Ocean Eyes

#23 - Jenna

Author's Note *PLEASE READ*: This chapter includes sensitive details about my family. If you are a friend from school who knows me personally and knows my family, with the exception of Ayla Spencer and Jordan Perkins, please do not read this chapter. I don't want anything bad to happen regarding me or my family because of it. This chapter also includes very graphic depictions of violence and near-death experiences. It also briefly glazes over self-harm and is extremely sad and disheartening. If this is triggering to you or any way offends you, or if you are a friend that I know from school, do not read this chapter. I REPEAT: DO NOT READ THIS CHAPTER. Please and thank you.

All my love,

Em

"I'm breaking up with you."

Saying the words made me choke on my own tears. I wasn't ready to say it; I knew that now.

"No, you're not." Jenna gaped at me incredulously. "You're not!" "I am," I replied, with more distinction this time. "I'm sorry, but I am. It's over." "But you love me," Jenna said in a confused tone of voice, stepping closer. Instinctively, I took a step back.

"I do," I said, my voice cracking. "I love you more than anything in this world. But I'm still breaking up with you." "You're not breaking up with me!" Jenna practically screamed, and lunged forward. I backed up until I could go no further. She started to cry.

"How? Why? Why are you doing this to me? I've given you everything! Everything! I fucking love you, Emma! Why would you ever say that?" "You know why," I whispered. "I love you. But what you're doing, what you've done, this isn't love. I might love you, but I'm not stupid, bunny. I know you don't love me."

As soon as the last word was out of my mouth, Jenna had me pinned against the wall. She grabbed my face in her hands and shook me. "Don't you say that. Don't you ever tell me that I don't love you. I love you. I love you so much, it hurts. Do you hear me, Emma Kay?! I fucking love you!" 

"No," I said brokenly, tears streaming down my face. "I don't care. I'm still breaking up with you. I mean it, Jenna. We're done."

"No!" she screamed, and grabbed me by the shoulders. I flinched against her tight grip on my shoulder blade as she shook my body violently. "You can't! I won't let you!" Jenna threw me against the wall once more. I cried out in pain as my head hit the plaster. 

Jenna gathered me in her arms and held me. I fought against her, but she only held on tighter. "Let me go!" I screamed. She released me as if I had burned her, but grabbed my arm quickly and dragged me out of her camper, down her steps, and onto the campsite's front yard. 

"Stop!" I said. "My parents are sleeping in there! They'll hear you!" Jenna flicked her gaze from me to the early-morning sky, and then back to me. "I don't care." Her eyes darkened, and for a minute, I couldn't tell the pure blue from black. My heart pounded against my rib cage. Her eyes had never been that dark, for as long as I'd known her.

Before I had time to react, Jenna raised a hand and slapped me across the face. "I can't live without you," she sobbed, staring at my cheekbones, which had nasty bruises stretched across them due to the fact that I hadn't put on my makeup yet that morning.

"I can't live without you," Jenna repeated. "You can't make me try." I jerked my arm, trying to break free of the hold she had on my wrist, but she only gripped tighter. I could see finger-shaped bruises forming where she was clutching.

Suddenly, I became aware of everything. The bruises that lined my face. The hundreds of horizontal cuts that littered my thighs, the ones that Jenna hadn't forbade, but encouraged, that I put there, because it helped me deal with everything. The yellowed, fading marks on my ribs and hips. The bruises that dotted my arms from months of being handled much too roughly. The current state that my mind was in, where I thought that everything she said was entirely true. All of the times when she had called me a whore. The time when I broke, when I caught her in bed with another woman. And, lastly, all of the times when she held me gently against her chest and kissed my face, telling me how lucky she was to have me.