Novel Treatments / Stella Pepper's Lonely Hearts Club - Chapter 2
CHAPTER 2 – BEFORE STELLA RAN, STELLA STALLED
”You’re right, there’s no excuse…”
”Damn right there’s no fucking excuse!”
”But…” Stella tried.
”There is no fucking excuse!”
Stella opened her mouth to find a remedy to make it all better.
”Get your shit out!” I don’t want a fucking trace of you in this house.” He picked up a photo frame showing them both in happier times, “No fucking photo’s!” She winced as he all too dramatically smashed it against the side of the bookcase. ”No fucking decorating shit!” he flapped his arms in no general direction. “No fucking clothes and more importantly,” he syruped, “No fucking you.”
She got up the cheap lounge and rushed over to him, “Don’t be…”
”Don’t fucking touch me! Just get the fuck out!”
He reefed her closer and spat in her face, “I never want to see your dumb ugly face again…”
Dumbfounded, she watched him trudge towards the front door, yank it open and crash it closed.
”Never ever want to see your dumb ugly face again!” she heard him shout from the other side of the door, “And that fucking fat ass of yours.”
She looked down at her shaking hands. She played his words over again. The more she heard them echoing in her ear, the less unbelievable they became. Did he really want her to take a large eraser to herself?
The shaking escalated as she found herself reaching for the phone. It was hard to dial through the mist of tears.
”Jenny,” she whispered, using her free hand to wipe her eyes, “Jenny, I just told him.”
There was silence on the phone.
“Jenny. I just…”
“When you said you told him, how much did you tell him?”
“I told him everything…” It was getting harder for her to breathe.
“You told about all the money…”
“I had to, you know why I had to…”
“Did he hurt you?”
“No. He was more in shock I guess.” Stella picked up the handset and walked around to the kitchen to grab a handful of tissues. “I had to Jenny. I had to. He was, he was…”
“I know Stell’s, I know. What are you going to do?”
“He kicked me out.”
“When?”
“Now,” she started crying into the phone, “I love him, I love him so much.”
“I know Stell’s. I’m gonna hang up. I’ll be there in ten. Just calm down and start packing as much as you can. Just calmly and quietly. Don’t do anything rash.”
“I think I’ll just cry.”
“Okay, do that then. Stay with Rich and me until this blows over. Just wait there, okay?”
“Okay.”
The phone went dead and Stella held it in her hand for a good minute. She wasn’t interested in putting the phone down. She stared at her front door which she’d only just stripped and painted a month ago. She remembered the day Jack returned home and noticed it.
“What the hell did you do that for?” he smiled as he walked in.
“Well, you were complaining about the grey paint coming off so I repainted it.” Stella, dressed in jeans, dribbled with red paint, a light blue bikini top and a bandana holding back her dark hair, sipped her lemonade.
“Did you sand it?”
“Yep.”
“How the hell did you get a sander?”
“I went down to Barry’s and saw Steve.”
“And what did Steve havta say?” His voice changed and deepened.
“I know what you’re thinking, I paid him full price to hire the sander and I got a quick lesson.”
“I’m sure he wants to give you more than a quick lesson…”
“Don’t be like that.” She touched his shoulder. “I sanded it back, primed it, and painted it.” She smiled a smile that went right through him. “I did it because I thought you’d like it.”
“Did you take back the sander?”
“Yeah.”
“What did Steve say?”
“What do you mean, what did he say?”
“Well, did you tell him what you were doing with it?”
“Why are you so interested in what Steve said?”
“Just tell me.”
She sighed. It was a dramatic sigh. “I asked him for the sander, he asked me what I was going to do with a sander, he made a joke about it, he said all I needed was a nail file, not a sander, I paid him cash, he showed me how to use it in circular motions, I brought it home, sanded the door, primed it, and returned it while the door was drying, he asked me how it went, I told him good, and he laughed because he really didn’t expect someone like me to be able to use a sander.” She took a breath. “That’s it.”
“And where did you get the paint?”
“Barry’s, I didn’t go anywhere else.”
Back swayed the door back and forward a couple of times, “You didn’t do a bad job.”
“You sound surprised.”
“I am surprised.”
Now sitting on the lounge suite, holding the telephone, Stella wasn’t really surprised. She was shocked. In the past, he had whacked her a few times when she was bad but he’d never done this before. But then again, she’d never done anything like this before.
After she eventually put the phone back on the receiver, she slowly made her way into her bedroom of seven years. It was exactly how she wanted it. Filled with the scent of frangipani’s delicately floating in small glass bowls intermittently placed around the room and seashells purposely positioned around each bowl. A light blue sheet was tucked around the bed and a lonely picture of the multi-coloured changing sheds in Brighton, Victoria hung on the wall.
