I snuck away to an OB/GYN appointment while Jeff was at work and accounted for. Since the miscarriage, he’d kept tabs on all of my appointments. After about two months, he became suspicious when I didn’t get pregnant. Last week he went through all of my belongings. My purse, my closet, my office. He was looking for birth control. I promised him I didn’t have any but he didn’t believe me.

On this day I was going to the OBGYN to get a refill of the birth control I promised him I didn’t have, because there was no way I was bringing a baby into this. Not this. And not this way.

I kept my birth control in the garage, hidden in a box of high school memories. It was on the top shelf and I made sure it never looked like it had been moved or disturbed in any way. He parked in there every evening he came home, but luckily for me he was working late a lot, and I was pretty sure he was too tired to notice anything in there anyway.

I sat in the waiting room rather impatiently for my turn to go in. I imagined at any moment Jeff would decide to go home early and wonder where I was, and I would have to pay for that. I tapped my foot for a few more minutes and then I finally heard my name being called by the nurse holding a door open.

I had worn a long sleeve shirt even though it was warm out because of the bruises on my wrists from Jeff holding me down. But the doctor insisted I get a breast exam and so I sat there in a hospital gown, my arms and everything else exposed. I tried my best to fold them in a way that hid the marks but the nurse shot me a glance. I couldn’t place the exact look on her face but it was something akin to silently asking me if I needed help, to which I just looked down.

“So you’re just here for your routine check-up and a birth control refill? the doctor asked, glancing over my chart.

“Yes, that’s all I need,” I said.

“Okay, let’s take a look. Lean back for me and try to relax,” he said.

Right. Like that would happen.

The doctor got in place and I heard the snap of gloves. I saw the nurse come over with a tube of jelly stuff and then I heard his voice.

“Okay, Delilah, just breathe for me. You’re going to feel my hand on you,” he said softly. And even though he’d just warned me, I winced a little. He looked at the nurse and the nurse tried to give me a reassuring smile. This was excruciating in a way it had never been before. I didn’t want anyone touching me anymore. Not even the doctor. After a few silent moments, he said I could sit up.

“Delilah, it would appear you aren’t completely healed up from your miscarriage. You haven’t been having intercourse have you? You were supposed to wait the prescribed amount of time. By the looks of it, you may have prolonged the healing process,” he said.

“I’m sorry,” I said. It was all I could manage in the moment. What was I supposed to really say to him? I couldn’t tell him the truth. And now he and the nurse were both looking at me waiting for more information.

“Is there anything you need to tell us, Mrs. Spencer? You can, you know,” he said.

Here was my chance. Here was the moment I could make all of this stop if I wanted to. I could tell them and they could call the cops and Jeff would be taken away and it would all be over. But men didn’t exactly do hard time for violating a woman’s very existence did they? A slap on the wrist and a restraining order would just piss him off. What if he came after me?

“No, I’m fine,” I said, looking away from them as the words echoed in the small room. They heard my silent pleas. I knew they did. They knew I was lying. They knew and there wasn’t a damn thing they could do about it. Because a woman’s silence causes people to stop asking questions.

I arrived home well before Jeff and managed to make it look like I hadn’t gone anywhere or even done anything but clean the house. I changed, put my clothes in the hamper, hid my birth control, and started dinner.

When he got home, he sat his briefcase down, hung his coat, and retreated to his office in silence until dinner. We sat down together for the first time in a while and I asked him how his day was. He shrugged his shoulders. He didn’t seem to be very talkative so I retreated into the silence with him. All that could be heard was the sound of silverware and chewing and the occasional clink of a glass. He was eerily quiet, in fact. I started to worry. I retraced my steps, wondered about the box in the garage, and looked around the room for signs of anything suspicious. I saw nothing. Perhaps my imagination was running away from me. I tried to calm myself, tried to remind myself that I had been careful.

Then, like a dagger being held to my throat, he put his fork down. He sat back in his chair and took a sip of his beer then put it back down and was staring at me the entire time. I tried to pretend I didn’t notice at first but I was forced to meet his gaze eventually. I stared back at him, and my movements began to slow. Then they halted completely. There was food in my mouth but I stopped chewing. I was waiting for him to say something but he just kept staring at me.

“So where did you go today?”

His words broke the silence in such a way that I could tell he knew I had gone somewhere. This was not small talk. This was deliberate. And I had no idea what to say.

This was what hell must be like. Fear slowly creeping up your neck while you sat there in silence, knowing how the next few hours of your life were going to play out, and knowing there wasn’t a damn thing you could do about it.

“Stand up,” he said.

I stood.

“Bend over,” he said.

“Jeff, please.” My voice began to shake.

“Do it.” His voice rose.

I bent over, my hands outstretched on the table like so many times before.

The last thing I remember was him standing up and starting to unbuckle his belt as he walked around the table. I blacked out for the rest. Or suppressed it. Or maybe I just forgot it. The funny thing about not remembering was that your body does it for you. The next morning I had bruises on my thighs, both front and back. As I examined myself in the mirror, Jeff walked in. He looked me up and down, grinning.

“Don’t worry, you liked it. You came for me,” he said.

I walked into the bathroom and shut the door. I locked it. I sat on the cold tile floor and sobbed. Your body was a strange thing sometimes. And it was capable of betraying you.