Hoping someone on the other end would call and tell me that Maisha was feeling better. Tell me that it was okay to pick her up. I just wanted to wrap my arms around her neck and never let her go — give her the best meal she’d ever had for protecting me. I sucked in a sob as I stared at the DVD case slightly hidden away in the TV cabinet of my bedroom, the case that Tamala threw at me. It haunted me just as much as my guilt over Maisha’s pain did. I needed something to get my mind off the pain—something to keep me from fiddling with the stitches in my face. I looked so horrible, I didn’t know how Eric could look at me. I couldn’t look at me. My black-eye, busted lip, and split forehead made me look like I felt on the inside. My body was covered in bruises here and there. He made me get x-rays at the hospital, but as I assumed, it was just another bruised rib. The first one was given to me by Cherish Clark. I glanced down to the cracked open door to my bathroom.
