I Survived - Part One

A true story.

 

I Survived

By

Kaylee Andurs

I work the swing shift at a micro-chip processing plant in Pocatello, Idaho called AMI. My boyfriend of about two years was going to college at Idaho State University (ISU). Every night when I got off work I would go and get him and bring him home to my apartment to spend the night. He had a dorm room and a roommate. It didn’t give us enough privacy so my place was the best choice. Beside I wasn’t allowed in the men’s dorm all night. 

I fell in love with him the moment I laid eyes on him. It was the end of our senior year. I was in a wedding dress when we met. Now don’t go thinking that we met on my wedding day or anything like that. I was in high school too young to get married. I was a bride in a play and after our last performance we had a get together in the gym to celebrate. He was playing basket ball with a bunch of his friends. I remember that day with perfect clarity. His friend John shot at the hoop and missed badly. I went after it. The wedding dress slowed me down considerable but the ball had bounced in my direction so I was closest to it. Quickly I snatch it off the floor before he could reach it. He flipped back his dark-brown shoulder length hair and smiled at me with perfect white teeth. 

“Can I have my ball back?” he asked. I couldn’t help ogling at him. He was so cute.

“Can I make a shot first?” I asked.

“Sure go ahead.” He moved out of the way. Sports are not one of my strong points but I gave it my best effort. I didn’t even get close to the net. He laughed and went back to the game and I went back to my party. 

I pulled my sister Kris beside me so I could whisper in her ear. We were almost exactly one year apart in age. “Who is that good looking Native boy?” I asked.  

“He’s Paul Chiefchild. He is in my Government class.” My sister and I watched them play basket ball for the next thirty minutes. He smiled every time he caught us looking.  Kris thought his friend John was “way cute” as she put it. We left before they did and I didn’t see Paul again for about a month. I was on a boring date at a dance. My date was a real nice guy that had two left feet. That didn’t bother me as much as the fact that when someone talked to me he answered for me. He hardly knew me and he was answering questions for me. It was really getting to me. That is when I saw Paul walk into the dance with a couple of his buddies.  I excused myself and asked him to dance. He was a good dancer. The rest of the night I refused to be with my date anymore and just stayed with Paul. 

After a couple of fast dances they played a slow dance. I put my arms around his neck. My head came to his shoulder. The cologne he was wearing filled my nostrils with its scent. I don’t know what kind it was but it smelled good. I looked up at his face and into the darkest brown colored eyes I have ever seen. He licked my cheek and smiled. He thought it was funny. I wiped my face off and sort of smiled back. Well that was weird, I thought. When the song was finished he leaned down to my ear and spoke loudly.  “There is another dance at a church that we are going to go to. Would you like to come with us?”

“Yes!” I said with excitement. I know it was mean of me but I just couldn’t take the guy I was with anymore. I really wanted to be with Paul and this was my chance so I took it.  One of my close guy friends gave me hell for it later. A whole hour lecture about how mean I was and what goes around comes around.

We didn’t kiss that night. But he did ask me to another dance the next weekend. The gym was decorated with stars that hung down from the ceiling. He snagged one for me. We made out in the back seat of his brother’s car while he drove us home. He wasn’t much of a kisser but my heart flipped flopped every time he smiled at me. I loved his dark skin and almost black eyes. I saved the star as a souvenir of our first date. After school I would go down to the track and watch him run. He was one of the best distance runners in the state. When he ran he was graceful like a dear. To him running was easy. That was the only time we saw each other at school. We didn’t have any classes together and our lunches were at different times. I’m sure if I would have asked he would have gladly ditched class to be with me. I was too afraid of getting in trouble to ditch class. 

The months passed and we spent every weekend together until graduation. We went to the senior all night party and spent the night in my room. My parents didn’t know about it and we left before anyone got up. I remember how he looked that night when he took off his shirt. He had a six pack then. He was lean especially his legs from running. His calf muscles were large and heart shaped. He had strong broad shoulders and a small waist. I really hadn’t planned on him staying the night. It just happened. We got to kissing and before we knew it we were having a conversation about if I wanted to or not. I said no and we proceeded to do what I had just said no to. It was just that his kisses were so good that night and it had been a long time since the last time. I wanted to be good but with a body like he had it was hard to say no. The word no did come across my lips. My body was telling him something different. It has a mind of its own sometimes. I was in love with him and I knew it. My will gave way I couldn’t resist him. That night we didn’t sleep and before anyone in my house woke up we left. I walked him half way home. I didn’t dare drive my car and tip my parents off that I had been out all night or that I had my boyfriend spend the night. 

