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Bertha

Bertha Schlagenhauffe

By LaurenPublished 3 years ago 25 min read
2

Bertha Schlagenhauffe

I stand in front of the bathroom mirror with a steak pressed to my rapidly swelling eye using every ounce of willpower that I have left trying to convince myself that he didn’t mean it—that his apology was actually sincere. I tell myself the same thing I always do to convince myself to stay.

“He is your husband. For better or for worse. Till death may force us to part. And the kids. They need a father. They need a mother. Think of what that would do to them. He only does this because you’re doing something wrong. You should know better. You should always have his dinner heated and ready for him with a glass of his favorite scotch to wash it down.”

On the inside, I knew exactly what was happening—that he was simply abusive.

“But he didn’t know why you hadn’t made dinner or why you were crying.”

That was the only true statement that I spoke. He didn’t know that just a few hours prior, I had been told that my brother wouldn’t be returning from Vietnam alive—on the exact day that marked the ten year anniversary of the start of this hellish war.

He was scheduled to return home in only 12 days.

Paul didn’t even let me explain why I was crying. He just came home two and a half hours late—drunk—and beat me to the punch, so to speak. He says such awful things when he beats me. Sometimes, I’m too busy trying to prevent my screams—trying to prevent the children from hearing what’s happening—to comprehend what he’s actually saying. It started about two years after we were married—after I had Mark (our oldest) and struggled to rid my body of the baby weight and, even despite all of my efforts, I couldn’t seem to spare enough time for Paul. It started out a verbal thing. A comment here and another comment there. I would get emotional as a result of not being used to that side of Paul—one that I had never seen before—and he would apologize and soothe me and hold me like he did when we were in our “honeymoon” phase.

After having Sam, however, the abuse became more cruel and crept into a rare but present physical abuse. I would do something he didn’t like and he would say something cruel. Not wanting to spark a fight I would apologize and make a move to walk away. He would grab me—sometimes so hard I would find bruises to hide the next morning—and push me up against something so hard that I would cry out in pain at the spot on my back where that particular bruise never seemed to fully heal before another would darken the spot yet again.

“You should be grateful that he married you in the first place. Bertha. What kind of name is that? A fat girl name, that’s what kind of name it is. And you’ve done nothing to prove otherwise. You should try harder. Put on some makeup that serves a purpose other than covering up the bruises and scabs and scars,” I berate my reflection.

The goal most days was simply to get through the day without any conflict. If I was ever feeling slightly hopeful, I might even say the week, but that hardly ever happened. It was only Monday and any hope that I might have had at the beginning of the day was smothered and buried in a shallow grave in my backyard.

I drop the mostly thawed steak into the sink and hold on to the edge as I close my eyes and struggle to push back the tears that threaten to breach my eyes and hold back a sob.

“Knock, knock,” I hear the familiar voice and jump around—startled—to face him. My heart feels like it’s in my throat and I choke back the contents of my stomach that threaten to erupt.

I don’t say anything. I just stand there, looking at him with wide eyes, failing to hide the fear in them. Tonight’s beating was by far the worst yet and the look in his eyes is different this time. They don’t hold the pity that they always do. This time, it seems, there is genuine guilt and sorrow in his eyes. I want so badly to believe whatever is about to come out of his mouth, but I can’t let him take down the guard that I have up right now.

I stay silent and so does he before he slowly approaches and hesitantly wraps his arms around my stiff torso.

“I’m sorry. You should’ve told me about Michael.”

I could’ve if you had let me get a word in. My brave subconscious snaps his neck when he blames me for something we both know wasn’t truly my fault.

“And you know how I get when I drink.”

And so do you, so maybe you should cut back…or, dare I say, stop altogether. She growls. I want to shake my head and be rid of her voice, but I can’t.

“I mean, if you had just…” I don’t listen to the rest of his shitty excuses and lack of responsibility and drift off to plans and thoughts for the weekend. The weekend is the only time that I can escape Paul, even if it’s only to go to a church to meet with a bunch of naïve newlywed women, most of whom are still either in their honeymoon phase or are in denial of what their oh-so-loving husbands are doing behind their backs and closed doors.

That Saturday, I pull into the same church parking lot and plant my car in the same spot that I have used for the last 13 years. I wear a modest baby blue dress with a high Peter Pan style neckline. My small, kitten-heeled shoes and pantyhose. Pearls adorn my neck and my hair is perfectly styled.

