Rain Storm

Broken Hearts

CHARLIE

(TW: domestic violence)

The first time he hit me, it was an accident. We were arguing about something dumb. He lost control.

He apologised straight away and kissed me so hard that I forgave him.

The second, third and fourth times were similar. He would apologise profusely straight away and then shower me with love and affection. So much that it was easy to forgive and forget.

It snowballed from there. The violence got more frequent but the love and affection got less intense, until it was so sparse that it was special when I finally did get it. I craved those moments where he kissed me softly and told me he loved me. I lived for them.

I didn't even notice that I was drawing away from the other people in my life. I just wanted to spend as much time as possible to try and be the boyfriend he wanted.

It was a good two years before I found the strength and courage to leave. The one person who had stuck by me, my sister Tori, had been begging me to leave for a long time. So it was her I had run to after he hit me so hard that I stumbled back against the coffee table, tripping over it and landing on the hard tile floor. I was sure I felt something break. Tears fell from my eyes as I looked up at him, mixing with the blood dripping from my cut lip. He looked at me with disdain, as if it was my fault, as if I had just tripped on my own. I cradled my arm against my chest, pain shooting up to my shoulder and begged him to take me to A&E but he just laughed.

"What a wimp you are. It's not broken. You have to make a big deal out of every little thing. Pathetic." He took another sip of his beer and walked away.

I sat on the floor of our living room, sobbing and holding my arm as close to my chest as possible. Something in me snapped and I realised I needed to leave.

I got up and quietly picked up my phone from where it had fallen, tucking it into my pocket before I silently left the flat. It was freezing outside and part of me wanted to go back and get a jacket, but if I did that, I risked him seeing me and trying to stop me. So I stumbled down the street towards my sister's flat.

She didn't live far away, just a few blocks but the journey felt like it took forever. I constantly looked over my shoulder, convinced I would see him following me but he never did.

Tori opened the front door of her flat after I knocked and it was like she saw a ghost.

"Charlie? Oh my god. What happened?"

"H-help me." I managed to get out before breaking down into fresh sobs and collapsing in her arms.

"Shh, it's okay, I've got you. I've got you." She whispered, holding me tight on the floor of the hallway. When I finally managed to stop the tears, I realised that my arm was practically screaming in pain from where it was caught between us.

"M-my arm. Tori, my arm. It h-hurts."

She pulled back immediately and glanced down, her eyes widening.

"Oh, fuck, Charlie. I think it's broken. We need to go to the hospital." I just nodded silently. I was in too much pain to do anything else.

**********

Leaving him was the hardest thing I've ever done. Tori refused to let me go back to our flat alone. She called my old friends Tao and Isaac who were, at first, a bit wary of me asking for help. And I couldn't blame them. I'd brushed them aside so callously. But after they took one look at my bruised and scarred face, my arm in a full cast, courtesy of a compound fracture of both the radius and ulna, they agreed to help.