A Scene I'm Not Sure How to Write

I want to be light-hearted about this, I really do.

I want to be funny and courageous. 

Losing weight can be fun, right.

Going without food for 18 hours a day is insightful, yes. 

I can have ah-ha moments.  

I can think deep and marvel at the body God created for me.

Or, I can clean out my refrigerator.

That’s what I did yesterday. 

I lost my mind in moldy zucchini sitting in a puddle of juice in the bottom drawer of my refrigerator. 

I let the moments tick by while I watched the baby crawl towards his toys.  Inch by inch he moves his little body, lifting his knee and then pushing off with his other foot.  

Now that’s cute.  

Cute is what you get when you watch a baby crawl. 

I used to be funny and I know I’m still fun, but first, there’s something I’ve got to do.

I’m working on my memoir Starving Girl 

and I have to write a scene that’s eating me alive.

How’s that for a pun.  A starving girl has something eating her alive.  Funny, huh.

Writing this memoir, it’s now necessary to explore the path of a girl who realizes she is so much more than a victim to a gray-haired man double her age who walks with a limp and smells like cigarette smoke. 

At the ice cream store she works at, he doesn’t act much like her boss, even though he is.  

With not much experience, this girl is good at making ice cream cakes. 

The first time her boss touches her she's standing next to the back counter mixing purple frosting.  His boldness shocks the girl and she's not even certain what just happened.

“What do you think you’re doing?’ she tries to say boldly, but all she  can do is whisper.

“Whatever I want,” he says with steady eyes. 

The girl places the frosting tube down on the counter, walks to the bathroom with the cement floor and locks the door.  She looks in the mirror and her pale face stares back at her like a ghost.

For months, her boss double her age continues his game of cat and mouse; teasing, pulling, reaching, tormenting, bullying, threatening, accusing, abusing all while she earns minimum wage.

So naive is the girl, so very trusting and curious she doesn’t see the writing on the wall.  Yes, she’s frightened.  She knows what he’s doing is wrong.  She knows he’s married.  She’s told several people who are close to her of the dilemma she’s in, but no one offers help.  Do they even believe her?
 

Besides his demands, she’s all alone.

Only when the boss man’s wife is killed, hit by a drunk driver and decapitated, does he leave the girl at the ice cream shop alone.  The girl comes uninvited to the funeral, crying like a fool, wanting someone to touch her so she can feel alive but he acts like he doesn’t know her.  She becomes indivisible.  Problem is, the girl is now addicted to the horrible games of cat and mouse he’s introduced her to.  Why doesn’t her boss want her now?  Why does he abandon her?

They say "time heals all wounds."  I think the saying might be better off “time helps forget deep-rooted rotten wounds.” 

And time did help.  I did move on, but with the scars of abuse I became trapped in another and yet another scenario, almost replaying the same games over and over again with men until one day I found my voice.  I said enough.  I broke free, went on a 18-month mission for my church and returned a new girl. 

I was a woman who understood the power of Jesus Christ can heal and empower.  You see, my love for my Savior is my anchor.  He understood my pain; He healed my heart and set me free.

I was flying, finding my way and dreaming big when I found out my boss from the ice cream shop committed suicide.  Nobody knew my relationship with him, that as a young girl I had given my heart to a man who stole it from me first so when I was asked if I would be attending his funeral I numbly said “Yes.”

And this my friends is the scene I have to write for Starving Girl.

How I shook as I approached his coffin.  My skin was ice cold.

How even through all my healing; even though he was dead, I was still afraid of him.

How I looked for any evidence I could find that he did in fact shoot himself in the head.

And most importantly, how I found the strength through Jesus Christ to forgive him.

Because this journey is not about being a victim, it's about overcoming.