The violence Justin had pounded into me could also touch and devastate them if Justin managed to find out where I was!
My stomach hurts just thinking about the possibility of that happening!
I try not to think about Justin and concentrate on my going-back-to-school party. The new splash of vibrant color all over the house makes it easier to be in be moment. The Sanchezes have hung miniature piñatas of burros and pointy stars throughout the home. Vivid Mexican music loudly resonates from the stereo.
I smile with all the positive and grateful energy I can squeeze out of me. No one has ever thrown me a party like this. My parents’ get-togethers would be absolutely taciturn compared to this. My parents would think this is gaudy, uncouth, and completely lacking in class and good taste. But forget what they would think! I tell myself. I’ve left that silly society girl far behind. I know that my parents would look down their aristocratic noses at the party the Sanchezes put together for me, but they’d be wrong. The Sanchezes are earthly angels! Their intentions are unselfish and loving. No one can convince me differently!
I sigh happily. The Sanchez home is full of cheerful kin. Luckily, everyone thinks I’m a foster child. Because the Sanchezes had fostered kids many times, their relatives already know the drill of not asking me too many personal questions since foster children usually come from broken homes—having had experiences that they often don’t want to talk about. The relatives just open their arms wide to me.
I’m completely accepted in the warmth of Mr. and Mrs. Sanchez’s clan of colorful kindred. Amongst the relations are Danila, Anelina, and Emily—three of the neatest girls you’ll find anywhere. I’ll be going to the same school they do. They take me into their warm circle of giggles. Danila and Anelina are sisters and Emily is a real blood cousin. They tell me I'm an adopted cousin. I wish I could let myself be carried in their current of friendship, but I just don’t trust anybody or anything anymore. Wish I could.
Still, I love being embraced into the Sanchez family.
The only blood cousin I had ever somewhat been close to was Lynette, and I couldn’t stand her! I know it’s awful to despise your own blood, but I can’t help it. Believe me, Lynette earned my repulsion. Earned it!
She imitated everything about me, tried to steal my boyfriends, and even tried to rob my parents’ love from me. Ever since we were children, she’d snitch on me to make herself look good.
“Aunt Chelsea, I tried to tell Lucette not to do it,” she’d tell my mother with wide open, innocent looking eyes. “But she did it anyway.”
Lynette was the one goading me into getting into trouble. She’d call me a chicken if I didn’t do it, and I fell for it until I caught onto her manipulations. Because I wouldn’t get caught up in her game anymore, she would stay close to my parents—completely kissing up to them. It still makes me furious to think how she worked them. They would ask me why I couldn’t be more like Lynette!
It would drive me crazy!
Bad cousin! Why couldn’t we get along like Danila, Anelina, and Emily did? I sighed. It would’ve been nice to have had a good relationship with Lynette.
At the moment, Emily starts talking about boys. I smile awkwardly. It’s a subject I don’t want to slide into. Guys are the last thing on my mind. After what happened to me with Justin, I’m convinced I’m much better off alone.
Even when I was with Justin I’d been avoiding boys even for just friendship. With his jealousy streak, I couldn’t even look at another guy. I had tried to tell Justin that our next door neighbor was gay but he smacked me before I could get the words out. I had seen Scott kiss another guy good-bye one morning after obviously spending the night with him. I thought it would be safe to ask for a cup of sugar to make Justin’s favorite pineapple upside down cake. I had forgotten to get sugar from the grocery store the day before, and I didn’t have a car. Remember, my parents had taken it away from me.
I was scared to death of having to tell Justin that I hadn’t been able to make his favorite cake. Things like that really upset him and his fists. I tried some other neighbors first, but lucky Lucette wasn’t so lucky. No one but Scott was home.
I shiver just thinking about that day. Concentrating back to the Dynamic Trio, that’s what I call my new cousins, I realize they’ve moved on from boys to our senior school year. Thank goodness!
“Hi, I’m Alfredo. You are . . .?” Someone interrupts my thoughts, slicing into them. I turn to look at a nerdy boy I had never seen before.
