I Ain't Me No More (20 page)

Jina sighed just as deeply as I did, as if she'd been holding her breath, as if she somehow knew exactly what I was going through. Who knows? Perhaps she did.

Now that I had confessed to my coworkers out loud that I was a victim of domestic abuse, I had only one question. “So are you going to help me?”

“Yes.” My boss nodded. “Yes, indeed. We are going to do everything we need to in order to ensure your protection while you're here.”

And that was just what my boss did. He immediately called a meeting with the owner of the company to enlighten him about my situation. The receptionist and her backups were notified, as well as the mail room staff. The building security was even asked to be more vigilant. A description of Dub was given to everyone who might encounter him, as were emergency safety procedures. The very next day my company even installed an emergency call button under the receptionist's desk and a button that gave her the capability of automatically locking the glass double entrance doors to the office at her discretion.

I wouldn't call it a false sense of security. I appreciated the steps my job had taken to protect me. But I couldn't stay inside my workplace forever. I had to eventually go out into the world, a world in which I felt one day, and sooner rather than later, Dub would be waiting.

“Helen,” the receptionist said through the phone intercom, “you have a call on line three.”

“Thank you,” I told her, then waited for the call to come through. “This is Helen,” I said, picking up after the first beep.

“Five days left and you're dead,” was all I heard. It was all I had allowed myself to hear before slamming the phone down in its cradle as if it were a hot potato.

Dub's chilling voice had come through that phone like a killer's voice in a horror movie, just before the victim got killed. I couldn't believe it. Dub was, once again, taking advantage of the loophole in the restraining order, and he was using it to his advantage to the fullest. First, the letter to my job and now the phone call. He'd left me with no choice. I'd have to go back down to the prosecutor's office and see if there was a way to fix the restraining order to include my workplace. But with him being released in less than a week, did it really matter now?

My eyes immediately watered. Dub meant business. He wasn't going to let up. He was consumed with thoughts of killing me and my loved ones and wasn't going to let up until he did.

“Helen.” I jumped when I heard the receptionist's voice blaring through my telephone intercom once again.

“Uh . . . uh . . . yes,” I stammered.

“You have another call, on line one this time.”

I remained silent for a few seconds. I was trying to think of a lie the receptionist could tell the caller as to why I couldn't take the call. It was too late; the call was coming through.

After the first beep I thought about allowing it to go to voice mail because I knew it wasn't anybody but Dub, but then I'd eventually have to hear his chilling voice on my voice mail. By the second beep, I'd convinced myself to just get it over with. The clock was ticking. Days were passing by. Sooner or later I'd have to face Dub. I needed peace of mind back. And fast.

“Listen, you bastard,” I began in a low whisper, not wanting my coworkers to hear the language I was about to use. “If you are going to kill me and my family, just do it. Be a man about it and just do it, but don't be a coward, sending me letters and calling me on the phone. Do you hear me?”

There was silence on the phone. I assumed Dub was in shock as my standing up to him was a rarity. I hadn't stood up to him since I'd discovered the naked woman in my house. That had been the first and the last . . . until now. And although I was making a death wish, I felt good about it. I felt empowered, for lack of a better word. I quickly went from feeling empowered to feeling embarrassed when the voice on the other end of the line finally spoke.

“Helen . . . this is your aunt Lisa.”

I burst into tears. For the first time in my life I'd finally stood up to Dub, or at least I thought I had, only to find that it wasn't even him on the other end of the phone. I couldn't take it anymore. I just couldn't. Not only hadn't I stood up to Dub, but now I'd definitely have to explain to my aunt what my rant was about. And through plenty of tears, I did just that. I told her all about the years of abuse, my escape from Dub, his letters, threats, and phone calls. “I just don't know what to do, besides plan my own funeral,” I said, sniffing through the phone receiver.

“I feel so bad. I should have known. I should have done something.” I could tell she was now crying.

“Please, Aunt Lisa, this is hardly your fault. There was nothing you could have done about it,” I assured her.

She paused for a moment, sniffing and then blowing her nose. “You know what? You're right.” Her voice lightened up just a tad. “Maybe there wasn't anything I could have done about it then, but that doesn't mean I can't do something now.” Then I could almost hear the wheels churning in her head. “I've got an idea,” my aunt Lisa said.

