As she stood outside the wooden door, she shuddered. A chilling wind blew past, perhaps echoing within its biting cold the reality of what she would find inside the four-room flat. She checked her watch, and bit back a yelp of shock, as she realised the numbers shown on those luminous hands. 4 a.m, the watch proudly displayed upon its face.
'The curfew!' she thought fearfully, sweat inexplicably appearing on her forehead.
Cursing herself for not paying attention to the time as she drank, she slowly slid in her keys, trying to make as little noise as possible. She winced as the lock sprang open with a click. Approaching cautiously, she let out a sigh of relief as she slid into the living room, cat-like.
'Where the hell have you been!?' A roar washed over her.
Her eyes widened in shock and fear as a giant silhouette stepped into the living room. Seconds later, blazing lights came on, and a finger withdraw from the switch and pointed slowly, menacingly at a face.
'I...I..we...went drinking wi..with the gals...dear' she spluttered
'A likely story you bitch!' and with a slap, sent her face crashing to the floor.
'You were fucking around again weren't you! With Charles or Dick or whatever right!? Don't think I don't know that you slut!' he spit the words, smeared with malice, at her.
She couldn't even reply, so hard was her crying. Her only wish was that her only precious, Rachel was not awakened by the commotion. Just then, she caught sight of something, and apprehension dawned on her. Empty beer bottles lay around, dripping their leftover contents over the carpet. She sighed inaudibly. It was going to be one of those nights again....
'Dear, I love you...please don't make me angry anymore ok? It breaks my heart to see you in this...' He cooed, seemingly forgetting that her injuries weren't self-inflicted.
Perhaps wisely, she kept silent. Things hadn't been this bad all the time. She could still vaguely remember a time when they usually cuddled, basking in their post-coital bliss, in the middle of the night. All that changed, as always, when he lost his job. A high flyer in a MNC, he took the blow hard. No longer the sole breadwinner of the family, his ego was hit hard, and drinking became his way of life. Despondent with his change, his wife worked hard, from day to night, just to avoid seeing him in his drunken state. and that served only to incense him, and delusions started haunting him, even taking control of him when he was drunk, oblivious and lost to the world. And the pattern of beating and consoling, beating and consoling just repeated itself over and over again, each time he drank, which was more often than not.
And of course, just like any sane person, this roller-coaster ride of emotions and physical abuse was taking its toll on her. Back in her room, she found and picked up a card from the floor. It was her IC. Beside the name Choo Mei Lian was a face she no longer recognised, with a face free of scars and full of smiles, and which she realised with a startle had been taken only 4 years ago.
The picture seemed to steel her resolve,and a fire blazed in her eyes, and she pocketed the card without so much as another word.
The next few days passed like a dream, incident and abuse free. She could not believe her luck, and she was right. Luck was not to be trusted. On that day, 5th of May, she came back, despondent. She was pregnant. Again. But this child was not of love, but hate. She had been raped, being forced upon by her drunken waste of a man. This had been weeks ago, and he had again apologised, groveling for her forgiveness. Wishing to love this man again, she forgave him. But never did he expect that this Child would have come. She couldn't handle it. Her stretching point was at its very max, a very fragile mix of volatile chemicals piled up inside of her.
She turned the knob. Again, bottles of amber liquid flowed, seemingly endlessly, onto the floor. Rachel was crying again. She kneaded her temples, willing them to stop hurting. and before she could step over the kerb of the doorway, the all-too-familiar roar started anew.
'WHERE HAVE YOU BEEN!? THE FUCKING BABY HAS BEEN FUCKING CRYING FOR AN HOUR! WHAT KINDA FUCKING MOTHER ARE YOU!?' and the accompanying slap came hard and fast onto her face. She fell back, shooting a look of utter disgust to her assailant. Her limit had been reached, and Rachel's incessant crying wasn't help things at all. A vein ticked on her temple.
'NO MORE!' she shouted. 'YOU ARE THE FUCKER!' and following that outburst was every resentment she had ever felt towards her husband.
'YOU BLOODY BITCH!' was the reply, as the man became lost in his drunken stupor. And the shouting travelled back and forth, with the baby's crying completing the chorus of melodious voices, each clamouring for attention within the sonata of their arguments.
She lost it.
Babbling incoherently, she found strength to deflect her husband's blows. The abuse was through, she was through. Running towards the kitchen, passing by the man, passing by her only love, her baby, and her life flashed through her eyes, as they tend to do when imminent death was approaching. Opening the window, she saw her husband's eyes widen in shock and realisation, but it was too late. All he could do was gape, as she wrenched open the window.
'Goodbye.' was the only word she manged, as she flew through the window, ghostlike, but with a all-too-human fatality. She dropped, and her man watched her, in silence, in shock, and also in awe of her bravery, for he had never found in himself neither the strength, nor perhaps the insanity to do it, even in his most despondent times, where suicide was not only contemplated, but close by, talking to him with its vile poison, slowly corroding away his mind.
A dull thud woke him up. He rushed over to the window, and looked down. There was his wife, mangles perhaps, but with a strangely intact face. And what he saw shocked him. Upon her face was not an expression of pain, but peace. She had finally made peace with fate and death, leaving him behind.
'NOOOOOOOOO!!!!!' was all he could muster, the scream reverberating throughout the neighbourhood. She had left him the horror of life, the torture of all his debts and burdens and his daughter. She had found peace, he hadn't. Her pain and suffering had finally finished. He broke down, sobbing uncontrollably as the sheer horror of reality hit him full in the face. His legs slowly moved, reaching for the window ledge even as his tears slowly stopped flowing down his face.
Just as he stepped over the ledge, a giggle made him turn around. Greeting him was joy, life's gift to the world, and her very own daughter. Looking at that face drove suicide and its greetings away. Here was his little bundle of joy, a living legacy of his once-beloved wife.
He steeled his resolve, just as she had days, but worlds, ago.
