Six Sentences: "Glancing Into the Abyss"

“I think you should leave,” she says, and she doesn’t know why, because a court sealed envelope run door-to-door by Sheriff Jackson hasn’t stopped Mike and she doubts her words will.

Mike grins—that feral cat grin that once made her feel wanted but now just makes her back and legs ache with the memory of bruises—and nearly breaks the hinge off the door as he pushes into the living room, pushes into her space, with his hand raised.

But she’s been practicing, three times a week in class and an hour every day on her own in the most claustrophobic spaces she can find, because Mike knows just how to use his bulk and the length of his limbs to make her feel like rolling over and playing dead.

Heart Monitor via Flickr - brykmantra

She throws up her left arm, catches his jarring blow and steps into him, putting the force of her body behind the knuckle she jabs into his throat.

His bugged eyes make her think of old Bugs Bunny cartoons and she can’t help but laugh a little at his strangled gag and the way his fingers scrabble at his throat as though they could uncrush his windpipe, because now she’s remembering the reedy blip of a heart monitor and the bitter-cold taste of metal in her mouth, keeping her jaw shut tight.

She’s going to get the cordless and do the right thing...call the police, but before she does, she leans down—close enough to see the shine of his fear blown pupils—and says, “It might have been a better idea for you to pick on someone your own size.”