I walk in through the same door and greet the same woman the same way—asking about her family with a bright, white smile on my face. She tells me that everyone is good but that poor little Johnny has recently come down with a cold. I tell her that I hope he gets better and to give her husband my regards as I continue to walk. I take the stairs to the basement level of the church and make sure that everything is set up for the girls; Brittany, Shelly, Cindy, Ruby, Edith, Jolene, and Eleanor.

Brittany. Age 23 years. Married for approximately a year and a half to her husband Tony. She insists that their life is perfect aside from the fact that she can’t cook—the main thing that I help her with. She occasionally visits me during the week while Tony is at work to receive cooking lessons, though, despit all of the effort, it never seems to make her food any better.

Shelly. Age 22 years. 8 months pregnant. Married to her husband Robert for 4 years this June. She assists me during these meetings and occasionally confides in me about her husband’s suspected infidelity.

“I just—he’s become so withdrawn ever since we found out that I’m pregnant. In the morning he leaves either before I’m awake or before I even have the chance to offer him breakfast and then most nights he doesn’t even come home before I’m asleep. And even when we do manage to see each other, he acts strange and jumpy…like he’s hiding something.”

Cindy. Age 24 years. Married to Dennis for 1 year and 3 months. Often comes to me to talk about her husband’s verbal outbreaks and her worries, often trying to justify it by saying that he’s overworked and so tired that he can’t control the outbursts or his emotions.

“I just worry. He’s so angry but he’s so distant and he just hides everything until it’s like a dam breaks and it all just comes pouring out and I’m just there..just struggling to keep my head above the water.”

Ruby. Age 22 years. 5 months pregnant. Has been married to Johnny for just over 7 months. Often tells me about her husband’s blatant infidelity. She typically speaks to me about wanting to leave him but her fear and worries about her unborn child keep her from being able to follow through.

“He mentioned her the other day—his lover. We were just having a conversation last Saturday at a small house party at ours and one of his co-workers, I think, asked him if he and his girl would join them for dinner and he just says ‘Sure, Daisy and I would love to.’ Like it was nothing. But I could see it—the exact moment that he realized what he had said. And the whole room knew. They were all so quiet you could’ve heard a pin drop in the other room.

“And then, after a few deafeningly silent moments, I pushed my chair out, put my napkin on the table, stood up, went into the bedroom and locked the door and just…cried until everyone had left. The worst is that the worst part wasn’t Johnny’s slip-up. It was that nobody even came to check on me—to see if I was okay. All of these women who claim to be my friends—one of whom I’ve known since kindergarten—I grew up with this woman. They just kept on eating the meal I had spent the better half of my day preparing. And he’s spent just about every moment that he’s managed to spend with me trying to make it up to me.”

Edith. Age 25 years. Married to husband Richard for 5 years last May. Spoke to me last week and accidentally mentioned the physical abuse that her husband inflicts on her and the woman that she saw him with several weeks prior.

“Just last week he beat me so bad I could hardly walk the next day. The bruises were nearly black and I had to stitch my stom—” Suddenly she stopped, her eyes went wide as she realized what she had just revealed to me.

“I can’t remember ever taking a beating from my husband so bad that I actually had to stitch myself up afterward.” You’re not alone, I try to say with different words. “You should’ve gone to the hospital.”

“They would’ve asked questions. I can’t do that to Richard.”

“Then you should have called me. You know that I’m a trained nurse. I could have helped you.”

“I’m sorry,” she wept, her palms covering her face.

“Don’t you dare apologize. You’ve done nothing wrong. I won’t tell a soul.”

Jolene. Age 26. Has been married to her husband Frank for about 3 years. Often confesses to me her worries and doubts about herself for not being able to successfully conceive a child in 3 years and expresses the guilt that she feels as a result and the lurking fear that Frank will leave her if she continues to fail.

“I’m just worried.”

“About what?” I ask her gently.

“Well, you know that Frank and I have been trying to conceive since we got married—He always wanted a big family and I promised him that I would give him one…but we’ve tried everything that we can manage and nothing is working. And I’m just worried that he’s going to wake up one of these days and realize that I’m no good. I can’t give him the one thing that he’s always wanted—the one thing that I always promised him we would have…”

Eleanor. Age 26 years. Currently engaged to Peter. Claims that they have no issues aside from their relatives clashing.

“They just always fight. And don’t even get me started on our parents. He’s even mentioned the idea of putting off the wedding or not getting married at all because his parents hate me and my parents hate him and our families hate each other. I’m starting to understand Romeo and Juliet more and more…I feel like our families are just the Capulets and Montagues renamed…”

To many of these young girls, I’m like a mother to them—more of a mother than many of their own, at least. My mother taught me everything that I know; how to cook just about anything and how to take care of and keep a husband. She taught me how to be a proper lady.