She walked to the wardrobe and started packing her clothes. It was painful to watch.
When all that she owned in the wardrobe was neatly folded on the suitcase, she heard a knock at the front, ruby door.
“Come in,” she whispered.
“Stella, where are you?” Jenny yelled from the lounge room. In a matter of five seconds, Jenny, still dressed her pajama’s rushed into the bedroom. Stella burst into tears as Jenny hugged her.
“Stella, I know what you were trying to do, I know…” Jenny stroked Stella’s hair. “I know you wanted to get him out. But people, people like that,” Jenny paused, “people like that really have to want to get out.”
“I really thought he would’ve understood… I really thought he would…”
“Oh Stella.”
“He really wants me out.”
“I bet he does.”
Jenny looked around the room, “Come on Stell’s. Just take what you need.”
Jenny took the lead, found a couple of small suitcases and started filling them with random clothes, toiletries, photo albums and CD’s.
Stella on the other hand spent her time aimlessly walking in and out of the four large rooms of the house.
“Do you want to take the books?” Jenny yelled from the lounge room.
“Do we have room?” Stella weakly replied.
“We’ll make room if you want them…”
Stella sat there and stared at her now, near empty dream room. Jenny popped her head around the corner, “So, do you want the books or not?”
Stella looked up, “Yeah, yeah, we’ll take the books.”
“Okay.”
Stella got up off the bed and followed Jenny back into the lounge room where she was genuinely surprised to see her sparse lounge room.
“Stells, we can’t get everything. Rich and I’ll come back later.”
“I got rid of the drugs to get them out of the house, to get that poison out of our lives…”
“Stella. I know whatcha did. You did the right thing,” Jenny finally looked back up, “Come on Stell’s, we just have to concentrate on getting you out of here… You know his temper.”
“I still love him.”
“I know, I know you do. But you really have to be loved back.”
“But he does love me…”
“Yes. But not true love where you put the other person first. He loves his drugs.”
“And I suppose you and Richie are the perfect couple?”
“No Stell’s, no we’re not. You can’t carrying Jack…”
“You never liked him!”
“Stella.”
“You never did.”
“You’re right, I never liked him. But I love you…” Jenny walked up to her and cuddled her, “Come on Stell’s, come on, I’m not here to fight with you, I’m here to fight this with you.”
Three days had started and finished. Stella was quickly running out of tissues. She didn’t know how many tears she had left but guessed it was more than her sorry collection could hold.
She missed him so much. He was the one. He’d always been the one. In Stella’s mind, she’d played this scene a thousand times. Jack in the backyard. Jack with Jack Junior running around, playing ball, catch and any other game a father and son played. This scene had been so embedded in her mind, it was real.
Jack Junior would ask his father, “Dad, how can I be as strong as you?”
Dad you see, he’d just touch the back of his son’s head, ruffle his hair and reply, “Don’t worry son, you’ll be as strong as me when you grow up…”
And then there was young Estelle. Young Estelle would be sitting in her high chair, refusing to eat her mashed banana’s and doing it in such an adorable way. Young Estelle had her father’s golden hair and strong temperament but her mother’s charm and smile. It was a perfect picture. The pigeon pair.
But looking blankly at the wall and staring at Jenny’s Marilyn Monroe picture, Stella was struggle with her image. Her image started in Technicolor. Now, the colour had faded and the black outline was starting to run off the page.
“Stella?” Jenny walked through the front door and interrupted the desperate artist. “Have you been crying again?”
There was silence. Silence just before the next wave.
“Stella. You need to stop.” Jenny threw her handbag on the coffee table and sat down on the lounge.
Stella held her face in her hands. She felt a gentle hand on her shoulder.
“Stella. I saw him.”
The sooking stopped. Stella’s whole body stopped.
“He came into the Club.”
Stella removed her hands from her face and looked at the hazy outline of her best friend. She wiped her eyes. Her friend was looking better by the second.
Stella’s sentence was broken with different pitches. “When… When did you see him?”
“I didn’t want to tell you.” It was the quickest sentence Stella had ever heard.
“Just tell me.”
“He was…”
“He was what?”
Jenny removed her hand and wriggled on the lounge. “He was with someone.”
Stella grunted. It was a very horrible and disgusting fluid filled grunt. But it was classified as a grunt nonetheless. “Come on Jen. He’s always with someone…” Stella removed the water from her eyes with her saturated tissue.
“No Stella. He was with someone…” The emphasis was on the word someone. You know. The obvious emphasis on something that should be crystal clear. Jenny was desperately giving a clue. ‘Someone’. Jack was with ‘someone’.
