

“It’s our anniversary, Tyson. Don’t tell me you forgot.” The scent was so strong I was sure it’d be stuck in my nose for days.

“Don’t start that shit, Tash. I didn’t forget. You just caught me off guard.”

He stumbled as I released him from the hug. I stepped back because I needed to let the reality of what was happening set in. This man had not only forgotten our anniversary but had the audacity to be out cheating.

“So, let me get this straight,” I said, holding up a finger. “Not only did you forget our anniversary, but you come home drunk smelling like another bitch.”

I turned on my heels and walked back to the kitchen. If I didn’t put some space in between us, I would never be able to calm down.

“Look, Tash, I’m not in the mood for the bullshit. Is the food done?”

I leaned against the kitchen counter with my arms folded across my chest. My weight rested on one foot while the other tapped against the ground at rapid speed. Tyson didn’t pay me any mind as he took off his coat and threw it over the couch before stumbling in the dining room to take a seat at the table. He’d been out with another woman on our anniversary, and she couldn’t even bother to feed him. This was becoming a pattern I knew all too well.

I turned off the music and blew out the candles before plating our food. I would always make sure my husband ate, but he didn’t deserve the mood I’d set. He didn’t even deserve to have me at the table with him, but I was hungry. I’d been slaving for hours over the stove trying to show him a little bit of appreciation, and this was the thanks I got.

“You don’t hear me talking to you, woman? I asked if the food was done.”

This was the asshole I’d married. He still demanded total obedience, even after coming in drunk on our anniversary. Any remnant of the boy I fell in love with was gone. I couldn’t for the life of me make sense of why I was still holding on to something that would never be the same.

“Yes,” I mumbled. I tossed Tyson’s plate in front of him. “Here’s your food.”

Tyson’s disrespect was at an all-time high, but I didn’t have to put up with it. I didn’t have to continue being the dutiful wife. I had options.

“Damn, this looks good, but you didn’t have to throw it at me.”

I set my own plate at the other end of the table and sat down in front of it. I admired the steak, mashed potatoes, asparagus, and lobster tail before picking up the bottle of wine and pouring myself a glass. Tyson had already had enough to drink, so I didn’t offer him a drop.

I sipped my wine and thought back on all the good times we’d had. Like in the ninth grade, we’d skipped fourth period to go Downtown to the arcade. We were both so competitive. We used to play those games until the streetlights came on and still didn’t want to go home. We were both running from our own family drama. Being with each other felt like we’d finally found peace.

By the time we were seniors, we’d graduated from skipping class to just not going to school at all. It was a miracle we graduated, but I was still able to maintain my honors, and I never let Tyson slip on his schoolwork. Whether we were there every day or not, the work always got turned in.

After I turned eighteen, nobody could tell me that Tyson and I weren’t going to get married and ride off into the sunset together. He hit the milestone a couple months earlier, so two days after my birthday, we marched down to the courthouse and got married. There was no one to object.

The clinking of my fork raking around my plate for the thousandth time brought me out of my trip down memory lane. I surrendered to the fact that I’d lost my appetite. I had only taken one bite of my steak, and I was sure my mashed potatoes were cold by now. As excited as I was preparing this meal, it was now the furthest thing from my mind.

“So, who’s lipstick is on your collar? You may as well tell me her name since you clearly don’t give a fuck if I know you’re cheating.”

“Tash, don’t interrupt my meal to ask me dumb questions. Even if I did care about you knowing, I still couldn’t tell you her name. I don’t know it.” He smirked with pride before taking another bite of his food.

“And you’re proud of sleeping with women you don’t even know? Women who can’t even cook you a decent meal?”

“How do you know what they can do?”

“Clearly you ain’t ate shit. You’re over there shoving down the food I spent hours cooking while you were out running the streets.”

My voice raised with the last words. I was so tired of Tyson playing with me. He was making it clear that he didn’t care anything about how this made me feel.

“Honestly, Tasha, I’m sorry this happened on your anniversary, but I’m happy everything is out in the open. Now, I don’t have to lie about where I’m going.”

“And you expect me to be okay with that?”

“You’re going to have to be. I pay all the bills in this house, and you don’t have nowhere else to go. That nursing degree has been collecting dust since the day you got it.” His chuckle was laced with sarcasm, but he was right. I’d never even seen a bill in our home.

“We will see about that.”

I got up from my chair and stormed into the bedroom. Pulling a bag from the shelf in the closet, I stuffed it with the first things I could find. I didn’t have a penny to my name that wasn’t given to me by Tyson, but I knew I could at least spend the night with my little brother. My degree may have been collecting dust, but I could still put it to use.

“Where you think you going?” Tyson snatched my bag from my hand and threw it to the ground.

“I’m leaving you, Tyson. It’s over. We’ve been over for a long time and I’ve done everything I can to revive this relationship. Tonight, you showed me you don’t care, so why should I? I am done.”

I’d heard you should never let a man tell you he doesn’t want you more than once, and Tyson had more than said the words. He showed me with his actions every day how little he cared about me. I was pathetic for still holding on to what used to be, even though there were clear signs that we would never get to that place again.

I picked up my bag from the spot where Tyson had flung it and threw it over my shoulder. Grabbing my phone from the floor, I shoved it in the back pocket of my jeans. I tried to push past my husband when the back of his hand connected with my face. I fell to the ground, holding the spot where he’d smacked me.

“I will kill you before I let you leave me, Tasha.”

He lifted his foot and crashed it into my stomach.

“I refuse to live without you. Do you hear me? I will kill you!” he yelled before kicking me again.

I wanted to grab my stomach from the pain but I needed to protect my face. I balled up into a fetal position to protect myself from whatever came next. If he kicked me again, I could at least prevent the little food I did eat from spilling onto my room floor.

“Tyson, please just let me go!” I screamed.

“I will never let you go. You’re the best thing that ever happened to me.” He bent down and lifted my head from the ground so we were eye level. “Clean yourself and this house up then come your ass to bed.”

Tyson was already asleep by the time I was done cleaning. Walking past the bed, I went into the bathroom to shower. I pulled my phone from my back pocket and placed it on the sink before I undressed. Pulling the shirt over my head was painful. I knew I would feel like I’d got hit by a bus in the morning, but the bruises had already started to show on my caramel skin.

It stung when I stepped into the shower and let the hot water hit my body. I slid down the back wall and let the water fall on my head. I was not the girl whose husband beat her. I deserved better than that. I owed myself more.

I went through the motions of trying to wash away the day. The soap I used or how long I scrubbed didn’t seem to stay in my mind long. I did everything I could to avoid the mirror as I dried myself off and pulled on the jogger set I’d placed on the toilet. My mind was going a mile a minute, and there was nothing I could do to slow things down.

How did I get here? How did I become the woman who tied herself to a man like Tyson? I’d missed all the signs. From the moment we’d met, I’d saw him in a light that even my friends couldn’t dim. Now, that light had gone out.

I grabbed my phone from the sink and called the only person I knew would come to my aid. It only rang twice before he answered.

“Can you come pick me up?”

“Yeah, what’s wrong, big sis?” my brother Rebel asked.

“I just need to get out of here before Tyson wakes up. Can you be here in an hour?”

“I’ll be there in half.”