Danila giggles. “This is our new cousin Araceli,” informs Danila. “What are you doing here, Alfredo? This is family only.”
“I’m part of the family,” he asserts proudly.
“I invited him,” announces Emily.
“You did?” questions Anelina.
“He’s our friend,” states Emily. “And everyone in the family just loves him.”
“Yeah, everyone just looves me,” Alfredo asserts.
“You’re such a nerd Alfredo,” Anelina bursts, chuckling. “Coming to a family party that isn’t your own.”
“Yeah, Alfredo, nice bow tie,” proclaims Emily.
“Thank you,” he shoots back. “It’s new.”
“So you came today to say hi to us,” declared Danila.
Alfredo shakes his head. “I saw you girls outside earlier and decided to come to meet her.” He nods towards me.
I want to freak!
No boyfriends for me!
At least not until I can get my head straight! My heart isn’t up for grabs.
It won’t be a target anymore!
Justin:
OMG!!!
Lucette and I aren’t married after all!!!
Crap! Crap! Crap!
It’s true. I’m officially single and totally distressed with the news. The piece of paper is telling me the impossible truth, that there was some sort of a mess up with our marriage certificate and so Lucette and I aren’t officially married. The judge personally wrote that he regretted the mistake and would be happy to officiate another wedding at no cost to us.
I’m devastated.
And what makes it worse is that Lucette knew about it right after the miscarriage and kept it to herself. I found the letter in her things. Ratchet told me to take her stuff apart to see if there was a clue about where she went. I found the official letter discreetly tucked away in her undies drawer. For some kind of reason she had left most of them behind.
Then something occurred to me—like a lightning strike to the head. That’s why she left me. Losing the baby and then finding out she wasn’t married to me, she must’ve panicked. Freaked out. Was overwhelmed with everything.
I have to find her and tell her nothing can keep us apart. No piece of paper or horrible loss can come between us. We belong together for always.
Forever.
Chapter 13
Lucette/Araceli:
My first day of school.
Scary.
The Sanchezes tell me not to be frightened. That I’ll have a good time. You don’t know how grateful I am that I won’t be facing it alone. Thank goodness for the Dynamic Trio!
I step into the somewhat run down school with Danila, Anelina, and Emily. They chatter. I stay quiet.
Surprisingly and fortunately I have most of my classes with one or more of the girls. They introduce me as their cousin. I’m grateful they’ve taken such a shine to me. I’ve really grown to appreciate them even if I still am having plenty of trust issues. The past just won’t let go of me.
Unfortunately, that annoying boy Alfredo is also in two of my classes and he insists on talking to me even though I grimace at him.
The silly boy just can’t take a hint!
Eeeek!
The other weird thing happening to me is that I’ve met up with my evil twin. Chiffon Everett. It’s like looking into a mirror. She’s exactly who I used to be. Dyed blonde. Ultra thin. Designer clothes. Fast car. Rich. The only reason she’s not in a wealthier district is because
her parents are trying to teach her some kind of a lesson. HA!—it’s not working. She’s got it made at Frida High School.
Chiffon is the most popular girl on campus.
Yeah, it’s really eerie. I watch her from afar as her starry eyed cronies pay tribute to her. She eyes them with a smirk—as if lavishing her with worship is the way things should be.
I just can’t believe I used to be her. Suddenly, my previous high school experience doesn’t seem so awesome. Suddenly, my perspective has really changed. Now that I’m outside of myself, now that I’m an onlooker instead of in the middle of adoration, I don’t see how being Chiffon or lucky Lucette is so great. It’s all a lie.
Yeah, a lie about who should be admired, what being a great human being really is, the worship of things like designer labels and such, and what life really is about.
Life—the place to find those who really care about you.
Justin:
I call the judge who married me and Lucette to try to clear up this misunderstanding of the invalid marriage.
“No misunderstanding,” he says. “I’m afraid you’ll have to have another ceremony.”