All bells, whistles, sirens, jerks and mallets started going off.
“Who? Who was he with?”
Jenny started to get up off the lounge.
Without looking, Stella used one motion to reach up and grab Jenny’s arm. “Who Jenny?”
Jenny sat back down.
“Who Jenny? Who was he with?”
“I knew I shouldn’t have told…”
“Jenny!”
“Belinda. He was with Belinda.”
Stella’s world as she knew it, as she imagined it, piece by piece, smashed on the cold hard ground. One painfully slow frame at a time. Jack Junior had gone. Estelle had gone. Her two lovely children. Her two lovely children had been replaced by one ugly rerun. A grubby, ugly rerun called Belinda. That old chestnut.
“I had to tell you.”
“No you didn’t!”
“Stella!”
“He’s my boyfriend!”
Jenny got up off the lounge in double time. “Stella. He was there. He was there with her…”
“But it’s only been…”
“Stella.” Jenny walked into the unit’s only bathroom. “Stell’s. You know he’s no good for…”
“Oh fuck off Jenny.”
“Don’t be…”
“Fuck off! You hate him anyway!”
“That’s got nothing to do with this…”
“Why are you telling me this shit!”
“They were there.”
Stella looked down. She looked back up. She did it a couple of times and figured looking up and down wasn’t going to change this feeling. Nothing was going to change her light stomach and her heavy head. “Did they?” Stella started sniffling.
“Did they what?”
“Were they?”
“Were they what?”
Stella sighed dramatically. “Jenny! Were they together?”
It was an awkward moment. Stella felt it more.
“Look. They were close. I just saw them together and they were…”
The answer floated somewhere in the unspoken air. Stella didn’t want to talk. She didn’t want to listen. She wanted her frangipani’s. She wanted her goddamn fucking frangipani’s.
“Cuppa tea?”
Stella shook her head.
Jenny disappeared into the kitchen. There followed many cupboard and drawer openings. “I know you’re hurting,” Jenny yelled as she clicked on the kettle.
Stella stared up at Marilyn Monroe on the wall. Marilyn understood the pain. Marilyn had her heart broken as well. Many times. Not even she couldn’t escape the pain of a shattered heart.
“Stell’s. I know it’s not easy.” For a brief moment, she thought it was Marilyn talking. “These things happen for a reason.”
Marilyn just sat there in the black and white photo wearing a white shirt and striped knickerbockers, smiling through to her.
Jenny continued, “Don’t you remember ‘98?”
Marilyn had all the answers. Marilyn understood.
“Remember what I was like when I broke up with Troy?”
“Come on Jen. You were with him a year.”
“Hey! It was a year and a half and just because…”
“Seven years Jen! Jack’s been mine for seven years!”
“Hey! It doesn’t mean that…”
“Seven…”
“Stop that! Jack’s always been a prick! Just let him fuck…” There was a long clunk in the kitchen. “Oh”
Stella jumped off the lounge. She rushed into the kitchen and found Jenny scooping up scattered coffee beans all over the floor.
“I though you were making tea?”
“I was… but Rich… oh fuck!”
Jenny stood up and threw the now contaminated coffee beans in the bin. “Look. I hate to be blunt but after last night… I don’t think he loves you anymore.”
“Did he say that?”
“No. He didn’t say…”
“Then stop butting in.”
“Look. Just trust me on this one.”
Jenny pottered around the kitchen while Stella leaned against the archway. She wanted to leave. She wanted to run to the Hotel and see him. She didn’t care if Belinda was there sprawling her grubby little tits all over him.
Stella stood up straight and found herself trying to locate the nearest exit. She heard her mother’s voice. “Know where your exits are. Know how you’re going to get out of a bad situation. Have your vehicle ready. Have it ready for when you bolt out the door.”
Now, all she could see was the front door of the small third story apartment. She glanced over at the side window. She turned around and saw Jenny mid motion, thrusting a mug of coffee in her face, “It’s good stuff.”
Stella took a sip and as she did, the outlined image of her perfect family came back to her. Stella. Stella and Jack Moroney. Stella, Jack Moroney, and their beautiful children John and Estelle. It was so close she could feel it, yet so far, she couldn’t touch it.
“What’re you gonna do Stella?”
What was she going to do? Stella wanted to finish her coffee and cry for a long time. She wanted to scream out to Jack and ask why it was so easy to let his family go. How could it be so easy to let her go? Why couldn’t he want what she wanted?
“What do I want to do? I just wanna cry. Alone.”
When she said it aloud, she realized that finally, she’d told the absolute raw, rock bottom truth. She nodded her head as to congratulated herself for her pure honesty.
“Okay Stell’s. I’ll be in the bedroom if you need me.”
