Chris used to take me to this paint recycle center in Vacaville. 
It's basically just a little shed lined with shelves where people can dispose of and donate their leftover paint. You can go and pick up a variety of sizes and colors of paint for no charge. I love to paint, so initially, I was really excited to go see what they had. I especially enjoy small projects, and one thing that I was attempting to renovate at the time was Chris' mom's front yard. I wanted to make it beautiful and new; black wood chips, attractive foliage, bright flowers, and a fresh coat of paint on her mailbox. 

I found a really pretty shade of blue for the mailbox, and a dark red color for one wall in our bedroom. He chose a dark shade of green, and a mix of earth-tone colors (which I hate); none of which I expected to go anywhere in the bedroom, let alone the walls, and when they did, I just stood there; puzzled and uncomfortable. 

I held off on the mailbox until I could figure out the other details of the yard renovation, so our bedroom was the first thing we began working on. Although I prefer vintage, I envisioned making the space modern; sharply clean with a bold, dark red color on one wall, a few plants, some organizers, new bedding.... I wanted it to be comfortable, and aesthetically pleasing. I was going into the second trimester of my pregnancy but I was already huge so I was trying to get things done while I was still able. My surroundings deeply affect my mood, and something as little as paint colors can calm me, or severely exacerbate my anxiety, but I didn't realize to what degree until the bedroom transformed into its own space.

C had some rollers and a few paint brushes, popped open cans, and away he went. He started painting the wall of the bedroom which faced the hallway so you could see it as you came down the hallway and back towards the bedroom. No prep, he just opened the paint and got to it. He dipped the roller, and just started turning it and scraping it along the edges, dipping it in several colors; and I just stood there watching him do it, because it had me in a sort of trance. There wasn't any plan of a design or anything, just freestyle painting that had me watching with such intensity that I could hardly blink.

He started out with what resembled a hill, then the trunk of a tree, then branches, and the way he twisted all the colors together, it came into existence. I hated the tree as he was actually painting it, not only because I hated the colors, but because it already had an awkward presence in the room. 

It looked ugly, barren, dreadful. 

The finished product closely resembled a cross between that bitchy tree in The Wizard of Oz, and that tree from the movie The Ring; beyond this realm somehow, like I could put my hand into it, and it would fade away between worlds.

I had to look at that tree every time I came down the hallway towards our bedroom at the back off the house, and every time I got into bed to go to sleep (what little sleep I could get). I stared at it as I walked down the hallway, but when I was in bed or in the room, I would catch myself spacing out at it, then refocusing my attention back onto whatever I was doing. I was entranced; and intimated by this insignificant thing that was flat against the wall, because to me, it wasn't. I wanted to take a chainsaw to it. That tree was alive in a way that it would probably keep seeping through the paint if you tried to paint over it. 

And the rest of the bedroom turned out to be as just as disastrous.

The dark red wall that was my choice, of course, threw that camouflage mural of his even more off than it already was, but he didn't stop there. The small wall above the closet he covered with a dark green paint, this color scheme getting quite worse by the second. It was awful, but he still wasn't done. On the red wall, he painted a white heart, and the paint was too thick, so the bottom of the heart dripped and dried with streaks, resembling a bleeding heart. He got a red Sharpie marker, and put my initials in it.

The paint and design all went perfectly with all the clutter and chaos that was in that bedroom. Wires, tools, hella backpacks and electronics, Big Gulp sodas, two-liter soda bottles that he cut in half and used as cups, cigarette butts put out into cans, scratched-up Lottery tickets, all kinds of shit under the bed and in the closet. Junk everywhere; in hindsight, I have no idea how any making up was even possible between the fights, the paint job, and the mess.

So, I found myself in this room where on my left, in that space between the ceiling and closet, there was this dark green color to which he added my full name and his name written in a gray sparkly Sharpie marker. In front of me, was the red wall with this white, bleeding heart and my initials in a red Sharpie marker. And on my right, was this tree on a hill that made me anxious no matter which angle I looked at it from. 

Even the wall with the window offered no real solace because it overlooked the driveway where there was more stuff, his car, his mom’s car, and the neighbor’s front door.

Under the bed, underneath us, was garbage, dumpster-diver collectibles, movies, chargers for whatever needed a plug, laptops, gaming equipment, camera equipment, food wrappers, and whatever else he shoved under there. The closet was busting at the seams, the floor in front of the closet was full of random shit, the space in between the dresser and the foot of the bed had bags, tools and more tools, and garbage. I couldn't get away from the clutter, and I couldn't keep up with it. I’m a very meticulous cleaner and organizer, borderline OCD, but the more I cleaned, the more space I made for more of whatever else turned up. I was constantly throwing things away and telling him to stay out of the dumpster, and stop picking up whatever he found in the street.

