Bruised

His laugh filled the room like sunlight—warm, full, rich with that rare kind of joy that makes you feel chosen just to witness it.

We were in the old apartment, the tiny one with crooked kitchen tiles and a way-too-loud fridge that hummed like a chainsaw in the dead of night. I used to hate it. But in that moment, I swear it felt like home.

Jake stood at the stove in his gray hoodie—my favorite one, the one that smelled like cedarwood and sleep. He flipped pancakes with one hand and held a mug of coffee in the other, like some kind of domestic god. He glanced over his shoulder, caught me watching, and that smile—that damn smile—spread slow and crooked across his face.

“Don’t just stand there, Cass. Come taste this perfection.”

I laughed. God, I actually laughed. The real kind—the kind that starts low and bursts out before you can stop it.

He walked over, pinched a piece of pancake, and held it to my lips.

“Open.”

I did. Of course I did. I would’ve followed him off a cliff then. The sweetness of syrup and cinnamon burst on my tongue. His thumb grazed my bottom lip.

“You’re perfect,” he whispered, like it was a secret.

And I believed him.

We spent the whole morning in bed after that. His fingers tangled in my hair, our limbs knotted like we were trying to memorize each other’s shape. He told me about the house he wanted to buy one day—with a big yard, a swing, maybe a dog named Basil because “it sounds fancy.”

I said he was ridiculous. He said I was beautiful.

I can still hear his voice in my ear.

“You know I love you, right?”

“Always.”

I blink—

And the light is gone.

The softness is gone.

Everything is gone.

My body screamed before my mind caught up. A raw ache in my face. Something sharp and wet sliding down my upper lip.

I groaned and tried to move, but pain knocked the air from my lungs.

The floor was freezing. Hardwood. I curled on my side, the world tilted with me. My hand shook as I reached up and touched my face.

Sticky.

Warm.

Blood.

My nose—twisted, throbbing. The bone under my skin felt... wrong. Like it didn’t belong to me.

I blinked hard. My left eye refused to open fully. Swollen. Ached with every breath.

The apartment was silent. Still.

No soft humming. No coffee brewing. No Jake.

Just me.

Just pain.

Just the echo of his voice whisperingalways, while my body screamednever again.

I closed my eyes and let the silence swallow me whole.

I don’t know how long I lay there.

Minutes. Hours. A small forever.

Eventually, I moved. Slowly. Every inch a rebellion. My arms trembled as I pushed myself up. My vision swam. The floor groaned beneath me like even the apartment was tired of holding me.

Bare feet scraped the wood as I staggered toward the bathroom. I clung to the doorframe like it might forgive me for opening it.

And then—

The mirror.

God.

My breath hitched.

There she was.

Me. But not.

My eye was purpled and puffed shut like I’d been stung by hornets. Blood crusted beneath my nose, dried to a rusty smear along my chin. My face was a patchwork of bruises—blues and angry reds blooming like wilted flowers.

I didn’t cry.

I just stared.

Like if I stared long enough, the reflection might blink and tell me it was someone else. A dream. A story I once heard.

But it didn’t blink. Didn’t move.

It was me.

And he was gone.

Jake.

My hands shook as I turned the faucet on. Cold water. I cupped it and splashed it over my face. Again. Again. As if it could wash away what he’d done. What I’d let him do.

My phone lay cracked on the counter—a jagged line like it’d been thrown. Maybe I threw it. Maybe he did.

I wiped it with the sleeve of his hoodie—I was still wearing it, Jesus—and unlocked it with trembling fingers.

Voicemail from work. Two missed texts from Amber. One from Jake, hours ago:

“Didn’t mean to. I just need space. Don’t call.”

I stared until the words stopped making sense.

My thumb hovered over my manager’s contact. Then pressed it. Rang once. Twice.

“Cassie?” her voice chirped. “Are you okay? You were supposed to be here at eight—”

“I’m sick,” I croaked. It sounded believable. Just enough rasp. Just enough hollow.

“Oh. Okay. Feel better soon, sweetie.”

Click.

I sat on the closed toilet lid, phone in hand, cold and small and invisible. I didn’t know what to do. Who to call. Where to go.

I only knew one thing:

I couldn’t tell anyone.

Because if I said it out loud, it would be real.

And I wasn’t ready for that.

I stayed in that bathroom a long time.

Time didn’t tick the same way in moments like this. It curled in on itself, slipped through cracks. The faucet dripped in sync with my heartbeat—slow and heavy and unforgiving.

Drip. Drip. Drip.