Jenny walked out of the kitchen and Stella walked back into the lounge room to continue her silent conversation with Marilyn.
It was a conversation that lasted another four days. It was just Stella, her tears and the most beautiful woman to ever walk this earth. But by day seven, Stella seemed to be fresh out of tears. It wasn’t a divine intervention, it was something a lot simpler than that. Pain. It was enough that her Jack wasn’t interested. The pain of expelling the tears, wiping her eyes, blowing her nose, and drowning her emotions didn’t seem to help her light stomach, weak body, and thumping head.
Stella was losing weight and found her jeans swimming around her hips as she walked. Her diet of coffee, two-minute noodles, and salty tears just didn’t give her the normal sustenance she’d become accustomed to.
Stella watched the fat boil up in the pan as she prodded her last packet of two-minute noodles. She took it over to the table, fought once again with the long strands and thought about something she hadn’t even considered for seven days. Stella. Stella and the now redundant seven years of her life.
She was now starting again. Or more to the point, starting at all. Ever since she was eighteen, she’d enjoyed being everyone’s favourite girl.
It was a complete accident. She wasn’t supposed to be working that night. He wasn’t supposed to be in her hometown. He only stopped because he was arguing with one of his suppliers on his mobile phone.
He walked into Bruno’s for a much-needed scotch. They flirted for hours. The first thing she was attracted to was his sideburns. Then it was his torso. His strength. It wasn’t until he threw her over his shoulder, caveman style, did she find out how strong he really was.
The first couple of years were the grandest of her life. She never went wanting. It worked out extremely well because she had simple tastes. Unlike his previous leeches apparently. Each of them had a nickname. All of them started with the words ‘high maintenance’. Stella was the fresh air Jack desperately needed and he told her time after time.
The only thing she ever wanted was to be taken care of. And that’s exactly what he did. That’s why for seven years, they worked so well.
That was, up until Stella wanted more. Wanted more for both of them. To live with what she described as the ‘right’ life. All of the drugs and the comings and goings were no environment for her young John and Estelle.
But with Jack now slipped out of her hands, she had nothing. And that’s what she was starting with. Correction. She now had a belly full of fat soaked two-minute noodles.
“How about some eggs, a whisk, some cream…” Jenny held the fridge door open and recited some form of a shopping list. She gave Stella her first job for the week. Go food shopping. It’s good therapy.
“Bread, some of that mustard mayonnaise and how about those little sponge cake things with the chocolate around them?”
“Lamingtons?” Stella replied, still writing down the word ‘mustard’.
“No not lamingtons, you know those spongy things…” Jenny let go of the fridge door, turned to Stella, and started using her hands. “They have a little dollop of cream in them but the cream’s covered with the chocolate, but you can still see the bottom sponge.”
Stella looked up and smiled.
“You have no idea what I’m talking about do you?”
“Wouldn’t have a bloody clue.”
Jenny turned around and opened the fridge again. “Oyster sauce, chicken, salami, carrots, apricots…”
Stella was furiously scribbling on a scrappy piece of paper. Jenny turned around again, this time, holding the fridge door open.
“You know Stella. The one’s we use to have at Mister Jordan’s house, you know those little chocolate sponge things.”
Stella, still writing looked up. “Mister Jordan?”
“Come on. You remember the old guy with the Sherlock Holmes hat…”
“Ah. Mister. Jordan. Yes! And those cakes!”
“Them!” Jenny let go of the fridge again. “Them! I want them!”
They both started giggling and Stella went to write on the piece of paper. She looked up again. “What’re they called?”
“They’re the spongy things Stells…”
“Oh shit I hate that. I know what you’re talking about now, I know exactly what they are! What the hell are they called?”
Jenny opened the fridge again. “Just put chocolate sponge things. Mister Jordan. I’m sure they still sell ‘em.”
Stella wrote down ‘Mister Jordan’.
It was a time in her life she’d forgot all about; the secret meetings with the man with the Sherlock Homes hat. He was such a wonderful man entertaining the young women until the day he died.
Stella never really got into Shakespeare, in fact, she hated it with a passion. She was heard to shout on at least on one occasion, “Is this English?”
Jenny made her stay. Mister Jordan kept her there.
He was the most beautiful man in the world. His soft voice. His immaculate appearance. He always said, “You never know when the Queen is going to drop in and visit.” May he rest in peace. No. May he be furiously running around in heaven making sure everyone had at least one of those ‘chocolate spongy’ things.
“Even the straw-bry one’s will be okay,” Jenny smiled, “I’m sure they still make them as well.”
Armed with her now two scraps of paper, Stella opened the door and waited for Jenny to fly past.