Though the next couple of years I told him several times that I loved him.  There was only a few times he told me he loved me back.

Well you’re probable wondering why I’m telling you this. I mean what do you care whether someone loved me back or not? The reason I’m telling you is because you might find yourself in a similar situation and maybe you’ll believe that you can change your life before it’s too late.

He left to visit his sister in Crow Agency until college started. All summer long he didn’t write. He did call several times. I dated someone else. His name was Hubert. He was visiting his brother for the summer and had a girl friend so we kind of fit. I had a boy friend I was waiting for and he had a girl friend. We had a lot of fun together. My favorite date with him was when we went for a drive and saw a field full of irrigation water. It was hot so we decided to go wading in it. It ended in a water fight when I slipped and fell in the water. He laughed so hard at me that I tried to tackle him. He was a big boy. Could have easily picked me up and thrown me into the water again but he slipped on the grass too. It was a fun evening playing with him in the water. Later I was freezing so he took me to get hot coco. I often wonder to myself if I should have tried to get him away from his girl friend. He was a great guy but I didn’t fill worthy of him. We never spoke about our feelings for each other. I let him go to afraid of rejection to try. I should have taken a chance and gone after Hubert.  When Paul came back I said good bye to my friend Hubert. That is when Paul started going to ISU and things changed.

My sister Kris started to date Paul’s friend John Izzic. I first started to think something was wrong with Paul when he started biting me on the neck and ear. He was drunk every weekend and I wasn’t allowed to go with him. He would call me to pick him up. We got in so many fights I wouldn’t even attempt to remember them all. They always ended with us having sex whether I wanted to or not. The ones I remember the most are the ones in which he tried to kill me. There were other girls too. 

In the fall I found myself pregnant and do in June. I moved out of my parent’s home and into my own place. One night while I was pregnant, we went with my friend Linda and her husband.  While in the ladies room an unattractive girl approached me. She told me that she had slept with my boyfriend and thought she was pregnant with his child. When we got back to my place I questioned him about it. Sober he admitted it. The dumb thing about the whole situation was that I wasn’t so mad about him sleeping around on me. What made me mad was that this girl was fat and ugly. If you’re going to sleep around at least do it with someone who is better looking! I know I’m superficial.

Sometimes on my days off I would go to the bar just see what he was up to. I kept seeing him with a beautiful Native American girl. They were perfect for each other. He told me that they were just friends. One night after work my friend Linda and I decided to go to the bar and see what he was doing. Linda left me to go to the ladies room. I didn’t drink so I didn’t much care to go to the bars unless they had a dance floor. I was about four months pregnant not really showing.  He was there and so drunk that he could barely walk. He saw me first and grabbed a hand full of my hair before I knew what was going on.  Somehow he managed to pull me out of the bar by the hair of my head. Thank goodness I have thick hair. Fortunately the bouncers followed us and Paul was in no condition to argue with them. These were two big guys. I swear they saved my life that day. The bouncers escorted me to Linda’s car. I had to wait for Linda to come and drive me home. Paul waited until the bouncers were gone and begged me to forgive him. He was kneeling on the ground

“Why are you even talking to him when he is like this? Tell him to get away from the car or I’m going to run him over,” Linda scolded me. I pushed him out of the car window. I wanted to go back and get him. He showed up at my apartment later. He was scrapped up pretty badly. He had a big scrape on his knee that tore a big hole in his jeans. He lost his favorite leather jacket. We went back the next day and he couldn’t find it. 

Several weeks later Paul came home drunk and started accusing me of cheating on him. I hadn’t done anything. Gees I was almost six months pregnant and all belly. Who would want me? No use talking to him when he is like this. He just kept getting angrier and angrier. I was scared and went into the only room that had a lock on the door - the bathroom. 

