Seeing My Parents Fight Inspired Me to Not Be a Victim
Disoriented staring out a bleak window in my parents’ room, I watch my parents shout at each other on the front lawn. I watch as they continue to approach the house, while my mother is throwing cans of soda at my father. I hear the front door lock click and the door swing open, “Jazmyn and Cayelan grab your things!”, my mother shouts from downstairs as her voice is shaking. Fixed in awe and chaos my feet felt as if they were concreted in the raw floors. They continue to argue downstairs, sounds of glass shattering and hands banging on walls. Still standing mute and fixated at the hole in the wall and dry blood upstairs from a previous argument they had.
I overhear my mother running up the stairs, my dad following not far behind. I instantly rush to my room and hide behind the door. As I hear them approaching my door I bury myself under my bedding. My mother enters slamming the back of the door on the wall, “Look at what he did to me!”, showing me a fresh wound on her arm.
My father follows behind her shouting, “Look!”, as he presents a deep bite mark on his forearm. “Call the police!”, my mother shouts to my sister Cayelan and I. As my sister reaches to grab her phone, my father seizes it and removes the battery and throws it back on my sister’s bed. My parents begin to argue and continue to strike each other, wrestling back to their room. Tears flowing my eyes, shouting for them to stop. I quickly grab my phone and hide in the closet to call the police, the operator begins to ask me questions and requests I stay on the line until the police arrive. I hear glass shatter, I race to my parent’s room abandoning my phone.
My focus blurred, I wipe my eyes and notice my dad sitting on the edge of their bed with his hand exuding blood. I swiftly grab a towel from the closet and try to hand it to him, he refuses to grab it, so I place it under his hand on the floor where there was a small pool of his blood. The room was mute, I could hear my heartbeat increasing in speed and tears still falling from my eyes as I stared at the shattered glass on the floor. They began to speak to each other again, yet in a more soft tone because I was in the room.
The room went silent again, still, the tension in the room was loud. “Boom! Boom!”, the police pounding on the door breaks the silence. My parents make there way downstairs, opening the door the police ask them to step outside, they close the door behind them. Cayelan and I race upstairs, stumbling on each other to look outside our parent’s window to see what was happening. We cracked the window to try and hear but they were too far to hear. We watch as they talked to the police, my dad began to remove everything from his pockets and place the items on top of the police car.
We hear the door open and our mom coming up the stairs, she enters the room sobbing trying to find shoes to wear she quietly talks to herself, ” I’ll see you in the morning, I love you.” my mother tells Cayelan and I as she heads back downstairs and walks back outside. They stand outside for about half an hour until a family friend arrives. We witness our parents get handcuffed and put in the back of two separate police cars. Cayelan and I pack an overnight bag and head downstairs, outside, and in Mr. Burts car.
On the way, my sister whispered to me, “What was this all about? Why were they arguing?” Simply baffled by the question, I responded, “Mommy found out about Kendra.” our father’s child with his mistress. This one-day significantly changed my mindset forever how I viewed relationships with men, my mother, my father. I came from a broken home, but I was not broken, I am not a victim but simply a witness.