“I fuckin’ hate mornings,” Jenny huffed and puffed. “Fuckin’ Jay and his glandular fever.”
Jenny didn’t wait for Stella to lock the door, she just flew past and down the stairs. “Fuckin’ stairs.”
Stella locked the door and eventually met up with her friend a minute later, swearing at the car door. “Why couldn’t he fuckin’ tell me I had to come in yesterday?”
“Jen. Calm down. Just get there when you get there.”
“I had my fuckin’ morning planned.”
Jenny opened the car door and threw herself inside. Before she put the key in the ignition, she wound down her window a fraction, “You’ll be okay?”
Stella smiled. “I’ve been shopping before.”
Jenny turned the key to her 1983 Midnight Blue Gemini. “Fuckin’ car.” She stopped what she was doing, took a breath, and tried again. This time, everything seemed to work. The Gemini started to fill the immediate air with potent carbon dioxide. Jenny jammed the car into gear. “Okay. Remember. The spongy things.”
“You and your spongy things,” Stella smiled.
Jenny took off out of the car park and left Stella to suck in the black smoke.
Stella waited until the Gemini was out of site before she walked out of the car park and into the warm winter sun. She’d forgotten how lovely it really was. The softness. The purity. The sun on her arms and the sun that soaked through her singlet top. The sun on her legs, just below her knees. The warmth. The big soft blanket of warmth. The smell. The lavender. The jasmine. The hibiscus tree on the corner. The flowers with unpronounceable names. The birds. The nature. The trees, branches, the leaves, and the bushes. Mother Nature was just one big show off.
She walked down the street, slowly enough to absorb the neighbours flowers but quick enough for them not to think she wasn’t staring past the flowers and into their living rooms. She was smiling the ten-minute walk to the shopping centre accompanied by the flopping of her designer thongs against the soles of her feet.
Before she made it around the final corner to the Plaza, she found herself humming. She stopped making any noise and silently tried to figure out what song it was. She started humming the tune again as she walked down behind the shopping centre, shortcutting through the loading dock. As she turned the corner, she looked down at the dark bitumen. It was at that moment, she felt an enormous pain in the back of her head. Someone behind her had grabbed a handful of hair and yanked her back.
As her world stopped, so did her heart. Life had just been put on freeze-frame and was now being played in slow motion. The person with the remote was clicking one slow frame at a time.
As her body jolted, it kick started her heart. It was only then she squealed. She wailed one of those high-pitched squeals only a girl could get away with.
The person from behind with a hold of her hair and with one great movement, threw her backwards onto the pavement. She put her arms out to break the help the fall.
She landed awkwardly on her side. The back of her head was thumping so hard she was afraid the thumping would open the back of her skull.
In total shock, she looked up and saw Tommy. Repeat. Tommy. Jack’s Tommy.
“Ya did a real stupid thing Stella.” He smiled as she looked up at him with her grazed and freshly bleeding arms.
“Tommy,” she gulped.
She looked at her arms and saw the long rows of blood screaming, ready to burst out of her skin and rain on the pavement. “What are you doing?”
She balanced her way to stand up. As she did, she saw the mighty fist she’d always heard about. Now it was more than a rumour. It was now imbedded in her beautiful face.
She screamed again. She fell to the ground again. This time she thumped to the ground and her aching arms didn’t do much to help the fall. Some small pavement stones latched themselves inside her fresh wounds and she cried out again.
“Tom…”
He took a step towards her. All she could see were his boots and pants. She didn’t think there could be a pain greater other than the one in the back of her head. She was wrong. The pain on the left of her face had superseded that. Her arms and hands didn’t know where to go or what to do.
But in a matter of seconds, they knew their role.
She looked up at him, her big brown eyes, the same eyes Tommy said he had a crush on. Her nose was bleeding, she was losing vision in her left eye, and her whole head was hotter than lava about to spew up from a volcano.
She felt it. The boot to her belly. Not once, not twice, but three times. Machine gun like, ranging from her lower breast to her crutch. The first two were impacted by fat, organs, and last night’s dinner. The third one hurt the most. Being kicked square on her pubic bone. She screamed out again. This time not so loud. Her hands shot directly to her lower torso.
“I think it’s best you fuck off outta here.”
Through her one good eye, she saw him crouch down in front of her.
“Jack said kill ya. I can’t kill me Stella.”
She saw him smile and move his hand again towards her face. She flinched and closed her eyes.
“Don’t be scared darling,” she heard him laugh. Then she felt him stroke her hair.
“Tommy… Please…”
“I can’t kill my Stella,” he gently whispered. “I can fuck her up, but I can’t kill her.”
