Operator: “Excuse me?”
Tiffany: “I’m out here at the police station. Y’all need to lock me up, because I’m about to kill my husband. If y’all don’t lock me up right now, there’s gonna be a dead body.”
Operator: “Where are you?”
Tiffany: “I’m outside the police station, so y’all could lock me up, ’cause I’m about to make a murder.”
Operator: “Don’t go anywhere. I’m gonna have one of the officers come out.”
The policeman comes out.
Police: “Ma’am, what happened to you? Are you okay?”
Tiffany: “I’m fine. I’m just fine.”
Police: “Do you need us to call you an ambulance?”
Tiffany: “No, I’m just fine. I’m about to go make murder.”
Police: “You’re gonna what?”
Tiffany: “Make a murder.”
Police: “Okay. Calm down. Tell us what happened.”
So I tell him and his partner what happened. The whole time, they were looking me up and down.
Police: “Okay . . . you do realize that you’re very damaged?”
Tiffany: “I am fine. I am just fine. I’m telling you, you need to put me in a jail cell, because I hit that motherfucker with a pool stick, and I’m gonna go back and kill him, if y’all don’t lock me up. I’m going to commit murder. I’m gonna go to the hood, get a gun, and I’m gonna kill that motherfucker.”
Police: “Ma’am, you need an ambulance. You are hurt.”
Then, the other policeman started pulling out his camera. Started taking pictures of my face and my throat. He asked to see my arms. They were all messed up, with cuts and scrapes.
Tiffany: “I didn’t even know that happened. Look, I’m gonna kill that motherfucker.”
Police: “Calm down. Are you hurting anywhere else?”
Tiffany: “My back hurt when he slammed me in the ground.”
Police: “Let me see your back.”
When they pulled my shirt up, it was all black and blue. They took pictures of that.
Then, they had an ambulance come. I got in an argument with the paramedics.
EMT: “We need to take you to the hospital.”
Tiffany: “No, I need to go to jail. ’Cause I’m gonna go crazy on this motherfucker. I’m fine.”
EMT: “Your blood pressure’s really high. You need to calm down.”
Tiffany: “I don’t give no fucks. I’m gonna kill this man.”
Finally the police decided to go to my house.
Police: “Look, we have to go see him. If he’s injured, if he has damage on him, then you may end up in jail.”
Tiffany: “You might as well take me there now. You might as well just start taking my fingerprints now, because I’mma kill that motherfucker.”
They took me to the hospital, and went to get him. The police told me later that he was in the house with the door wide open. He was sitting there with his shirt off, watching a football game. He knew they were coming. The police arrested him, ’cause all he had was one bite mark on his wrist. I don’t even remember biting him. He didn’t have no other marks on him. Nothing.
Tiffany: “No. I hit him with a pool stick, y’all. It should be a big ol’ bruise across his back. I hit him with that pool stick as hard as I could.”
Police: “Ma’am . . . he was fine.”
They arrested him. Then his whole family started calling me. They asked me to bail him out.
Mama: “He wants to know if you’ll bail him out.”
Tiffany: “I’m not bailing him out! No. I’m getting a restraining order and everything. You crazy if you think I’m finna bail him out.”
Then, the next day I was hurting so bad. My back, everything. I could barely walk.
I started bleeding like crazy. From my vagina. When the blood starting coming, I knew. I mean, I didn’t know I was pregnant before, but now I did. I was having a straight-up miscarriage. I don’t know if it was from the beating or the stress, but it happened.
I guess God decided to send me a real fucking clear sign this time, didn’t he?
That was pretty much the end of that. I filed for divorce and moved back into my old place.
Let’s just all pause here and take a breath. Maybe get a drink, rest up. Because the story is not done, and we about to dive back into some intensity.
? ? ?
OK, you rested? Here we go:
I left him, but I don’t know what the fuck was wrong with me, because I still wanted my husband back. Even though I had a restraining order and everything, it was still a part of me like, I think we can work through this.
My friend had the same reaction you are having: “Girl, you crazy. This motherfucker almost killed you. Leave him alone.”
I just thought . . . he had to see how much he hurt me. He saw how messed up I was. We had love. He’d never do that again. I know he can be a better person. We just got to get some counseling. We can get through this. We got to do this together. We just got to work together. No relationship is easy. It’s just work. We just gotta work at it.
I didn’t act on these thoughts. I just had them, all through the divorce (which was quick and easy and painless) and afterwards.
After the divorce . . . everything sucked.
I was single now, but I didn’t want to be out there dating. Dudes would try to talk to me, but I just wanted my husband. That’s all I wanted.
During this time that we were apart, his son went into foster care. Why that happened isn’t part of my story, but it did happen.
He was in the foster system for six months.
This really hit me hard. I was in the foster system, I knew how terrible it was. Even though I was divorced from his dad, I was actively trying to help get him out of there. I wanted him to be with his mom or even with me. I even helped his mom to fly out, and I was driving her around.
When I think back about it, I was so fucking stupid with that. That whole situation drove me back toward my ex. It’s just my opinion, but I’m convinced he used that situation—that his son was in foster care, and the guilt he knew that would cause with me—to try to get me back with him. He knew I’d been in foster care, he knew I would not be able to resist helping his son, and that it would bring me back around him more.
And it worked.
I won’t get into more details. You would just start yelling at this page you’re reading, like some crazy person.
We got married. Again.
We got a bigger house, a better house. And the one good thing was that me and his son were super-close. His son knew what I had been through with foster care and all this stuff. He was lovin’ on me and everything.
And honestly, it was okay for a while. He wasn’t hitting me or none of that.
Then he started acting really weird. He started being on the phone for like two, three hours at a time, ducking off into his office. Running into the backyard to talk, being really secretive and stuff.
I tried to have positive thoughts. I’d go on the computer and look through our wedding photos, to remember the good times.