Atrapada en memorias

There was a story that I would always tell to people I met and started to become friends with. I never considered myself a liar, but this story was both fictitious and real all in one.

Plain and simply, this is the truth:

I was home alone and kept hearing really loud bangs followed by screaming. I was confused by it all, ignored it even, until it became inevitable to ignore. I went downstairs to check it out, moved closer and closer to the noise that was coming from my neighbors’ in law apartment. It turns out the loud bangs and screaming were signs of a husband hitting his wife. I asked “¿está bien? and the man, angrily replied with a yes. I asked again, but this time I said,  “Señora, ¿está bien?” because I didn’t actually care about him. The banging and screaming paused only because I was there, asking. I could tell she was crying even when she said, “sí, estoy bien”.

Here’s what I made up about it: So I banged on the door, got him out, I dragged him, and started punching him. I was angry! I just left him there and he eventually left.

Here’s how it actually ended: I remember yelling and asking him to leave or I would call the police. I went back upstairs, cried, didn’t call the police, heard him slam the door on his way out. Weeks later, they moved out.

I did want to punch him. I did want to drag him out.

I wanted to hurt him and avenge all the times he may have hurt his wife. I wanted to hurt my dad for all of  the punches, kicks, and slaps against the wall and the bed frame that he inflicted on my mom; I wanted to hurt him for all of the screams and tears he ripped out of my mom.

I wanted to call the police on the man but, in that moment, I was too frightened, stuck in my own memories and flashbacks. I felt powerless just standing there, like I did growing up and seeing my dad beat my mom.

Every time my dad hit my mom, my brother and I hid behind a chair through which we could still see mom’s face swelling up from all of the punches, the red and the purple on her lips, fresh blood, bruises, old blood.

Paralyzed.

This time, however, I was fortunate to have had a door as the barrier between them and me; I didn’t actually see the blood (if there was any), the swelling, or the tears.

It makes sense that I would change the ending to the story–in another life, perhaps the life I lived in that one bedroom on Balmy Alley, I wanted it to be true. I wanted to pick up the phone and call the police on my dad. Have them take him away. I didn’t just want to leave for the night, the few hours left in it. After all, we only left across the street, to my abue’s house where my mom was asked “¿qué le hiciste?”; I wanted him to vanish.

I wanted to hurt my dad worse than he did my mom.

Worse than he did me. And my brother.

 

When I think back to when this happened, how I felt then, how I feel now, it’s all one big blur. A whirlwind of  emotions, memories, flashbacks, shame, and even guilt takes over me.