All she could see was black. A lot of white clouds, but a hell of a lot of black.
“Don’t make me fuck you darling. I’ve always wanted to fuck you. But don’t make me do it.” He leaned closer to her right ear, “Because if I do Stells, I’d have to kill ya.”
She didn’t hear anything for a couple of seconds but felt him stand up. He kicked her again. This time he got part of her arm and her breastbone.
“No-one fucks Jack. You of all people…”
Stella wasn’t doing a good job protecting herself. She opened her eyes and saw flashing stars. She saw his outline hurrying away.
She just starred at graffiti on the brick wall next to her but didn’t really understand what she was staring at. All she could understand was the pain just vibrated throughout her body. It was at that moment, the bells started ringing in her head.
It was more of a siren then a bell. A constant high-pitched siren that echoed and engraved itself in her ear. The pain in her belly was excruciating. She clutched it like she’d never let go.
As she was trying desperately to get up, or sit up, she saw a flash travel in her general direction. She thought he was coming back. She tried with all her energy, might, to use her bloody arms to get up.
“Sweetheart. Sweetheart. Are you okay?” It was a male voice. But it wasn’t Tommy’s.
Stella, still seeing stars, didn’t know where the voice was coming from.
“Sweetheart. Can you hear me?”
Dazed, confused, and hurting, Stella flapped her arms in the air. “What? What?”
“I just saw what happened. I came as quick… I tried.”
Stella with the help of this stranger managed to sit up straight.
“We need to get you to a hospital… your nose… I reckon it’s broken…”
There was still an element of shock bouncing through her brain. One minute she was thinking about the beautiful carnations, the next, she was being kicked as hard as a cannonball being fired in her belly.
Her brain stopped working.
“Come one sweetheart… We’ll get you to a…”
He was holding her hand and her back.
“No.” She shook her head, trying desperately to get her good eye to focus. “No. I’ll be…”
“Darl. I saw everything. I’m on your side. I’ll get the Cop’s…”
“No!” Now her brain was starting to catch up. “No! No cops!”
“Look at your eye.”
“No cops! Who are you?”
He held her close. “I just saw what happened. I tried… I tried to get here…. As quick as… But…”
Stella flapped her arms again. “No cops. I’ll be fine.” She slurred like she was drunk. “I’ll be fine.”
Her body was limp, bruised, and bleeding. All of a sudden, an image popped into her head. The spongy things. Jenny’s fucking spongy things.
“I have to…” she tried to get up. But she knew she couldn’t without this stranger. “Can you please…”
“Let me help you. I’ll take you to the hospital.”
“No! No hospital. I’ll be okay…”
“You’re bleeding and I saw him kick you…”
Her vision was slowly getting better but not by much. She saw his brown hair. He was white. That’s all she could see through her good right eye.
He held her hand and used what she thought was all his strength to pull her upright. “Sweetheart, what’s your name?”
“Stella.”
“Stella. We really need to get you to a hospital.”
“No! I wanna go home!”
“You’re bleeding, you need to…”
“No! I’ll be fine.” She looked at her arms and noticed grazes crossed all over. The picture she was looking at was dream like. It didn’t really happen. Stella was watching this horrible movie where a young girl had just got belted up. It wasn’t Stella. That’d never happen to her.
“Who was he?” The stranger was holding Stella as she wobbled on the spot.
“Who was what?”
“The guy. Do you know him?”
Of course she did. It was Tommy. She taught him how to cook and taught him how to beat her at Scrabble. He was someone she knew, understood and empathizes with.
Stella didn’t think he could turn so easily and kick her with all his might. But was he using all his might? It was all too fast. It was all too confusing.
“If you’re not going to the Hospital or to the Cops, what’re gonna do?”
Stella didn’t know. Well, she did. She wanted the pain to stop. She desperately wanted this thumping in her head, belly, and bones to stop.
“Home. I wanna go home.” She looked down at her legs and because of her reflex, wiped away the bitumen stones that were embedded in her sores. Leaning down made her want to fall down again so she shot back up in the air.
“Okay darling. Where do you live? I’ll make sure you get home…”
“I’m okay. Just give me a minute.”
Stella, now standing up, still with an aide, decided to take a step forward and see if she could do it by herself.
“Take it easy.”
She was starting to feel a little stronger each slow second that ticked by. She wanted to get home, out of the street and back to the sanctity of Jen’s locked apartment.
“I’ll take you home. We’ll call the ambulance from there.”
She pushed him away. “No ambulance.” Every mention of an emergency services department inflamed her even more. “Just take me home.”
She took a step away and he followed her motion. “Okay. We’ll take you home, just take it easy.”