Once Aunt Lisa shared with me her plan on how to help me deal with my situation with Dub, I was on the fence. Going along with her idea meant opening myself up big-time. It meant taking a big risk, but the more I thought about Dub and his threats, which I knew beyond a doubt he would go through with, the more I realized I didn't have anything to lose. After all, what could be worse than losing my own life? So hesitantly at first, but eagerly at the end, I agreed to my aunt's idea. Her idea definitely trumped just running down to the prosecutor's office again.

 

 

“Come in,” Nana said to the Channel Ten news reporter. It was now four days after I talked to my aunt Lisa. One day remained before Dub would be released from jail.

“Thank you,” the reporter said as she entered Nana's living room, followed by a cameraman.

My heart raced, but there was no turning back now. I'd given my aunt Lisa permission to call the news station and tell them my story, how I had remained in an abusive relationship without even my family knowing. How most of my family would be finding out about the abuse for the first time ever as they watched it on the news.

“You must be Helen,” the news reporter said to me when she saw me sitting on the living-room couch. “I'm Andrea Storm with Channel Ten News.” She extended her hand.

I stood and shook her hand. “I'm Helen Lannden. Please have a seat.” I sat back down and gestured for her to sit next to me. I felt like I had butterflies flying through my stomach. It wasn't a nervous fluttering; it was a feeling of anxiousness. Even though I was about to tell the entire world of my humiliating ordeal, my spirit felt at peace in doing so.

“Your aunt gave me some background on your story, but I'd like for you to tell me about your situation in your own words.” She took out a pen and notebook. “You don't mind, do you?” she said in regards to her writing down what I was about to tell her. “I just want to talk with you before we begin taping to make sure I'm going in the right direction with the story.”

“Oh, okay,” I agreed. After all, the world would hear the story in my own words in a matter of minutes. Who cared if she had it down on paper as well? So I began to tell her about the years of abuse I'd suffered at the hands of Dub. I even told her about how he had shattered my car window, which ended in a trip to the hospital due to glass in my eyes. I dug up every single threatening letter Dub had written me and allowed her to read them.

Andrea took steady notes, but at certain points, when I caught myself off in a daze, talking, reflecting, and providing her blow-by-blow details of my mental, physical, and sexual abuse, her pen would remain frozen in her hand, as if she was too stunned to even write.

After about a half hour, Andrea closed her notebook. “Well, Helen, I think we have enough.” She looked at me with such pity, almost as if she couldn't believe I'd lived through all that I'd shared with her. “As a matter of fact, I think we have more than enough.” She thought for a moment. “Before we begin taping, do you have a photo of Dub?”

“I might,” I said. That was when I realized that Dub, Baby D, and I had never taken pictures together. There were no family portraits, or even father and son pictures, for that matter, but then I remembered one picture that I did have. “Just a minute,” I told Andrea as I went upstairs and retrieved my senior year memory book, which had been packed away ever since I moved into Nana's house. In the memory book was a prom picture of me and Dub. “This is the only one I have.” I handed Andrea the picture as I sat back down on the couch.

Andrea admired the picture of the lovely couple smiling for the cameraman. All of a sudden she looked up at me. “Had he already been abusing you at the time this picture was taken?” I nodded. “Hmmm. I wonder how many mothers and fathers have their daughter's prom picture sitting on the mantel, with no idea that the very date in the picture is abusing her. Even worse, I wonder how many mothers and fathers have their son's prom picture on the mantel, with no idea that their son is abusing the very date in the picture.”

I shrugged. Abuse wasn't something girls sat around discussing in the girls' locker room. It was the best kept secret I knew of. So whoever said that girls couldn't keep secrets was wrong.

“Well, let's get ready,” Andrea said, looking at the cameraman, who had managed to set up everything while Andrea and I were talking. He gave her a nod, letting her know that he was all set. She then looked at me. “One last question, Helen. Why are you doing this? What do you want out of this interview airing? I mean, I know Dub is scheduled to get out of jail tomorrow, but he's locked up on unrelated charges. So what is your purpose for doing this?”

I didn't even have to think about the answer to that question. The answer to that question was what had allowed me to give my aunt the go-ahead to contact the media in the first place. I had literally felt as though I was living my last days on earth, so without flinching, I looked Andrea in her eyes and said, “I am going to be murdered, and I want the world to know exactly who killed me.” I then turned to the cameraman. “I'm ready!”

