Page 15 of Pen Pal

Five years later

Everything changed the day I caught my husband cheating.

Mark and I met in high school, and he was the new kid. He seemed so sweet and caring, and we married young. Others would call him traditional, and Mark wanted us to lead a traditional life. He wanted kids, the white picket fence, and a white-collar nine-to-five job while I stayed home and minded the house.

I was young and impressionable then, so I sacrificed my dreams for him. We were straight out of college when we married, and I had just passed the bar exam and began my internship. During my internship, I was assigned to an inmate, Lorenzo Ricci, who was a convicted murderer. I shadowed his lawyer, interviewing Lorenzo during law visits until Lorenzo got tired of his lawyer and fired him.

When Mark and I got married, I had just finished my internship as a lawyer. I barely had five cases under my belt before I quit my career for him.

We moved away from everything I’d ever known back to his hometown of Ashwood. I was now hours away from my friends and family, but I did my best to make my own life.

Everything changed the minute after I uttered those two words at the altar.

Mark grew cold and distant. We came home that night, and he was rougher with me than ever. Mark took what he wanted and didn’t care if I enjoyed myself or not. The following day, I was bruised and sore, and he gave me fresh flowers and apologized, claiming he drank too much and got carried away in the moment. I plastered a smile on my face, and I forgave him. What else could I do?

He bought us a house, and I fell in love with it. It had a white picket fence with a large backyard for our future kids to play. It was a modest three-bedroom bungalow with crown molding and a wrap-around porch. There was a porch swing out front, French shutters, and beautiful flowers. The inside was all hardwood floors and beige walls. I planned to paint them with earth tones to match my love of nature. It was in an ideal school district, a lovely suburban town with friendly neighbors. Mark furnished it with leather couches, cute rocking chairs, and a matching dining set. Our bedroom was large,and Mark joked that I could install a stripper pole to give him a strip tease. It was gorgeous, and it was everything I ever wanted in a home. What I didn’t know was that it would become my prison.

I began to see his true colors when he came home from work after our honeymoon. He was early, and dinner wasn’t ready yet. It still had a few minutes left in the oven, and Mark flipped out on me. He punched a hole in the drywall as he screamed, telling me how I was a failure and a terrible wife. Mark threw his empty plate at me, which smashed against my face. He shoved me until I fell on the floor, sobbing and clutching my bleeding nose. Mark shouted that he had paid the bills and that he was my husband, and I had to serve and obey him. He said that if I didn’t, I was worthless, and he would put me out in the streets.

From then on, it only got worse.

If I burned dinner, Mark would burn me. He would press his lit cigarette against my skin and would laugh as I screamed in pain. My husband started slapping me around, and then he closed his fists when he hit me. He never took me to the emergency room, so I had to sneak into the free clinic while he was at work to get fixed up. I lost count of the times I needed stitches, splints, and casts. When he’d see those, he’d lose it again and beat me worse. Told me I better never tell anyone what he did, or he’d kill my family.

That’s when I began seeing a doctor for a birth control shot. He wanted kids, and so did I, but not with him. There was no way I would drag a child into this. If I took pills, he would find them, and if I wore a patch, he’d see it. He’d had an ex-girlfriend before with an IUD, and he claimed the strings poked him, so I knew that was out. An injection once every three months was the most inconspicuous option, and if he ever asked questions, I just told him it was a fertility shot or a vaccine.

I tried escaping through church, where pastors encouraged me to try marriage counseling with Mark, but he refused. So I tried to keep busy, volunteering since Mark didn’t want me to have a job. There was a prison pen pal program to encourage rehabilitation, so I signed up. To my surprise, I was paired up with an inmate who never got mail, Lorenzo Ricci. I recognized the name and encouraged him to reflect on his crimes and why he committed them. We were getting somewhere, but eventually, Mark stopped me from going to church, too. I stopped hearing from Lorenzo, so I stopped writing him.

I knew my parents were worried about me. Mark always listened in on my calls and would hang up the phone often after only a few minutes. Then he stopped letting me talk to them at all. My husband took my cell phone away, and I was entirely at his mercy, especially without access to his bank account. He left some cash on the table for groceries, and ifI didn’t show him the receipt and give him the exact change, he would beat me.

I thought of leaving at first when I still had some self-esteem. As time passed, Mark wore me down, breaking me more and more until I was convinced I deserved this, that I was a lousy wife, and everything I did made him angry. The only solace I had was that he was loyal.

Until he wasn’t.

I was out running errands when I realized I had forgotten the money Mark left on the table for me. I headed home, and when I opened the door, I froze.

There were clothes littered everywhere, clothes that weren’t mine. A pair of pumps were laid by Mark’s shoes, and my heart dropped. I heard the unmistakable sounds of moans upstairs. I removed my shoes and closed the door slowly before creeping up the stairs.

I burst through our bedroom door and gasped. Mark was there, naked with his secretary. He was fucking her in missionary, something he no longer did with me since he didn’t want to see my bruised-up face.

Mark looked up at me and stopped, immediately pulling out as the secretary scrambledto cover herself. “What the fuck are you doing here, Amara?” he shouted.

I laughed. I couldn’t help it. Was Mark asking me questions with accusation in his tone? He wasn’t sorry at all, only that he got caught. I felt hurt, and part of me was devastated but profoundly relieved.

I could leave him now. No one would blame a woman for leaving her cheating husband. Loyalty was the last thread that kept our marriage together, and now that was gone. I was done.

I was even more done when I noticed the swell of the secretary’s belly. She was single, and I was pretty sure that was my husband’s baby she carried.

“You got her pregnant?” I countered, my voice shaking with shock.

“It’s not like you can get pregnant,” He sneered as he pulled his pants on. “We’ve tried for years and nothing! You can’t even do the one job women have. You’re fucking useless, Amara.”

The secretary bolted from the room, muttering, “I’m so sorry, I’m so sorry,” as she probably went for her clothes.

“You don’t have to leave,” I called after her. “You can have him. I’m done.” I turned to Mark, almost smirking as all the repressed rage at his treatment of me surfaced. “It’s over, Mark.”

He laughed. “You can’t leave me, bitch! You have nowhere, no one, and not a penny to your name. No one else will put up with a failure like you.”

At that moment, I didn’t care. “I’d rather be homeless than live with you for another second.”

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