“But my wife is in the hospital!” I burst, lying and trying to grasp at straws. “Can’t you just validate our marriage without another ceremony? That’s the least you can do!” I snap.
The judge sighs heavily through the phone. “I’m very sorry, young man, about what happened. I truly regret it, but the only way to validate your marriage is to have another wedding. I’ll be happy to go to the hospital and marry you and your girlfriend there. How about it?”
I slam down the phone!
Fury burns every cell inside of me! Ratchet gets me the judge’s address, and I go there with my trusty ice pick and a full grocery bag in the middle of the night.
I keep thinking about one word as my hand shoots up and comes crashing down on the dead fish—girlfriend!
Girlfriend! Not wife! Lucette was back to being my girlfriend and I just couldn’t take it! My fingers hold the ice pick tightly.
Stab, stab, stab!
GIRLFRIEND—it’s all the judge’s fault!
STAB, STAB, STAB!
GIRLFRIEND!—GRRRRRRRRRRRRRRRRRR!!!
Chapter 14
Lucette/Araceli:
The nightmares just won’t go away.
I sob uncontrollably. It’s late at night, and I’ve just forced myself to awaken from a horrible dream. I’m soaked with perspiration. My heart thunderously thumps in my ears. Tears shoot out of my eyes like bullets.
I sit up and listen for footsteps. Even though relieved I hadn’t woken up the household, I still scamper under the bed. It makes me feel better. I’m very glad that this time I hadn’t awoken the Sanchezes with involuntary screams during my nightmares. The times I had woken them up they stayed in my room, calming me down until I fell asleep. They’d been so patient and loving with me.
“You’re safe with us,” they repeated over and over again until safety eased me into drowsiness.
This time, I’d have to find my security zone on my own. But the thing is that the nightmare, the recurring one where Justin keeps telling me he loves me while his tight fist plunges into me, is making me relive what I wish so badly I could forget. My mind is fully set on memory mode. Maybe it’s good not to forget what I went through with Justin. You know what they say about knowing your history—something about being doomed to repeat it otherwise.
I definitely don’t ever want to repeat what I had with Justin!
By some miracle I’m not married to the monster! The legality of the marriage didn’t take. Lucky! A remnant of lucky Lucette.
The miraculous letter from the judge who had performed my marriage ceremony is what changed everything for me! It’s one of the things that gave me the guts to get away from him. Just knowing I wasn’t his wife opened something inside of me I didn’t know I had—bravery. But of course I had it and other powerful traits all along. Justin had tried to take so much from me. Stomp on my self-esteem. I look back to see where everything had gone wrong.
More of Lucette’s back story:
When bad boy Justin suddenly appeared in my life, I had read all those bosom heaving romance books and swooned with the movies. I had seen all those videos with my favorite singers pushing fairytale romance at me as they sang to magic lovers. I took it all in!
Clueless, silly girl.
I believed them. Hook, line, and sinker. I believed that true love consumes you so much that it’s supposed to take everything from you, that you should sacrifice everything for it—even your well-being and self-worth. Love is supposed to be total, right? That’s what I believed.
So when things with Justin started turning shaky, I excused him because love should be all forgiving. Besides, I truly believed that he acted out of love. But I can tell you now that I should’ve been paying closer attention. I had foolishly ignored many warning bells. Many!
Justin and I were stuck like gum—together as much as we could. We lived in a romantic bubble. We lived for each other and mostly ignored those around us. However, there were other moments, times I had to talk to other people. This became a problem.
“Don’t talk to any other guys!” he’d screech at me. “You belong to me!”
When he would sprout snakes of jealousy for me just because I talked to another guy, I took it as a sign of love. I really thought that when he yelled all kinds of obscenities at me, it meant how much he cared for me.
HHHHHHHe has so much passion for me, I would tell myself, excusing his verbal abuse even when he graduated from yells to physical cruelty by jerking my arm so much I’d have to wear long sleeves so no one would be able to see the bruises.