His voice was very soothing. It was like he was reading a verse of romantic poetry. He held her close. “Come on. We’ll get you home.”
She touched her nose and looked at her hand. Blood pooled all over it.
“If you don’t want an ambulance, we need to get you a cab at…”
“No. No. I’m just down the road. We’ll walk…”
“Not in your state.”
He took the lead and started held her as they made their way down the main street.
“Stella. Which way?”
She looked around at the main road. She saw several cars zoom past but all she could really see was a whole bunch of blurry colours.
“Oh… I think…” She tried to think. She used everything she had left to think. “Left.”
She looked at this stranger. He was taller than her, he had streaked dark hair, a symmetrical face and dark eyes. He was furiously looking around.
“Stella. Sit down.” He guided her to a knee-high brick wall. “I’ll get a cab…”
He really didn’t give her a choice. That may have been his plan. She had one of her own. “Okay.”
She sat there. Slumped on a brick wall, bleeding profusely, still processing what had just happened. Well, she knew what happened but Tommy? Tommy of all people. And Jack. Jack telling Tommy to kill her? All of her thoughts were now slowly merging together.
Tommy. Jack. The Drugs. Young John and Estelle. This stranger. The Brick wall. The carnations. Those spongy things. The red door. The pain of her forearm. That Shakira song. The blue of the car driving past. The money she used to have. Tommy. Jack. The drugs. Young John and….
The guy had gone. The guy had disappeared from her blurry sight. It was time to jump from his plan to hers. She tried to get herself up off the brick wall. Her arms killed her. Every time she moved them, the wind seemed to pick up and blow dirt air into them. It was like she was being canned all over again.
She steadied herself as she got up and managed to stand up straight. It was an achievement in itself. She turned to her left and looked down the street. She could barely see the end but knew, that once she got there, and locked the door behind her, she’d be safe from Tommy, this stranger and the Cops. So she did the only thing she thought she could do. She made it as quick as she could down the end of the street.
But Stella’s quick wasn’t a standard ‘quick’. It was ‘a drunk, stumble quick’. She looked around the street and saw the colours of the flowers she’d admired so much on her way down the street earlier. She remembered a street, a street she crossed and saw it in her hazy vision.
She slowly fought her way through the air, using her only working limbs to get herself across the street and closer to her haven. She exhaled. She felt herself getting faster by the second. She knew she wasn’t that fast, but fast was forward and that was the right direction to be traveling in.
Stella saw the bright green house she cringed when she saw it the first time. A washed out light green that really didn’t deserve to be a colour. She knew if she counted her steps, she’d only have to count about a hundred to Jen’s unit.
Every step deserved its own prize. The wind was picking up. It’s only purpose seemed to be to dry the blood. She looked down at her white shirt and saw blood strewn across it. She put her right index finger and thumb against her nose to stop the drainage. But fuck, it hurt.
Her feet were moving faster and by the time she was playing around with her nose, she realized she was only about four houses away and continuing to gain momentum.
She stopped. She looked behind her. She didn’t see anyone and thanked herself for being so quick. It was only about another fifty metres to go. Her only objective now was to get up the three flights of stairs, regroup, and hopefully not hit the ground again.
Stella made it up the three flights of stairs and made it safely into the apartment. Once she closed the door behind her, she spent the next ten minutes slowly repairing herself. She used the laundry trough to wash down the blood from her arms and legs.
Just before she was about to put antiseptic on her wounds, she decided to cleanse her body. It wouldn’t stop the bleeding but would hopefully make her feel marginally better.
When she undressed, she looked at her bloody clothes then walked to Jenny’s full-length mirror and stared at her tarnished naked body. She burst into tears. The left side of her face was not only red and shiny, but it was nearly twice the size of the other, untouched side of her face. Her lip had swollen. Dry blood was scattered everywhere. Her torso and the side of her back was covered with valleys and troughs full of aching colour.
She took a few steps into the shower and let the water from the showerhead and the water from her tears wash away everything that was making her hurt so much. But one thing that was helping her. Her white blood cells.
They were racing to her rescue. Racing and thumping to what seemed like against time.
She got out of the shower dripping wet, walked to the hallway cupboard and grabbed one of Jenny’s old towels. Ever so gently, she patted herself down.
The red lines and smudged down her now dry body were now becoming more evident. It could’ve been because she could see a little better through her left eye. She surveyed her whole body. Swelled left face, a maybe broken nose, a myriad of marks over both her arms, marks on her hands, fresh bruises on her stomach, marks on her legs and a still thumping head.
She found some knickers, slowly put them on, and sat down on Jenny’s lounge. She tried to get her head together but was coming up with more questions than answers.