“Don’t sit like that….Cross your legs at your ankle, not your knee. That’s how women get those dreadful veins behind their legs….Sit up straight..Shoulders back, chin up…”

She taught me how to do my makeup properly and how to dress like a woman—like a housewife. But she never held me back either. She always encouraged me to follow my dreams and convinced my big-headed and misogynistic father to let me attend classes at the local community college. She taught me to always stand my ground and never let a man walk all over me—something that none of these girls were taught. Then again, look how much good that did for me despite having that.

I do the best that I can with what knowledge and experience I’ve been given. I help the girls cook and assist them whenever they need me and with whatever they need within my power. I am more of a mother to most of these girls than their own mothers ever were or will be. Unfortunately, we all know what would make all of our lives easier—no men.

All of the girls know about each other—our husbands; the cheating, the abuse, verbal or otherwise. They know about Paul and the beating—when they started, how they started, when they got worse. But Paul is different from the rest of them. He doesn’t know what he’s doing or saying when he does it—I deserve it when he does it—every time.

He works hard and provides for me and our children. And I can’t even stop crying long enough to make him dinner in the kitchen that he provides for me; under the roof that he works all day, 5 days of the week to keep over our head. I couldn’t pull myself away from Mark to cook him a decent meal and when I did, it was with little Mark in a high chair two feet away at the farthest. I would greet Paul with a quick kiss and ask him how his day was without ever really listening to his answer as I rushed back to spoil the baby.

The girls know everything. Except for the fact that Paul is nothing like their husbands. Even though he may do the same things as some of them, hit me so hard, my bruises are nearly black, shout cruel things at me when I mess something up.

“He’s different. He’s better,” I insist when the girls insist that Paul is just like their husbands. “We may go through the same things but we are not married to the same man.”

That night, I schmooze up to Paul. I make him a beautiful dinner that I started on nearly the moment I arrived back home. I pour him his scotch and serve up dinner.

“Where are the kids?” he asks me after a few minutes of silence.

“They’re at my parents tonight. I hope that’s okay…I just thought that we could use a night to ourselves. We never have that anymore…” I answer, drifting off, worried that I should have asked him or even just told him.

“Calm down. That was very thoughtful. Thank you,” he says, reaching for my hand.

I simply nod in response and squeeze his hand.

“This is delicious.”

“Thank you.”

“I miss your cooking.”

“I cook every day, darling,” I reply with a lighthearted giggle and smile at him.

“I know but I miss everything about this…”

“What do you mean?”

“I miss our life being just us.”

“I don’t think I understand,” I say carefully.

“I love our kids. Don’t get me wrong. But I love our life being just us. I miss these meals that you can make when it’s just the two of us. I miss the calm of a childless home. I miss being able to talk about things without having to worry about children eavesdropping. I just miss us. How we used to be before we had kids.”

“I miss it, too,” I sniffle and blink back the sentimental tears in my eyes.

“What happened to us?”

“I don’t know.”

“We just stopped speaking and got so wrapped up in our responsibilities. You with the kids and me with my job…”

“I know. And I’m sorry. I should’ve tried harder but I let us fall apart even though I was so desperate to save us, I kept having the kids and every time I did, things just seemed to get worse and, even then, I still didn’t learn and we haven’t had a single night without any of the kids in nearly 10 years…”

“It’s okay. We just have to try. Promise each other that we’re going to try harder.”

“I promise you.”

“And I promise you. No more shouting. No more drinking. No more coming home late. No more hitting,” his voice cracks when he says it. Hitting. “I promise that I’m going to start coming home when my shift ends and I’m going to make an effort to get back to where we were before the kids. And I’m going to spend more time with them, too.”

I’m crying now. I can’t help it. The happy tears stream down my face. I smile at him and suddenly, I’m in his arms. He’s holding me like he used to. In a way that he hasn’t held me in nearly 12 years.

We are in a newlywed sort of bliss the rest of the weekend and into Monday morning. He kisses each of the kids on the tops of their heads and kisses me soft before I walk with him to the front door.

“You haven’t forgotten about watching the kids tonight when I go out? Brittany really needs help with dinner tonight,” I ask and look at him with my big brown-green doe-eyes.

“You know that I can’t tell you ‘no’ when you when you look at me like that,” he answers with a white-teeth smile.

“And you’re sure that you’re okay with watching the kids? Because if not, I can always call my moth—”

“I’ll be fine. I promise. Now I have to go or I’m going to be late to work. I love you,” he repeats the words that we’ve been echoing to each other since Saturday night.

