Redemption(Struggle #3) (8 page)

I sneaked inside the bedroom. Eva was sleeping
peacefully, but many creases were visible on her forehead, like she was having some bad dream. I twined my fingers through her hair. “Baby, come on eat something and then sleep again.”

“No, please go away
,” she said in irritation. She didn’t seem to be hungry. But I couldn’t let her sleep like that. I didn’t remember my vows or maybe I didn’t take any vow when we got married, but I remember those when I married with Samantha.
I will take care of you and be with you in sickness, poverty, hunger and everything.
And Eva sleeping hungry didn’t fulfill my duty.

“Baby, please eat something. Look what
I’ve prepared for you.” I slowly lifted her head with my hand.

She opened her eyes
; they were red. “Don’t you understand? I want to sleep and don’t want to eat your stupid food.” She busted in anger and pushed me away. That was a new emotion from her. I had never seen her talking like that. I felt a twitch in my heart. I didn’t really expect her to be rude with me; she reminded me of Samantha. Many days and nights I got home from work and prepared food for her, but she pushed me away, cursing me with the worst words. I moved back from Eva in slight fear and anger. I had seen glimpse of Samantha in her. The courage I gathered for making this marriage successful shattered in the blink of an eye.
No this can’t be happening. You can’t just behave like Samantha.
I put down the dish and laid down on the couch, thinking about my future with her; it didn’t look like a peaceful one.

***

“Hey, sweetie, wake up.” Eva was shaking my shoulder.

“Hey
, good morning.” I smiled at her. It took me few moments to remember her behavior from last night.

“Did you tr
y to wake me up last night?”

“Yes.”
Didn’t she remember it?

“Sorry,
I must have been rude with you. Actually, I had taken some sleeping pills and when I take those and if someone tries to wake me up, I turn extra rude to them. Chloe had experienced this a few times and I didn't remember anything next day. So If I was rude, I’m extremely sorry.” She kissed me on my forehead.

“It’s okay babe,
I can understand. By the way, what time is it?” That explained her behavior. I felt good; she wasn’t herself last night.

“Don’t worry, I
have your coffee ready.”

“It’s not about the coffee
; I have a call scheduled.”

“It must be around nine in the morning
. I woke up at eight and it took me half an hour to get up from bed.” She tried to smile, but her face still held some creases of the pressure she was facing.

“Shit, I
have a video call in half an hour.” A client had scheduled a call between testers and me to solve some issues. And because of Lobo and Martha, I couldn’t complete my work last night. “They are going to hang me for this.”

“And why would you say that?” Eva giggled.

“It’s not a joke, Eva. I’m already neck deep in the work and that Lobo bastard tricked me meeting your…” I bit my tongue hard.

“Meeting my?”
she asked.

“Nothing,
I wanted to say that bastard Lobo fought with me on a silly issue last night and I couldn’t finish my work. Only God can save me today.” I quickly walked to the bathroom and splashed some cold water on my face.
Fuck you, Lobo, you messed with the wrong guy.

I changed into a suit and sat in front of my laptop. Only five minutes were left
before my meeting. But when I tried to start my laptop, it wasn’t working. I tried and tried, but it didn’t even blink. I checked the power source; it was fine. I checked the cable and I found out my power cable had a nasty cut on the left side.
There goes my laptop. How in the hell am I going to join this meeting.

“Babe, do you want your coffee? It’s ready.” Eva was standing at the door with a cup in her hand.

“No, sweetheart, not now, please. I’m already fucked up. My power cable is broken and I can’t join the meeting.”

“Why don’t you join from the
cell?” She asked.

“
Yes. Yes.” I jumped up and ran to kiss her and then take out my cell phone.
Why didn’t I get this idea? I’m supposed to be the computer guy in this house.

I dialed in as fast as
possible; still, I was five minutes late.

“Mr. Nathan, you are late.” The client manager st
ruck the moment I signed in.

“Sorry, my computer broke.”

“Please, don’t give me excuses. I don’t even care if your arm is broken. We have a delivery cycle for the product and we have to follow it by any means,” he shouted.

My nerve was popping out o
n my head. He was really making me angry.

“Anyways, my tester said that you were not reachable yesterday. Do you have any idea how many defects are pending on your name?”

I was clueless; the day before yesterday I sent all the defects back to the testing team and yesterday I couldn’t login after the fuck-up evening. “Sorry, Jim, but I couldn’t log on to my machine since last night. Kind of sick, actually.”

“Oh, now you are sick also. If we have developers like you
, no way we would finish it on time.” He threw his shoulders in the air. “Anyways, we have a very critical defect in front of us. Can you open the defect number twenty-four so we can discuss it?” he said.

“I’m sorry
, Jim, I’ve joined by my mobile. I have to get my laptop fixed to access the defect log.” I was ashamed by everything and the only reason I could think was Lobo.

“Then why did you even care to join the
call? To show us your sorry ass?” He was stammering in anger. “Get your computer fixed as soon as possible. I want you to start work on this defect by noon,” he shouted and closed the call.

I sat there holding my head in my both hands.
I couldn’t believe the way Jim talked with me, but I couldn’t do anything. I was bound by the contract and it was my fault. I was late to respond, I didn’t complete my work and I got trapped by Lobo. It was all my fault.
No, it's all your fault, Lobo.

“I’m so sorry
, babe.” Eva was sitting on a chair nearby. She had listened to every word Jim said.