In any other circumstances, that stupid tree would never have mattered in the least to me. It would have been just another thing on a wall, something else to just walk by without particularly noticing. 

But it was alive somehow. 

It made me uneasy, and almost added to the nausea that I was already experiencing from the pregnancy.

I didn’t want to be there, not in that room, not there with him. It’s one of those things though, that I still think about; not intentionally of course, but that tree will suddenly flash in my memory and throw me off whatever I’m doing at the moment.

It flashes in my mind’s eye, and it makes me shut my eyes tight.

I wish I could forget about it, and I wish I still didn’t see it so clearly. It’s just something else in all this mess that I wish I could erase. It’s a reminder, even though I don’t have to look at it anymore because I’m not there.

I can still see it; I can still feel it there.

*****************************

I know that I won’t ever have to step foot into the bedroom that I once shared with Chris, ever again. I’ll never have to sleep in this room that once seemed to close in on me more with each passing night. I’ll never have another nightmare in that room like the one I had in it that ultimately made me leave. I won’t ever have to argue in that messy and uninviting space.

But I still think about it from time to time, never really meaning to.

It’s strange how these seemingly insignificant things can leave such an imprint that they actually haunt you, even years later.  

As I was experiencing all these things in real time, I was always thinking about how I absolutely never had to endure anything like this at any other time in my life. In fact, it was quite the opposite. He thinks I’m babied, and he’s right; he didn’t like that love and care was reciprocated to me by everyone close to me. But here I was, pregnant and extra vulnerable, being abused in so many ways, and being love-bombed in between fights, everything was upside down and I couldn’t make it make sense.

I felt so alone, so raw, so emotional, so fragile. And physically, I was drained.

I felt hurt; and full of so much anger because since I was baking a baby, I couldn’t fight back like I wanted to. I wanted to give it to him, as good as he was giving it to me. But I had to try to stay calm. Most of the time, all I could do was pray. Even if I wanted to brawl with him, I barely had energy to get up from bed; let alone go a full 12 rounds with him, and he never tired.

So, beside this tree, I prayed.

Beside this tree, I cried in silence while screaming inside.

Beside this tree, I fantasized about the past and a couple/few men in my life who made me feel happy, loved, and very desired.

And beside this tree, I dreamed about the future — I thought about what I wanted it to look like, and it didn’t look anything like what my eyes were seeing. I couldn’t imagine myself or my kids, living in a home that was always a mess, where chaos was normal, and drama was the foundation. The future also didn’t feel like anything that my body was being put through. I was roughed-up then roughed-up some more, he would then “feel bad” and flood me with love; laying it on thick and to the naked eye, appearing to be “such a nice guy”.

And although there was always lots of making up, it was only because there was always so much fighting going on. Whether he started it, or I started it because of him; make up and break up were in a constant push-pull. Nothing ever made sense because I was constantly being convinced that what I was seeing was made up; that what I was hearing wasn’t real, and anything I felt was insignificant. I was listening to someone proclaim their love for me, while simultaneously chipping away at me.

I was with a man who loved me AND hated me, sometimes within the same minute.

I loved him, and hated him, also sometimes within the same minute.

I felt confined to this bedroom that I didn’t like sleeping in, next to this damn tree, in this house which wasn’t mine, in this city that wasn’t home, with someone I didn’t trust; always quietly planning my escape because I knew it was never going to work out. We were so different in ways that were deal-breakers, so there was no chance in making a life with him. Like the yard I planned to make so special for his mom, as a surprise, only with love and the best of intentions; everything I thought out, would never come to fruition. In the crazy, there was no time.

I was sleeping with my keys, hiding my bag, keeping emergency gas money tucked away in my car, and tiptoeing around the endless daily landmines trying to just keep some sort of peace between us so the house would settle down. While trying to relax, I had to be stay ready in case it popped off. My pregnancy was my main concern because this innocent little boy was caught in the middle of his dad’s addiction and my trying to fix it because it was killing me significantly more than it was killing him. I knew I had to get out of there, and I knew that once I left, I was no longer obligated to go back, and if I did, I could no longer be forced to stay.

The only things that keep me going back there, are memories.

And uncomfortable things.

Like that tree.