“Goodbye. Have a good day at work. I love you.”

I wave to him as he backs out of the driveway with a wide smile on my face before going back inside and getting the boys ready for school. Soon, I’m alone but for little Margaret Anne who is still fast asleep in her crib. I smile down at the innocent little girl before leaving the room to call Brittany.

“Hello?” she greets.

“Brittany? Hi, this is Bertha—” Good God, I hate my name. “I just wanted to ask a favor of you, if you’d be willing to tell a little white lie for me.”

“What is it?”

“I need you to tell anyone who inquires that I was with you tonight.”

“Okay.”

“Thank you. I just need you to tell absolutely anyone who might ask that I was with you tonight.”

“Okay. This isn’t the first time you’ve done this,” she says, laughing. “I know the drill by now.”

I thank her and end the call when Margaret Anne begins to cry from her nursery.

The day goes just as it typically would; M.A.—the nickname that I’ve decided to give her—wakes up, I feed her several times throughout the rest of the day in between tidying up the house, preparing dinner for Paul and the boys, getting ready for tonight, greeting the boys when they arrive home, greeting Paul when he arrives home.

I quickly brief Paul on bedtimes, dinner, desert if they’re good for him, baths and everything else that he needs to know before giving him a kiss goodbye and leaving.

I park just outside of the printing office that employs Edith’s husband, Richard and wait for his shift to end. He exits with several men—coworkers—laughing as they head to the local pub. I drive ahead of them and wait. Watching as they enter. Watching when he exits the building to enjoy a cigarette in the fresh air.

I laugh to myself. What’s the point in that? Fresh air, my ass. The only fresh thing out here is the smoke polluting the air. I think back to the Surgeon General’s report last year linking cigarettes and smoking to cancer. I showed it to Paul just about the moment he got home from work that day, lecturing him and forbidding him from smoking around either the kids, myself, or in the house.

“Focus,” I scold myself, breaking out of the memory and taking a deep, calming breath. “You know what you have to do. Just get this shit over with.”

I watch Richard toss the still-burning addictive stick of toxins to the cement sidewalk before stomping his right foot and twist it—crumple and destroy the stick—in order to ensure that the stick is no longer burning before he finally pushes off of the brick wall and makes his way back inside the small, nearly vacant pub. I sit and wait for another two hours and 45 minutes before my tired eyes finally see Richard exit the bar on a drunken, boisterous laugh and wobbly knees that won’t seem to allow the poor man to walk straight.

I quickly start the car and pull up beside him after him and his co-workers part ways.

“Richard?” I greet as I pull up beside him. “It’s me, Bertha. I’m a friend of Edith’s. we’ve met before. Would you like a ride home?”

“Nah,” he waves me off after he finally recognizes me. “I’ll be okay. Besides my house isn’t far and I wouldn’t want you to have to go out of your way to get me home. It’s late and you have the kids and Paul must be worried about you by now.”

“Richard, I insist. It’s not a problem. You’re hardly out of my way and Paul isn’t expecting me home for a little while yet.”

“It’s just a 15 minute walk—”

“Seriously, Richard. What do I have to do to convince you that I want to take you home. You’ve clearly been drinking and it would really be a shame if something were to happen to you on your way home because you were too stubborn to take a ride from your wife’s friend.” I reach across the car to the other side and pop the door open as much as I can for him. “Come on. If something were to happen to you because I left you here, I would just feel awful about it. The guilt would never leave me,” I persuade him, giving him the doe eyes that get a ‘yes’ every time.

“Fine, but I’ll pay you back somehow,” he says with a sigh as he drunkenly climbs into the passenger seat. As soon as he’s strapped in, I make my way down the street.

“No need. This isn’t a taxi. Just a friend looking out for a friend,” I give him a kind smile before making a left turn when I should have made a right.

“That was supposed to be a right turn.”

“Oh, my bad. I’ll just have to turn back around,” I say with an air-headed giggle.

“It’s alright. The longer it takes to get home the better.”

“And why is that?”

“Edith hates it when I drink. She nags me about it all the time. The later I come home, the more likely it is that she’s asleep.”

“Well then I guess it’s a good thing I made that wrong turn. I can keep accidentally making them if you want me to?”

“That would be nice but I should probably get home. So should you.”

I shiver as a breeze blows through the open windows. “Would you mind closing that window for me, please? It’s just a bit chilly in here for me…” I ask Richard as I close my own.

He wordlessly winds up the window while I make another wrong turn. Closer to my spot. Farther from where people will still be out and about.

“Hey, I told you not to worry about it. I need to get home.”