Why his said ownership of me didn’t bother my independent streak, I don’t know. I guess WWe lovhhh
I just believed that love was about owning one another, that it meant melting into each other forever. You know, silly crap like that. Silly, silly crap that sounds so true and romantic. I know you may want to argue with me on this point since movies, magazines, and books have reached into our minds and imprinted a love-is-everything, forever, and always intoxicating mentality.
But now I’m convinced that those ideas are crap.
Sorry. You can disagree all you want, I still feel the same. Yeah, I’m disillusioned with love. I admit it. But again I ask you to listen to the rest of my story before you judge me too harshly.
At the time, I really believed that Justin’s obsession for me was actually complete and eternal love.
Obsession. Yes, I used the right word because he’d follow me around everywhere, even skipping some classes to spy on me. He’d hide in places and watch me. He must love me sooooo much! I’d say to myself, actually swooning.
Then the pregnancy—an unexpected fruit of our love, he told me and I foolishly believed him. And then the wedding. Marrying him was like sealing us forever, so I thought.
But in the middle of all the swooning, intoxicated love, and deep sighing reality set in. Funny how that love you think is so everlasting and impenetrable starts fading away when truth comes in the door.
Let me tell you about truth. The rough manhandling of me because of Justin’s fiery jealous streak suddenly became explosively physical. I shake horribly when I remember the first time he hit me.
It was only a week after we got married. Just a week!
Justin and I had gone to the movies. He was unusually quiet until we got home. He demanded to know why I had flirted with the popcorn counter guy.
“Justin, be serious,” I had snapped.
SLAP!
He backhanded me so hard that I fell backwards, stunned. Fortunately, the wall caught me or I would’ve tumbled to the ground.
“Don’t you ever speak to me like that!” he menaced.
“But you’ve got to understand that I was flirting with—”
WALLOP!
OUCH!!!
He had pummeled his closed fist in my stomach. I doubled o
ver in pain.
“The baby—” I started to mutter.
He grabbed fistfuls of my hair and pulled my head up, so I would be face to face with him. By this time I was in so much pain from his abuse that I couldn’t utter a single word.
“You’re trying to justify what you did, and it doesn’t sit well with me—understand?” he snarled.
I squeaked out a yes. Anything to get him to stop hurting me. When he let go of me I went straight to the bathroom and sobbed. I just couldn’t believe what had just happened, but at that point I wasn’t yet ready to face the truth.
I justified him.
I told myself that he got physical because of his tremendous love for me. I need to stop talking to guys, I told myself.
I convinced myself that Justin lashed out because he was stressed from working so hard to support his new family. The next day he brought me a rose. Even though it wasn’t my favorite flower, I took it as an awesome peace offering. It’ll never happen again, I asserted within myself but of course it did. He would wallop me for any little thing he’d consider unacceptable.
The kitchen table isn’t clean enough!
PUNCH.
“Why are you wearing that sexy dress?”
SLAP.
“Why are you embarrassing me with my friends by dressing all frumpy?”
KICK.
So life with Justin became about punches, slaps, kicks and plummeting self-esteem. Both verbal and physical abuse flourished. Black eyes, deep purple bruises, and many bumps. Sprained body parts became a normal state for me. Normal! How can something like that be normal?
Is that really love? I started questioning. Does it have to be so painful? At this rate I’ll never make it to even my twenties!
Truth—love can’t possibly be what I thought it was!
And there were other things that hadn’t bothered me in the past when we were just dating but were now really getting to me. Your guy spying on you gets old real fast. Your supposed husband demanding to know everything about you like your email password and how you’re going to occupy every minute of the day is frustrating! Your supposed soul-mate questioning you about every single cent you spend is beyond exasperating.
Eeeeeeeek!!!
I wanted to yell out with all the force I had inside of me that I was suffocating!—drowning without air. I was bleeding bucketfuls from the inside!—feeling my life rush out of me. And I was in anguished agony—the beatings I frequently got bruising me all over.