Law of Attraction Read Free

for diapers and formula, baby chores, but mostly his attention. He pulled away. But the less D’marco was around, the more he thought she was with other men, even though she was stuck in a house with her mother and two babies. He started drinking more, and the beatings got worse. He always apologized afterward. He cried about how sorry he was; he begged her to forgive him. When he was apologizing, he was the nicest he ever was to her. He lavished her with attention and finally said all the things she wanted to hear. It was like he only realized how much he loved her right after he’d hit her. She always took him back.
    Laprea put a hand to one throbbing eye.
    “He’s my babies’ father,” Laprea said at last. “We been on and off since D’montrae and Dameka was born. They twins—a boy and a girl. Four years old. Anyway, since D’marco been out of jail, we was on, I guess. I thought it’d be different this time.”
    Anna nodded. “What happened this morning?”
    “I was getting ready for work. I’m a cashier at the Labor Department cafeteria.”
    Laprea looked at her watch. She was over two hours late for work. She would call them as soon as she got out of here. She hoped they’d understand. She needed that job.
    “My mom left out—she was taking the kids to visit family in Baltimore. D’marco came over after she was gone. At first, I was happy to see him. But he was drunk and suspicious because I wasn’t home last night, on Valentine’s Day. We didn’t have no plans—I was just at my girlfriend’s! But he ain’t believed me.
    “I told him he was being crazy, and that put him over the edge. He started hitting me. Once he started, he wouldn’t stop. He was just punching me everywhere, my arms and chest and legs. I couldn’t get away.”
    Her mother cut in. “Show her the bruises.”
    Laprea rolled up her sleeves to show the nasty welts on her arms. She spread apart her shirt’s neckline, where a big bruise was forming on her chest. She grimaced as she remembered the thudding sounds D’marco’s fists made as they landed on her body.
    “He must’ve been hitting you very hard,” Anna said.
    “I think he been working out in jail.” Laprea let out a short, bitter laugh. “I ran out the house, but he caught me right outside the door. He smooshed me right there, out on the front porch, for all the world and God to see.”
    “‘Smooshed’?” Anna asked.
    “To grab by the face and push, ma’am,” Green said.
    “It was so embarrassing,” Laprea continued. “I wasn’t even thinking about how much it hurt right then—I was thinking I didn’t want my neighbors to see. I just wanted him to go away. So I told him I should see someone else, ’cause he don’t deserve me.”
    Laprea began crying again. Anna handed her another napkin.
    “Then he grabbed me and threw me against the side of the house and started punching my face. My nose was bleeding, and I couldn’t hardly see out my eyes. He mashed my face into the brick wall so hard, I felt the skin on my cheek burning.”
    Laprea dabbed her swollen eyes delicately. The worst thing about this beating wasn’t the pain, or the shame, or even the heartache. It was how she was going to explain her face to her kids. Other times, she’d told them she walked into a door or fell on the sidewalk. But they were getting old enough that they were questioning her “accidents.” They had seen D’marco lay hands on her. It terrified them.
    She swore to herself that they would never have to see that again. She would do whatever it took. For now, she just had to finish this terrible story. She took a ragged breath.
    “He was holding my face against the wall, and he came in real close. He put his mouth to my ear, like he about to tell me some sweet nothing. And he whispered if he ever caught me with another man—he’d kill me.”

3
    A t five-thirty that night, Anna and Grace closed up the Papering Room and walked across the street to the U.S.