But instead of leaving him, I proceeded with caution and kept giving him my all. I didn’t see his combative, and argumentative, nature as abusive. He hadn’t hit me, yet. But his habit of snatching me by the arm whenever I tried to walk away from an argument should have been a red flag for me. It wasn’t. I pressed on.
Then one night—about a year into our relationship—I was on the phone talking with one of my girlfriends, getting caught up on all the girl stuff we normally did on our girl’s night out. Since I didn’t go out now that I had a man in my life, there was a lot of gossiping and cackling to do. The call waiting beeped. I ignored it and kept on talking, since my call was to Maryland. Finally, after the tenth time the line buzzed through, I clicked over. “Hello.”
“Yo, what the fuck took you so long to answer the damn phone?” he asked in a tone that told me he was pissed.
“I’m on the phone long distance with my girl Velvetta,” I said, keeping my voice calm and steady, trying to keep my attitude in check. Ty and I had already had an argument three weeks prior about me being too “damn mouthy” as he kindly put it. So I was making a conscious effort to keep my attitude in check.
“Yeah right. You probably on the phone with some nigga,” he snapped. “Let me find out.”
I rolled my eyes. “Ty, please. Where are you?”
“Why?”
“’Cause I wanna call you back.”
“Fuck that. You tell that bitch you’ll call her back.”
My first instinct was to tell him to kiss my honey-dipped bottom, and hang up on him. But I didn’t feel like beefing with him for two days, then him giving me the silent treatment like I was the one who had done something wrong.
“Hold on,” I replied, clicking the phone over before he could say another word. “Hey, Vetta, let me call you back. Ty is bugging again.”
“Humph. What else is new?” she said. “Go do you, Girl. I got my own man drama to deal with. Call me when you can.”
“I will,” I said, then clicked back over. “I’m back.”
The phone line was dead. He had hung up. And I was pissed.
Twenty minutes later, there was a knock on the door. It was Ty, standing there with his face all bunched up. His jaws were clamped tight. Just by his posture, I knew there were gonna be problems. I took a deep breath, opening the door.
“Don’t you ever do that shit again!” he shouted, pushing the door in. He took off his leather coat, tossing it across the leather ottoman. I shut the door, counting to ten.
“Do what, Ty?” I asked, scooping up his coat from off the chair and walking over to the closet to hang it up.
“Yeah, aiight. Play stupid if you want. But let me call here again, and you don’t answer and…”
The nerve of him, I thought. The last I checked, it was my name on the bill, and I was the one paying it.
“Look,” I said, feeling myself lose it. “Don’t come up in here with your bull. I’m not in the—”
Before I could get the rest of my words out, he was hovering over me and had slapped me. His hand burned a print into the side of my face. I couldn’t believe he had raised his hands to me. This couldn’t be happening to me. Not to Persia Monae Swanson. No man had ever hit me before. Not even my father. I didn’t grow up around men beating on women. I wasn’t raised in a home where there was violence. Or strings of expletives hurled at you. I had been fortunate throughout my life to not be a victim of abuse on any level, be it emotional, physical, or mental. But with the strike of a hand, I was now on the receiving end. I was hurt and in a
state of shock.
“I don’t believe you just hit me,” I said, holding my face. It stung. I fought back my tears.
“Baby, I’m sorry,” he said, trying to touch the side of my face. “I don’t know what came over me.”
“Get out!” I yelled, backing away from him. The wells of my eyes were beginning to open. I willed them shut.
“Come on, Baby. I didn’t mean to hit you. It just happened.”
“I don’t wanna hear it,” I snapped, snatching his coat off the hanger and throwing it at him.
“I’m sorry, Baby.”
“Just get the hell out!”
He reluctantly left, but kept calling me and calling me. And I kept hanging up on him until I got tired of it and turned the ringer off. I didn’t want to hear anything he had to say. He had crossed the line. And I had no intentions of putting up with it.