“It’s okay
, Eva, it’s not your fault. Would you mind going out to get a charger cable for my laptop?” I had to take my anger out. I had to do something.
I need to box for a little while.
That was the only way I could release my pressure. That was a perfect stress buster for me.

“
Sure, babe. But what should I ask them?”

“I’ll message you the details. Just grab it from
Wal-Mart.”

“Okay. Are you
alright, sweetie?” She came closer and fondled my hair; she cared a lot for me. I liked that, but now wasn’t the time I could appreciate it. My insides were burning with fire and it was best to get it out on the boxing bag rather than on anyone else.

“Yes, just get me that damn cable.”
I tried to keep my voice calm.

In
a few minutes, she left the house and I picked up my gloves. I didn’t even care to change into something comfortable. Hatred consumed my mind. I was imagining Lobo and Martha instead of my punching bag. I started landing the hits quickly.

My phone buzzed.
Who the fuck is it now?
I ignored it at first, but it continued ringing.
It could be Eva, some issues with the cable?
I picked it up.

“Hello
, Mr. Brown. It’s Steve from Goliath Bank. I hope you remember me.” How could I forget his voice. He knocked my pants off last time; I wondered why he called me this time.

“I think I’ve paid my mortgage and you shouldn’t have any issue with that.”

“No, no. I absolutely don’t have any issue with that. I called you to inform you that due to your irregular history of the payments bank has decided to terminate your loan. You have one month to shift your loan to another bank or the bank will auction your property.” He paused. “And believe me, I’ll make sure that no other bank will give you any sort of loan.” He chuckled. “You messed with the wrong woman, dude, and it’s gonna cost you a lot.”

“Fuck
you, Steve. If I ever get my hands on you, that day would be the last day when you will laugh with your own teeth.”

His laugh stopped instantly.
“Whatever. You should worry about your apartment first. We’ll send you the official notice in few days. Wait for it.” He hung up the phone.

With a swing
, I threw my phone on the couch and paced the hallway. I didn’t care if it broke or survived. The bag stood in front of me and now it turned into the unseen Steve and Martha.

“You have
gone too far, Martha. I won’t take it anymore.” I punched it harder and faster. After some time, my hand started feeling numb, but I continued. The pain vanished a little after and only bloody faces of Martha and Steve remained in front of me.

“Nathan, what the hell are you doing?” Eva was pulling me away.

“Leave me alone, Eva, I wanna kill these bastards.” I pushed her away, but she resisted and came in between the bag and me. I gave up and walked back.

Chapter 12

Eva

“Honey, I’m back with your cable. Where are you?” I shouted when I came back with the charger cable. He didn’t reply back.
He must be doing something in his workroom.

Indeed
, he was doing something there, but not what I expected. He was practicing boxing wearing a suit and shorts below. “Men are men,” I muttered and walked near him. The sound of his punches echoed in the room, but for a microsecond in between his punches, I heard sound of a drip. Something was dripping from his hands. A red liquid.
Oh, my God, it’s blood.

“Nathan stop, you
’re bleeding,” I screamed from the bottom on my lungs. A dizziness filled my brain for a moment; I just couldn’t see him like that.
Why the hell is he doing this? I
recovered and ran to stop him, but he pushed me back and continued hitting the bag, like he couldn’t feel the pain at all.
What is this craziness?
My heart broke seeing him bleeding. I hugged him from behind; he stopped for a second and pushed me back again. I had no other choice; I moved in between him and the punching bag, and only then he stopped beating that bag.

His sudden outburst was
beyond of my imagination.
Is it because of that work call?

“Nathan
, what happened?” Tears rolled down my cheek. “Why are you doing this to yourself?” I breathed hard. “Please tell me, babe. What’s wrong?” I hugged him and rested my head on his chest, wetting his suit with my tears.

“
Please leave me alone for a while. Can you, please?” He held me away with his boxing gloves. As I looked in his eyes, I saw a wounded animal, his eyes filled all hatred.
But for whom?

“Not until
I see your hands.” I was determined.

He took out his gloves. The white cloth he applied on his hand was completely red, colored with his blood.

“Why did you do this, Nathan? Why?” My tears started flowing down again. I loved him more than anything and he was bleeding in front of me. Seeing him like that was utterly painful for me. “This is why I don’t like you boxing. When you get hurt, I feel like a knife pierces my heart. Do you understand that?” I held his arms and shake his body. He stood there with his eyes on the ground.

“There
’s a first aid box in the cabinet above the laptop.” His voice still was full of angst.

He
gritted his teeth together when I applied the bandage on his hand. If I could have, I would have taken away his pain and his angst, but sometimes I felt he didn’t share everything with me; this was one of those moments. He wasn’t ready to open up and his in his work area, I was out of my league to offer him any advice.

I slowly and carefully cleaned his
blood; the wound inside wasn’t deep. I wanted to sit there, but he didn’t look like he wanted that. So I decided to do something else.
“
Okay. I’ll cook something then. Let me know if you need anything.”

“Sure.” He didn’t even look me while saying this. He wanted some time alone and
I appreciated that.

After cooking
, I opened up my iPod, checking for emails. The first email was from the university. I had six days left to decide on my scholarship. My heart felt like someone had dumped a ton of weight on it.

What am
I going to do with this? Why the hell am I stuck with this?
I wanted to talk with Nathan about the issue, but he surely wasn’t in any condition to talk about this.
Chloe? I should visit the college as well.

But before
I made any decision, I checked on Nathan. He was back on his computer, hitting the keyboard fiercely. My heart wanted to stay there, but I needed some sound advice. Only Chloe could give it to me.