What just happened? Why did he thump me? Okay I got rid of Jack’s money and drugs. How did he find me? Was it just a coincidence or was he following me? Has Jack had me under surveillance all this time? Does he really want to kill me? If he wanted to kill me, wouldn’t he have done it by now? Was this just a scare tactic? Is this another ‘Jack thing’ where he belts me and then we make up? Tommy said he’d kill me. I can’t believe what he just did. I taught him how to fucking cook.
She got up off the lounge and walked to her temporary bedroom to cover the shame all over her body. She dressed in jeans and a light long sleeved shirt before making it back to the bathroom.
It was there she decided that she’d have to leave. She picked up her bloody clothes and when she picked up her shorts, realized that she had Jenny’s hundred dollars for the long list of food she’d have to cart back to the apartment.
After fishing around in her bloodied shorts for it, she thought back to the day she gave the seventeen thousand dollars away. Her ambition to start all over again was far greater than even having one dollar of drug money. Now, holding this note in her hand, she knew what she had to do with it. She put the money in her jeans pocket.
Stella bundled up her bloody clothes, along with Jenny’s old towel, stuffed them in a plastic bag, and threw them against the front door. She walked back into her bedroom, slowly reached under her bed and pulled out her suitcase.
This time she was going to have to pack alone and only take the things she really needed. She went through the whole bedroom and managed to fill the suitcase up in a couple of minutes. She packed only a few photos of her and Jenny and her and Jack when she came across a picture of Tommy.
“How could you Tom?”
He stared back at her and in her mind she heard, “How could YOU Stella?”
She ripped the photo in half and left it on the bed. As she did, she heard his voice for real. “Stella! I know you’re in there!”
She looked at her suitcase. She looked out through her bedroom door and into the hallway. There was a thunder at the door. “Stella! Don’t make me break the fucking door!”
She heard her mother’s voice. “Know your exits; have your vehicle ready.”
Stella used all her might. She grabbed her suitcase. It was bloody heavy for her weak grip. She dragged it into the lounge room.
“Stella! I just wanna talk!”
Looking at the front door, she made her way to the window and quickly giggled the dead bolt. The window wasn’t moving. Every other time she opened it during the week, it slid up with ease. Now, it wasn’t budging. “Come on. Come on please…” She stopped what she was doing.
“Now you’re pissin’ me off Stella!”
She slowly pushed the window up but not before the doorknob started to move.
Stella used every ounce she had to hoist the suitcase up on to the sill. It took her a couple of seconds but she managed to balance it as she looked down at the yard below.
It was a long way straight down. But the front door jiggle got louder each second that passed. She kept looking down and before she knew it, her suitcase was testing the length from the window to the ground.
It made an enormous sound. She heard one of her glass frames smash into pieces.
“What the fuck was…” The door stopped moving.
Stella looked at the door then concentrated on getting herself through the small opening of the window. She only had a little frame. But then again, so did the window.
Stella didn’t have anything much to lean against. It wasn’t like she was going to jump bungee style, from a standing position. She thought about it. She didn’t really want to do it but now, Tommy had started kicking at the door.
She looked down at her now lopsided suitcase and knew it would only be a matter of minutes before Tommy figured a way to get inside.
Her adrenalin was violently pumping through her working veins. She closed her eyes. She counted to three. She made it to two and jumped. As she was falling, she realized that she hadn’t figured out her landing procedure. Yes on the suitcase but how…
Thud. Stop. Thud and crack.
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You did a pretty good job writing this, there are just a few things that i thought i should point out to you however.
First of all i came across this, “fucking photo’s!” ” Photos do not own anythiny at all. You are using the possesive form of that word when it doesn’t need to be that way. Try instead, fucking photos!” Just get rid of the apostripe and we are all good grammer wise.
Next thing i found was while reading this, “Steve havta say” Maybe have it be “hav’ta” instead of havta. It makes the reader have to stop and figure out what you are getting at.
Next thing i came across was this, “can’t carrying Jack” Carrying doesn’t work for that sentence because you are saying that can’t carry him not carrying him. So just drop the ing and it willl work much better.
Besides that you did a prett good job with the story. You tried very hard and put a lot of effort as well as time into it. I hope that i helped in some way shape and / or form. Keep it up all you got to do is polish it off a bit and all. You get an 8 out of 10.
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Wow, another great chapter, with the same compelling drama as its predecessor.
The reaction of Jack was well written and the emotional Stella made for a believeable breakup.
Jenny is so supportive of Stella, even when she is blaming her friend for her own breakup.
I don’t think Jack really loved Stella, if he got with someone else so soon after the break up.
The emotion showed by Stella will draw people in, as everyone has had a heatbreak at some time.
Well done and looking forward to the next installment.
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