Free Her Last Scream by J. A. Kerley Page B

women’s center.”
    “I went there five times,” Gail said, her voice a husky contralto. “The first two times for short stays until my boyfriend, James, cooled down. Then, as my boyfriend went from yelling to physical abuse, longer stays.”
    “Did he know you were being sheltered by the center?”
    “James thought I was with friends. It got pretty bad because he terrorized them all looking for me.”
    “But you went back to him,” Kavanaugh said quietly, nonjudgmental. “Several times.”
    Gail nodded as if it was something she’d considered a lot. “I didn’t have a high school diploma. Or a real friend. My family only gave a shit about me when I was working some crummy job and they could borrow money I never saw again. I was fat and pimply and nearly puked when I saw myself in a mirror.”
    When Gail paused to light another smoke, Sal turned to Harry and me.
    “Self-esteem issues. Gail was probably a typical-looking girl, but could only see her life and appearance and prospects as failure in every direction. Women who allow themselves to be abused often think they deserve it, giving subconscious assent to the treatment.”
    “Things got worse between you and James,” Kavanaugh said, pulling our eyes back to the television.
    Gail downed a healthy tot of Crazy Lady. “After he knocked out two of my teeth I went to the center in Boise. They helped me see my relationship wasn’t normal, that James had a sickness. When he started threatening my life, I got a restraining order.”
    “How long did it take James to violate the order?”
    Not did he , but how long , I noted.
    “Two days. James said the order was just a piece of paper and did I believe a piece of paper could stop a knife from slicing my throat? He had been getting worse and worse, but taking out the legal order turned him crazy. He started driving past my apartment and screaming, calling my phone every two minutes. That’s when I knew I had to get away, to become another person. The people at the center almost got mean.”
    “Mean how?”
    “Saying I’d be with James forever. That I’d never change. That I wanted to commit suicide by boyfriend …”
    I looked to Sal to protest treatment seeming cruel, or at least tasteless, but she held up a hand and nodded to the television, Wait and listen.
    Gail said, “I broke down and started crying. ‘You’re WRONG!’ I started yelling ‘YOU’RE WRONG, YOU’RE WRONG. I WANT TO LIVE. I’LL DO ANYTHING TO LIVE!’”
    Kavanaugh nodded calmly. “That’s when you were accepted for the underground railroad.”
    “I had to pass a test at the center. To make sure I wouldn’t run back to James and tell him everything. He would have thrown gasoline into the center and burned it to the ground.”
    Kavanaugh stood to refill the glasses. Harry figured it out: “The abused woman has to show total commitment to the idea of No Turning Back. To make the decision that will change her life for ever.”
    Sal nodded. “It helps protect the center from violence. If the woman is gone, the only thing left for the abuser to attack is the system itself. More than a few men would see the system as a thief … personify it as a being that stole from them.”
    “Women stealing women from men,” I said. “The misogynist’s worse nightmare.”
    Harry nodded at the television, the interview set to resume. The Doc leaned toward Gail, her voice low. “Tell me what it was like in the system, Gail. Your experiences.”
    “I felt like a package, but a very important package. The first night I was picked up in an alley. A woman who called herself Alicia drove to Boise from Jackson, Wyoming, to get me. I’m not sure that was her real name – some people use fake ones. I stayed at Alicia’s place – slept on the couch – two nights before being picked up by –”
    “Excuse me, Gail, picked up how?”
    “Alicia left me at a bridge. It was midnight. We stopped on the bridge and way up ahead we saw headlights