Juniper

In the light of day, six months ago, when she bought the house, the bushes seemed lovely. Charming hedgerows, grown six feet high, provided privacy and a fence of sorts. A wrought-iron gate, only three feet high, filled a gap between the bushes and blocked off the cracking walkway to solicitors. Sure, the brown grass grew in fairly skimpy patches. But on that sunshine-riddled afternoon, the hedgerows seemed to breathe a British magic which overrode the yard’s other failings.

She couldn’t really afford it working for a non-profit domestic violence shelter.

Still, the yard was wonderful. As the months passed, however, and Sara came home after late nights filled with bruised women who told true horror stories, the bushes lost their pleasant enchantment and became something far more sinister.

With no garage or carport, Sara was forced to park on the street. This felt like a minor detail when she’d purchased the house. Tonight, she parked at the curb and, from her position in the driver’s seat, the orange porch light fell against the iron-barred gate. The porch light was always dim, no matter how many times she changed the bulb. The dingy glow cast long, indistinct shadows against the sidewalk. Almost midnight. No one else out on the street. Somewhere a cat yowled to be let in.

At night, the hedgerows did not comfort.

The shelter had certain rules, certain ways of conducting business to protect the women, their children, and the counselors themselves. Sara heard her own voice every night when she looked at the bushes. In her head, she repeated her own advice to herself.

“Be aware of your environment. Vary your routine.”
Her environment originally seemed safe. Privacy hedges. No one could see her.

After a few weeks, she realized she could not see out. In the house, only her small yard was visible.

When she parked on the street, she couldn’t tell if someone waited there, behind the bushes.

“You must think strategically. You must understand that things you use to protect yourself, like weapons, can be used against you. If your partner is spending time and energy to get to you, you must spend at least as much time and energy to get away. I’m sorry this happened to you. Now we have to make sure it doesn’t happen again.”

Sara ended her relationship four years ago.

She climbed out of her car. Between tiny gaps in the branches, Sara made out light from the porch, but nothing distinctive. The bushes loomed over her, making the partly cloudy sky seem darker. Her first couple steps were loud on the sidewalk. Too loud. She stopped. She arched her already sore feet higher in her high heels and kept to her toes.

When she reached the last hedge before the gate, she paused. She waited. She listened. She felt silly. In the months she’d lived here, there had been nothing, no sign of a soul when she entered her front yard. Still, she waited. She listened. Because things which protect you can also be used against you.

Sara held her breath. Soft wind. A breeze rustled through the hedgerow, making the tight branches tremble. The tops tilted and bent. A sharp pine scent floated in the cool January night. Air moved through the evergreen needles, first in one direction, then the other, as if the plants breathed. She let out her own breath and opened the gate.

As she crossed into her small front yard, as the gate clicked into its latch, Sara realized too late the hedges had not been the only thing breathing.

Her left cheek cracked against his familiar knuckles. The bone split along its old fault lines, never fully healed. She did not need to see his face to know his fingers.
Sara stumbled to the side but didn’t fall. Her purse landed in a patch of brown grass. One of her shoe-heels pushed deep into a spot of exposed dirt. Her foot twisted and the sharp pain which radiated up from her ankle hurt worse than the old, renewed wound in her cheek. Somehow she stayed upright, her foot freeing itself from the shoe, her outstretched hand tangling in the bushes, her fingers wrapping around the thin branches. Her joint would not hold her weight for long.

Scream, she told herself. Make some kind of noise.

But they, the two of them, fell into their old habits. She turned to face him, her left eye already swollen. Blood, she tasted blood when she tried to take a breath. She choked. His fist hit her in the stomach next. She couldn’t breathe to scream. The force of the blow sent her back into the hedges. Scaly hedge needles scratched her face, pulled at her hair, and clung to her wool coat. The bushes took her weight and held her upright. Things which protect you can also be used against you.

Sara had done so many things to protect herself in the past. Things like hedgerows. Things like the domestic shelter where she worked. Things like moving five states away. Judges. Police officers. 911.

His face pressed close to hers now. She recognized him the same way she recognized the thumbs pressing into her throat and the Captain Morgan on his breath.

She’d done so many things to protect herself. The house was clean. Dinner ready on time. She said, “I love you.”