“I have to pee,” I said. Grabbing a hold of my night gown he tried to lift me to his angry face to yell at me. I pulled away from him and into the bathroom. My gown tore exposing my chest. He wanted to hit me so he punched a hole in the wall instead. I was too scared to do anything so I stood in the bathroom with my back to the wall.  He turned away from me and kicked the wall then he punched through the glass cabinet below my bathroom mirror. When he drew his hand back his wrist was spouting blood all over the place. He had cut an artery in his wrist. With every beat of his heart, blood spurted from the cut like a fountain. I had to act fast or he could bleed to death. I grabbed a towel and applied presser to the cut. He didn’t believe that he was hurt. Struggling against me I pulled him to the couch and dialed for an ambulance. 

“I’m not hurt!” he yelled and hung the phone up. “Look,” I said. “You can bleed to death you cut an artery in your wrist.”

“Just let me bleed to death,” he mumbled and started to pass out on me. Great here I am six months pregnant, my night gown torn, Paul is so drunk that he can barely walk and he is bleeding all over my apartment because he doesn’t believe me. Every time I loosened the pressure on his wrist his blood came spurting out. I called emergency back. I couldn’t drive and apply pressure to his arm. He was in no condition to apply pressure to his wound himself.  I found that out when I went to change my clothes.  I got a pair of sweat pants on and a jacket. Before I could get the jacket on he let off the pressure and started spurting blood everywhere again. I couldn’t zip it up, which means that my chest was still exposed. The ambulance was on its way and I was worried that they would not be able to find my apartment. It was over the garage of my landlord’s house. I was sure they would wake them and I would be evicted. 

It was impossible for me to zip up my jacked while I was holding Paul’s arm. We started down the stairs to wait by the street for the ambulance. Paul fell down the stairs and I still managed to hold onto his wrist somehow. He was telling me that he couldn’t do it. We managed to get to the street. The ambulance was already there. As soon as they took him from me I quickly zipped up my jacket, closing the curtains on the peep show. I wanted to ride in the ambulance with him. They wouldn’t let me. They thought he had tried to commit suicide. I’m sure it seemed that way because he hung up the phone on them and they could hear me arguing with him that he was hurt. 

After he left I had about four big cops in my apartment asking me questions. It was late and I was tired. I’m sure they could tell. This incident was probably the most excitement they had all night. They looked at the blood all over the walls and floor. I talked to them for what seemed like an hour or more trying to explain what had just happened. Then I started to clean up the blood while they were still in my apartment. There was a huge puddle of it in the bathroom and it was already starting to dry around the edge of the puddle. As I tried to clean it I cried. There was just so much blood, I couldn’t get it all rinsed out of the towel. It seemed as though I was just smearing blood everywhere, making it worse. It gave me something to do and it calmed my nerves. Finally the police left and the blood was cleaned up. I went to the hospital and waited for them to finish stitching up Paul’s arm. It took them a long time. While I waited I had time to think. My baby and I could have been seriously hurt tonight. I decided that I was going to go live with my sister in until I had my baby for safety reasons. The doctor explained that Paul’s arm kept jumping while they stitched the tiny artery closed so it took a long time. I knew he twitched in his sleep. They sent him home in my care with a brace on his arm. He was good for a while after that. I mean I saved his life he should be good. By the end of the month I quit my job and moved out of my apartment and was living with my sister in Utah.

You might be wondering why stick it out with this guy? Two reasons: one he was my best friend when he was sober and I was pregnant with his kid. It was only when he was drinking that he was like this. We carried on a long distance relationship and he came to visit me a couple of times. I was safe for now. I delivered a six pound baby girl by C-section. She was beautiful and premature. I had to wait over a week to take her home. Paul loved her.
 

Author's Note

My daughter keeps telling me to write this story. She thinks it will help me bring closure. The story line can't be altered. This how the things really did take place. I was young and foolish. I just hope that it will help someone out there realize that you have a choice. You don't have to live like this.

Reviews

[Samuel Dickens]

When something weighs on you for years as this evidently has, I think it's a good thing to "air it out" or set it out in the light so it can be exposed. I've done the same thing with a few of my old bad memories.
What a mess that was, but of course it could have turned out a lot worse. Thank you for sharing this personal story.

[Deborah Leah Krempa]

We do have a lot in common. I'm sorry you had to go through this. You have bravely and beautifully written about it and hopefully it will help others in similar situations. My husband was also very abusive when he drank but not when he was sober. It's like living with two different people. You have to finally make a decison to get out alive. Thank you for sharing. My prayers are with you. Debileah

[UponATyme]

That was really powerful. You told the tale beautifully.