“I can't believe you did that! Why didn't you just tell me? I would have taken care of the situation. Now I look like a punk, like I can't protect my family!” Dino ranted and raved as he paced back and forth across Nana's living room. It was just seconds after my story had appeared that evening on the five o'clock news.

The morning Andrea came to Nana's, I'd taken off half a day from work. But right after we wrapped up, I'd headed back to the office, feeling like even if Dub came straight to my house once he was released from jail the next day and carried out every threat he'd ever described, I was going to live that last day free, which was something I'd never truly really been since getting trapped in Dub's clutches. He'd always held a piece of my mind captive.

Nana had called me and told me that the story had aired at noon, but with everybody at work, virtually no one had seen it then. Those very few who had made sure to get on the horn and let everyone know to tune in to the five o'clock news to receive the shock of their life, which was the truth about mine.

“Look, Dino, I'm sorry. But I felt as though this was my last resort,” I told him.

“But you didn't even give me a chance. I'm sure I could have talked with Dub man to man and—”

My mom, who had come over to Nana's after seeing the story on the news, burst out laughing. “
Talk?
Boy, please, Dub don't do no talking. Trust me, I've dealt with that fool.”

“I didn't want to tell you and have you all caught up in the middle,” was what my reply to Dino was. I think that was one of the reasons why a lot of abused girls and women didn't tell what their mate was doing to them. They knew they got that crazy daddy, brother, or cousin who would do something they'd have to repent for later, or serve jail time for. Not telling was their way of protecting the people they loved. So they sacrificed themselves. “I was just trying to protect you.”

“Protect me? From what?” Dino fumed. “Dub ain't nothing but a man just like me. I could have talked to dude, and if he tried to jump bad, then we'd take it from there.”

Once again my mother burst out laughing as she headed back into the kitchen. Dino and I both heard her mumble as she shook her head at Dino's ignorance. “He just doesn't get it. He can't beat Dub.”

Dino looked at me after my mother's comment. “Is that what you think too? That I can't beat him?”

I couldn't even stand there and think about lying to Dino about how I felt. I knew he was no match for Dub, not while he was in this relentless state. Dub had been shot, stabbed, and dragged by an automobile, and still he stood. He was like a real-life boogeyman.

“Answer me!” Dino exclaimed when I was taking too long to respond.

“You can't beat him, Dino. I mean, you're bigger than him and everything, but Dub's not going to fight, so I don't mean you can't beat him physically. What I mean is that he's crazy. You can't beat him at being crazy. The things he'd do to a person, you don't have it in you to do,” I said, trying to reason with Dino without insulting his manhood.

“Unbelievable!” Dino flopped down on the couch. “So that's why you left me in the dark for so long. I mean, why should you tell me about this crazy fool when all along you felt in your heart that I couldn't protect you, anyway. Now I'm looking like a buster. Got my peeps calling me, talking 'bout, ‘Y'all all right, man? Everything good with the family? You need some back up?'”

“Please don't try to make this about you,” I said, trying to contain my anger as I watched him whine.

“Helen, it's for you.” My mother peeked around the corner with the kitchen phone in her hand. I was so engaged in my conversation with Dino that I hadn't even heard the phone ring. “It's the news station.”

I went and took the phone, wondering what the news station could possibly want. “This is Helen . . .Yes . . . Really? . . . Oh my God! Thank you! Thank you! Yes, I can be there. Thank you again so much,” I said before I hung up the phone with Andrea. “Thank you, God!” I shouted as I fell to my knees. No, I wasn't a practicing Christian. No, I couldn't even consider myself a babe in Christ. But this all had to have been orchestrated by God. That much I knew . . . I felt.

“What it is?” Nana asked, coming out of her bedroom and into the kitchen.

“That was Andrea, the lady from the news that interviewed me,” I answered. “She said the news station contacted the courts, asking them if there was anything more they could do to protect me from Dub. Come to find she got a call back from the prosecutor's office, which says that Dub sending me threatening letters through the U.S. mail is a felony, and they can charge him one count for each letter he sent that I can present to the judge.”

“So what does that mean?” my mom asked.

“It means that if I can get down to the prosecutor's office ASAP, they can start the paperwork and present it to the judge first thing in the morning.”

I was shaking with anxiety. I was anxious to get down to that courthouse. I made a mental note to call Andrea up later and thank her again. She'd contacted the courts, putting a fire under them and pushing them to do something more. She'd aired my story, so if Dub got out and harmed me, there was no doubt my story would come back to haunt the legal system, which I'd reached out to for help. They did not want that type of embarrassment.

