It takes me three days before I have the courage to go back to the mall and retrieve my packages. Michael never asks what happened and I’m grateful. I watch the house constantly. I will never be able to explain my way out a second time.
In a few days, I will have filled the old cabinet in the basement with the necessities to survive. It gives me some peace knowing I won’t have to go hungry in these cold days. Yet, I’m terrified of being discovered. You’ll be ok…just hide it well…The old cabinet was part of a kitchen somewhere and there are old boards and other discarded junk. I’ve rearranged it a bit, turning the cabinet to the wall and putting other things in front of it. There’s just enough space from the wall to stick my arm in there and get to my supplies. I hate this…I hate the basement and I always fear what I can’t see. I worry when reaching in for a can of soup, that will ensure I get fed, that some spider will have claimed the space for its own.
Today I will eat. I make vegetable soup and with the crackers we always have, it is a feast. I sit here in this gloomy place and eat…and eat some more. I save some broth for when the babies wake from their nap. It will warm their little bones. I put the evidence of the can in a bag, put on my shoes and carefully get rid of it all, by throwing it in the bin of the bakery next door. From my side, they can’t see me and I toss it in and run back. I feel foolish. Would you rather he find it…?
Back in the house I have to do the laundry which I need to psych myself up for. We have no washer and dryer and he won’t allow me to go to the Laundromat, so I wash everything in the tub. I run the hot water and add dish soap. I do the babies stuff and small stuff first. They are easier to wring out by hand. When it comes to the shirts and jeans I could scream. I save a day every month to do the linens by themselves. I don’t know how he expects me to keep doing this. It is painful and so hard to wring out those heavy things. But it gets done and I have fresh blisters on my hands. I hang it all over the house, as close to the heat vents as I can. I put down towels that I will have to dry out later to catch the drips. I’m so tired…It has taken me two hours and now the babies are awake. I will spend my time chasing them away from the wet clothes.
He comes home and the first thing he does is bitch about the damn dripping he has to put up with all evening. “You do this as soon as I leave so I can have some peace!” he yells. So now I have a new rule. I just about tell him I can go to the Laundromat but I think better of it. I swallow the bitterness.
I lie in the darkness…the clothes have stopped dripping. Only my life is dripping away…
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