Chapter 2

The first time he hit me, I was two months pregnant. He'd lost two thousand dollars on a sports bet, and when he got home I said a few words too many. I told him, "We're going to have a baby soon. Can't you stop gambling?" He raised his hand and slapped me across the face, hard enough that my ear rang and I couldn't get back up for a long while, the corner of my mouth bleeding.

Then he knelt down and begged me to forgive him, slapping his own face until it swelled, saying he was wrong, that he'd never do it again, that he'd just lost his head for a moment. I laid a hand over the baby inside me, my heart softened, and I forgave him. Looking back now, I never should have. There are only zero times and countless times when it comes to a man hitting you. That saying is exactly right. Once there's a first time, there's a second, a third, and no end after that. That night I quietly took the twenty dollars I'd saved and went to the pharmacy to buy the morning-after pill. I sat downstairs for three hours clutching the box, the sweat in my palm soaking it soft, and in the end I threw the pill in the trash. I couldn't bear to give up the little life inside me. It was my first child. After that he hit me more and more often. He hit me when he drank. He hit me when he lost money. He even hit me when he came home sore from something his boss had said.

When I was seven months pregnant, he took up with the woman who ran the hair salon downstairs. I went to have it out with her, and right in front of her he kicked me in the belly, kicked me until I bled on the spot. I lay on the ground writhing in pain while he walked off with his arm around her, never once looking back, and said, "Better if she just dies. Saves the trouble."

It was Granny Chavez next door who heard the noise and got me to the hospital. The doctor said the baby had nearly been lost, that I should stay in bed or I'd very likely go into early labor.

I stayed in the hospital three days. He didn't so much as call, let alone come see me. When I was discharged I stood at the hospital entrance with a plastic bag of clothes to change into, the winter wind cutting my face like a knife, and right then I made up my mind: once the baby was born, I'd divorce him. Even if I had to beg on the street, I would raise my child.