The hoodie still smelled like him. Faintly. That clean, crisp cologne he always wore. The one I used to love so much I’d bury my face in his shirts fresh from the laundry just to breathe him in.

Now it made my stomach turn.

I should’ve thrown it off. But I didn’t. Couldn’t. Like keeping it on held the good parts of him close—the parts that smiled like I was his whole world. The Jake from the fairgrounds. The Jake who taught me to drive stick shift and kissed my scraped knees. The Jake who made pancakes with chocolate chip smiley faces after my first college rejection letter.

Not the one who left me bleeding on the floor like a ruined thing.

A sob built in my throat, but I swallowed it down. I didn’t want to cry. Crying meant I still believed this wasn’t normal. Crying meant there was still a version of me who hadn’t accepted it.

But I had.

Somewhere between the screaming and slammed doors, begging and blaming—I had accepted it.

It wasn’t always like this.

I remembered the first time he raised his voice. How it made my skin prickle. How he apologized after with flowers and his favorite playlist playing in the car as we drove nowhere just to feel okay again.

But now? The apologies were texts. The flowers never came. The bruises didn’t just sit on my skin—they nested there, made a home of me.

I glanced at the clock on my phone. 11:12 a.m.

Half the day was gone and I hadn’t moved past the bathroom. My back ached from sleeping wrong on the floor. My chest ached from loving a man who didn’t know how not to hurt me.

The ache in my heart...

I stood slowly. Limbs like jelly, regret heavy as lead.

I padded to the kitchen. Empty fridge. Half a jug of expired milk. An open bottle of wine on the counter. I grabbed it—no glass. Just the bottle.

I took a swig and let it burn down. Maybe it would burn away last night. The way his voice cracked when he said, “You make me do this.”

The worst part?

A piece of me believed him.

I sank into the couch, hoodie wrapped tight like armor. The silence wasn’t peace—it was punishment. It hummed through the apartment like a ghost, like a warning.

I didn’t know when he’d come back.

But I knew he would.

He always did. And I’d let him—because deep down I thought maybe he could go back to how he was.

The buzz of the front door lock sliding open made me jolt.

I froze mid-sip, bottle clutched tight, the glass neck pressed to my lower lip. My heartbeat stuttered.

Footsteps.

Heavy. Familiar. Worn like the tread of his favorite boots.

Jake.

The door clicked shut behind him, silence falling like a curtain.

I didn’t turn around. Didn’t have to.

His presence soaked into the apartment like smoke—slow, suffocating, uninvited.

“Cass...” His voice was hoarse. Cracked. Like gravel caught in honey. Like regret straining to sound like love.

I didn’t answer. Just stared at the muted TV screen. Background noise. Filler for silence I couldn’t bear.

“I’m so fucking sorry,” he said.

Soft words meant to soothe. Meant to erase the way his fist collided with my face like I wasn’t breakable. Like I didn’t matter.

“I lost it last night, I—I didn’t mean to...” He trailed off, taking hesitant steps closer. “You know I’d never hurt you on purpose.”

A laugh caught in my throat like shattered glass.

“Really?” I said, still not facing him. “Then how did I end up on the floor?”

Silence.

I stood slowly, knees stiff, head swimming. I turned to face him—and saw it. That flash of guilt in his eyes. The panic. The sorrow that always came too late. His eyes flicked to my bruised face, my swollen nose. Something inside him shattered, too. I saw it. But I didn’t care.

“You weren’t here,” I whispered.

“I—I didn’t know what to do,” he said, voice thick. “I panicked.”

“I woke up alone,” I said. “Bleeding. In pain. And you weren’t here.”

He ran a hand through his hair. Looked like hell—tired, unshaven, wrecked. But still had that charm. That dangerous, soft-boy charm that used to make me melt. That used to feel like home.

Now it felt like a trap.

“I’ll change,” he said. “Cassie, I swear. I’m gonna fix it. I just... I lost control. Work’s been hell, my mom’s been riding me about money—”

“I don’t care.” My voice was ice.

His mouth snapped shut. Good.

“I called out sick today,” I said. “Told them I had the flu.”

He looked at me, eyes wide, searching. “I’m so sorry.”

I didn’t answer.

He stepped closer, reaching for me—but I flinched before he touched me, and his hand froze midair.

“Can I stay?” he asked softly.

The worst part? The part I hated?

I nodded.

Because I didn’t know how to say no.

Because some twisted part of me still wanted to believe he meant it.

That he could change.

That he’d choose love over rage next time.

But deep down, I knew the truth.

I just wasn’t ready to accept it.