I immediately headed to my bedroom and dug up every single threatening letter Dub had written me, along with the postdated, stamped envelopes, which showed he'd used the federal postal service to get them to me.

“Dino, do you want to drive me?” I asked as I cleared the corner and entered the living room, only to find the spot where Dino had been sitting empty. I went to the window and looked outside.

“He's gone,” my mother said. “He left.”

A small part of me could understand how Dino must have felt, but the bigger part of me was more concerned about protecting myself and my family, and Dino too, for that matter. So without harping on Dino's absence, I headed out the door to meet the prosecutor.

 

 

“What do you want me to do?” the judge asked me. “Keep him in jail forever?”

I couldn't believe the sarcasm of this man. After reading all those letters he'd been presented with by the prosecutor that morning, how could he not want to lock Dub up and throw away the key? Here this man was ready to just let Dub go on his merry way without so much as a fine. Something was wrong. Something was very wrong. That was when it dawned on me that the judge had received my case only that morning, and now it was only early afternoon.

“Have you read the letters?” I asked him. This man probably hadn't even read the letters, and yet he was ready to rule.

He paused. “No,” he said in an almost inaudible voice that didn't hide his unease.

By now my eyes were filled with tears of both anger and frustration. I was angry because this man had been all ready to decide the outcome of the case—my fate—without even having taken the time to review the crux of my complaint. The crux of my fear.

I supposed the judge could read all these emotions circling in my mind like a tornado, as he decided to take a few seconds and read over some of the letters right then and there. Every now and then the expression on his face would change, as if he couldn't believe the words he'd just read. Then he would look at Dub, who stood at the defendant's table, with disdain.

I, on the other hand, had not looked at Dub one time in the courtroom. I could feel his intimidating presence. I could feel him staring me down with his eyes, which he was using as daggers. Just that morning I could imagine him as happy as a lark, knowing this was the day he was to be released back into society. This was the day he would be set free. I pictured him all packed and ready to go. So when the guards came for him, I was sure he hadn't had an inkling they would be bringing him to court for fresh charges. Unadulterated anger had to be writhing inside of him, like a worm trying to escape the hook of a fisherman.

I had always feared Dub, no doubt, but what I feared more than Dub at that moment was fear itself. I didn't want fear to force me to back down. I'd come too far. The light at the end of the tunnel was shining brightly on me. I couldn't dim it with the darkness that Dub held within himself. So I just kept my eyes on the judge and did something I hadn't done in a long time. I prayed.

After one minute of praying and only one minute of the judge getting the gist of the letters, my prayer was answered.

“Mr. Dublen Richard Daniels, I find these letters to be repulsive and threatening. Not only that, but I find them to be a violation of the laws set in place by the state of Ohio and the federal government.” The judge sifted through some other papers. “Had you not committed prior criminal acts that involved violence, I might have almost chalked these letters up to simple jailhouse threats, but with your record, I can't take the chance with Miss Lannden.”

The judge looked at me as if he wanted to wink at me, letting me know that he was on my side, after all.

I stifled the smile that was wrestling to make a courtroom appearance.

“I know you were probably incensed at the time these letters were written,” the judge continued. “And there is a possibility that you didn't mean everything you said and that you would never carry out these threats.” He looked down at the letters again and then looked at me. “But I'm not willing to take that chance.” Turning his attention back to Dub, he concluded, “So, with that being said, I'm sentencing you to twelve months jail time.” The judge slammed the file closed. “Plus the other four months from your last sentence that you didn't serve. Since the last eight months didn't give you time to cool off, maybe the next sixteen will do the trick.”

“Hallelujah!” I shouted, with tears of joy now streaming down my face. At the time I didn't even know that “Hallelujah” was the highest praise to God. All I knew was that God had answered my prayers and I had to communicate my gratefulness in His own language.

In the midst of all the celebrating, as I watched the deputies handcuff Dub and take him right back to jail, I forgot one thing. I forgot about my promise to God. And it wouldn't be long before I forgot about God altogether. How I saw it, when I was in trouble, when I wanted something from God, I knew exactly what to say in prayer. But once God had done what I'd asked Him to do, I didn't know what to pray about. God realized this same thing about me too, so it would only be a matter of time before He gave me something else to pray about.