“Oh, I know…I’m sorry, I’m just a bit turned around right now,” I say in a shy voice.

He doesn’t reply. This is good because I really didn’t want him to. The conversations are always so boring. I look over and see that he’s resting his head against the window with his eyes closed. I pull up to the small storage unit that I rent. Paul thinks that I have things in there that I just couldn’t part with completely when we married and subsequently moved in together. He doesn’t have the slightest clue that I was perfectly fine with parting with everything I left behind in those months. He has no idea that he’s been paying for my workshop for the last 15 years.

I quietly and swiftly pull out the gun from the thigh holster under my dark navy dress.

“Get out,” I direct, pulling open the door that his head rests on.

“What are you talking about?” Richard says when he sees where we are.

“I said ‘Get out’. As in, get the hell out of my damn car,” I say calmly in a venom laced voice.

“You’re crazy,” he shouts at me.

“You haven’t seen me crazy yet. But you will either way,” I promise, pulling out the gun and pointing it at him. “Get out of the car. I won’t ask you again. Don’t try to run or be brave. You won’t win and you’ll regret it more than anything else you’ve ever done.”

“You’re god-damn crazy, woman,” he says stepping out of the car—struggling.

I quickly walk him over to the unit, unlocking it and shoving him inside and into the metal chair I’ve placed in the middle of the unit.

“Here,” I say, tossing him 2 sets of handcuffs.

“What do you want me to do with these?” I snaps.

“I want you to stop talking to me the way that you talk to your wife. You have two sets. For your ankles. Don’t try anything stupid. Just cuff yourself and then put your hands behind the chair.”

“So that’s what this is about, huh? That little whore told you all about what I do to her.”

“Cuff yourself and stop being a jackass. The more you resist and talk back, the more painful this will be for you.”

He completes the miniscule task silently and defeatedly places his hands behind his back with his head hanging low. I walk behind him and lace the third set of cuffs through the back of the chair and lock the cuffs around either of his wrists.

“Here’s how this is going to go. For every injury that I know of that you inflicted on Edith, I am going to give it back to you. Twofold, because you’re a big, strong man. I want you to feel as defenseless and she feels every time you hit her. Let’s start with the black eye you gave her. How many were there? Three? So that would mean six, right?”

In the end, I’ve hit him in the face so many times that his eyes are swollen, the left almost completely. His cheek is bloody and his lip is busted. I’ve dislocated his shoulder with a hammer and broken seven of his toes with pliers. It’s likely that he’s concussed. His wrist is either broken and hangs useless—twisted at an odd angle. Then comes the most recent one. The one that will finish this. If this one doesn’t kill him than one of my bullets will have to do the job.

“Now this last one is going to be my favorite,” I say with a sadistic smile as I pull out a long knife and sharpening stone. I drag the length of the knife across the stone and shiver in delight at the sound the two surfaces make as the move against each other. “Did you know that poor Edith had to sew herself back together last week after you cut her stomach open?”

“No please. Just let me go. I swear, I’ll never do it again.”

“That’s what I say to my husband every time I want the beating to stop. All we want is for you men to just let us the hell go. But you never listen to us. So why should I listen to you?”

I walk over and kneel in front of him. I cut open his shirt so that I can see my work. “You are going to die tonight. Whether it’s from this knife piercing your skin just enough or from after bleeding out from that combined with a bullet would, you are going to die tonight.” And then.. I slice. I cut his skin deep without remorse. Relishing in his screams of pain. They mean that he finally understands—finally feels—a fraction of what I’ve been going through for the last 12 years—what Edith’s been going through for the last 5 years. His blood rushes out of his body, like it’s earnest to escape the monster that it’s been trapped in for nearly 30 years.

I see the exact moment that the life leaves his eyes. It’s almost right after the fifth slice into his chest. He screams one last time and then…it’s quiet. I quickly unlock the padded cuffs after checking for his nonexistent pulse and drag his limp, heavy body out to the car and shove him into the plastic lined trunk before climbing into the car and taking his body to a spot just outside of town; secluded but not so much so that he won’t be found. Just enough so that it should take just a few days before he’s found. I dump him and clean the plastic from the truck in a nearby ravine before wedging it under one of his arms so that it won’t blow away—a ridiculous thing to worry about—littering. When I’ve just murdered someone.

When I’m confident that everything is taken care of in terms of disposal, I return to the scene of the crime and clean up after myself. I do the job quickly. I am a housewife, after all, we know how to clean up after ourselves. And with a husband like mine, I’ve gotten pretty good and covering things up and keeping them hidden.

slasher
2

About the Creator

Lauren

Aspiring writer.

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