It’s
Me
Pinned. Lying on the floor, the weight of
his 220 pound body pressing down on my chest. With every exhale his body sinks further
down, leaving less room for my lungs to expand. I’m helpless. His knees holding
my arms down as another strike bears across my right cheek. Searing pain envelopes
me as his fist misses the intended mark and lands square across my right eye.
Tears pool but quickly drain, exiting through the outside corners of my eyes.
***
Karen
Gentry’s essay “No Exit,” describes a personality test, the Myers-Briggs Type
Indicator (MBTI). “Candidates were given a list of ninety-three questions and a
Scantron form on which bubble in their answers” (Gentry 17). The test would
then be analyzed based on which words applicants would place together, creating
a list of personality traits.
Who
wouldn’t want to know who they are or what personality type they have? She
decided to take the test, but she was disappointed at the outcome, “she was
always an INFP. An introverted, intuiting, feeling perceiver” (19). Almost
insulted, she takes another test, then another, and another, hoping for a
different result.
***
Smiling and laughing in the car as we head
to Naperville, Illinois for his hearing – some parking violation. I begin jamming
out to Nickelback’s “Someday.” I wasn’t paying attention as I turned the volume
up on the radio while watching the trees and buildings speed past my window. Pulling
into a small strip mall, I turn my head, still singing and smiling, and in an
instant my eyes focus in on his hands. His white knuckles contrasting against
the dark grey steering wheel. His hand releases and his arm flies towards my
face. Instinctively, I turn my head in an attempt to lighten the blow I know is
coming, but my actions result in a solid collision between his white knuckles
and my nose. Tears well in my eyes as the blood from my nose lines my top lip.
***
Years
are passing and with this she given a new boss. This boss is different
insisting all of the employees engage in an activity that will encourage
everyone to ask questions to one another. To get to know each other. However,
this posed an issue as she saw the picture of her husband on her desk. A man
that left, unwillingly, when she was younger.
She
did not want to participate in the new game and was deemed a “hard-core
aggressive anaconda,” a “dream snatcher,” a “limitation thinker” (21). Has she
changed? Has all of the hurt and anger from her life changed who she is? However,
she holds tightly to one possession, cassette tapes. Tapes her husband made
before he passed. Tapes she would never let go of.
***
Immobile, frightened, dead. He has me. On my
knees he is behind me, his arm around my neck squeezing tighter until I can’t
breathe. His arm feeling like an anaconda who constricts its prey before
consuming it. My eyes being to blur and I am to the point of passing out. As
quickly as it had started, he released me, but he wasn’t done with me yet. I
flopped to the floor as I began gasping for air. I can hear him, opening a
drawer, then the sound of metal clinking together. This was it, he is finally
going to end my suffering. He grabs my hair, pulling my head off of the floor,
my limp body following in succession. The feeling of the cold blade against my
throat. A thought. One thought – FINALLY. My dead eyes gaze into his and the
look of happiness fades away. He wanted me to fight, he want me to say no; but
I had no more fight left to give.
***
In
a desperate attempt to change she takes the MBTI again. Hopeful the results will
change. Her boss sees her, stating “There’s no use in retaking it.
Personalities rarely change over the course of our lives” (21). Reflecting
back, her personality must have changed. How could it have not changed with the
loss of her husband? However, her boss was right. She was still an INFP.
***
The blade slipped away
from my neck as I dropped, once more, to the floor, sobbing uncontrollably. One
thought now filling my mind – Why?
I started to plan and execute my escape.
Leaving behind everything that would remind me of him. Anything that would
remind me of the moment I almost lost everything.
Works Cited
Gentry, Karen. “No Exit.” Creative Nonfiction. 9 Sept. 2015:
16-21. Print.
