Empowerment
"What's this?" I caught up with Mia after work. I waved the sheet of paper she'd stuck in my locker.
"Our group is having a WEN tonight." She informed me. "I arranged to have here."
"WEN?" I didn't have any idea of what group she meant. I glanced down at the bright letters on her flier.
"Women's Empowerment Night." Her dark eyes shone as she spoke. "It's the best self-esteem booster."
"Are you implying I have low self-esteem?" I half-joked. The other half of me wondered how she could've seen any if my insecurities, after working with me for only about a month, broken through all the walls I'd built around myself trying to hide them.
Am I completely obvious? I worried.
Sarah guessed, I remembered our talk in the park a few days ago.
"Quite the opposite."
Ok, so I'm better at hiding things than I give myself credit for. The thought made me feel a little more reassured.
"So why do I need empowerment then?"
"Tonight is a self-defense seminar. How to defend yourself against a guy with less than moral intentions, to put it mildly." She winked at me. "You can never be too safe."
".. Yeah." I forced the word out of my mouth, which felt so dry I was tempted to check in a mirror to see if someone had stuffed cotton balls over my tongue.
There's no way you could possibly know, but.. Six years too late Mia.
"So you'll come? It's really a lot of fun, you get to attack people!" The excitement in her voice concerned me. I began to realize there were parts of her I barely knew.. such as the possibility of her being a threat on my physical well-being, for being such a tiny person herself.
"Umm.. sure I'll go." I hoped I knew what I was getting myself into.
"Oof!" Thud.
"I don't think I'm doing this right." I complained to Mia.
"Did it hurt?" she asked.
"Not really, but I feel stupid."
"It's natural to feel uncomfortable when you first start out." What a complete switch of our roles: her the teacher and me the student. Not that I minded though, certainly not as much as I minded trying to kick the living daylights out of 'Bob.' Bob, so named by the women's group, was 'bad'. I didn't think he looked like such a nasty individual, but according to them I was to think of him as a serial rapist. Until now, I didn't know that serial rapists ran amuck in the dark alleys of inner cities, while wearing six inches of thick padding surrounding their entire body.
"Ok.. but do I hafta keep kicking him there?" I referred to his groin, the so-called 'target area' of the evening.
"It might get painful." I added after delivering another thud with my instep to Bob's tender spot.
"The whole point is pain!" she exclaimed loudly enough so the rest of the group to hear.
"Your life or his penis - you pick which one gets it." I knew she was focusing on me, but she looked around the small cluster of women clad in sweatpants and sneakers around us in the aerobics room. I recognized many of them from my classes.
"Good point. Sorry Bob." I grinned a little as I stood back, aimed, and shoved my knee into him.
Thud. I was actually pleased at the slight groan that escaped through the front spokes on his helmet. I could almost get used to beating up people.
"Don't apologize Maggie." Mia reminded me.
"Here, try this." She moved me aside and focused on poor Bob.
"NO!!" She screamed loudly, kicking him with a strength about forty times harder than I felt I had in me.
"No?" I asked her after she put her leg down. I didn't want to say anything while she still had it up, resembling our neighbor's dog before it 'attacks' our mailbox, if you know what I mean. Kind of a scary connection there, but I'd rather get marked as a dog territory than attacked by Mia.
"Just yell something.. it helps you concentrate your energy into your attack."
"No." I squeaked, feeling incredibly silly.. or rather incredibly feminine (so same thing). I figured it wouldn't hurt to try though.
"Louder." she commanded in a deep voice.
"No." Not much difference.
"Louder!"
"No!"
"Louder!!"
I felt my stomach muscles tighten from an unfamiliar internal pressure that built up in me right before I exhaled. "NO!"
"LOUDER MAGGIE, GOD-DAMMIT HE'S GOING TO KILL YOU!"
I sucked in my breathe and screamed at the top of my lungs:
"NO!!!"
The pressure inside me was so great I almost lost my balance from shaking. I rapidly and repeatedly lifted my leg to Bob, screaming each time I attacked him. The raw energy surged inside of me; I felt completely in control as I let it devour my body and turn it into, for lack of better words, an ass-kicking machine.
My vision blurred as tears formed in my eyes from from squinting them so tightly. Even so, I continued,
"No!"
"NO!"
"NO!"
"NO!!"
"Good." Mia sent me a nod of approval, a signal to switch places with someone else. Her words slanted off deaf ears.
"NO!!" Thud.
"NO!!" Thud.
"NO!!" Thud.
"Maggie?" she asked a few minutes later.
"NO!!"
".. Umm.. Maggie!" She tapped me on the shoulder. "Can you let someone else take a turn now?"
"I umm," I flushed, noticing how everyone in the room was staring blankly at me. Several women looked like they were trying not to smile. Not that I could blame them - had I been in their shoes, I'd have been rolling with laughter on the floor by now.
"Yeah, sure." I gasped, completely amazed at how I felt at the moment. Although physically exhausted, my heart pounded so hard I thought it would leap out of my chest. My lungs burned along with my legs with each shortened intake of oxygen and my fists quivered slightly from clenching them together so tightly. I opened my hands and noticed tiny semi-circular incisions in my palms where my fingernails had gouged into the soft flesh.
Did I do that?
At the same time, I felt like I was flying. My mind flashed quickly as it deeply searched the depths of my soul. Although slightly embarrassed at my outpour, a tiny glimmer of pride swelled throughout my system, lifting me to the limits of the stars. It was an incredible feeling.. where the heck did it come from? Perhaps it was the recent behavior of certain males in my life who were infuriating me..
Nah, couldn't be that. Of course not. Not a snowball's chance in hell. Still, I took my place at the end of the line with a smile on my flushed face.
"You're insane." Mia joked to me after the last newly-empowered woman closed the door behind her. I'd stuck around to chat with Mia. I noticed Bob had stayed after too.. well, sort of. He lay curled in a fetal position on the floor mats, as he'd been the past fifteen minutes of the class.
"What do you mean?" I smiled innocently in his direction.
"Don't give me that! You know what I mean." She threw a sweaty gym towel at me.
"Gee, thanks for the present. Are you sure it isn't my birthday?" I threw it in a nearby collection bin.
"So how's Zac?" she changed the subject suddenly, remembering she was supposed to ask me about that subject yesterday.
"Ok I guess.. I haven't heard from him in about a week and a half or so, but oh well." I said softly, shrugging my shoulders.
"Why?"
"Just curious.."
Taylor asked. She turned her head and grinned at the sight of Bob.
"I don't know if I've ever seen anyone go so ballistic before on you. Poor guy, had a rough first night, huh sweetie?"
"Sweetie?" I started to ask, when I saw a faint twitch in his body. My mouth dropped practically to the floor as he sat up and lifted his helmet off his face. I recognized him as-
"Taylor!?"
Shit. I doubled over in laughter at the sight of half his blonde hair sticking out in odd directions. The other half was plastered to his neck.
"I- don't believe this!" I said between laughs, sitting down on the floor. This was too hysterical.
"Yeah, it's me." He mumbled, reaching up to smooth down his hair. The glassy look in his eyes made me afraid he was nauseous, but that didn't help to suppress my endless supply of giggles.
"Thanks for volunteering, Tay." Mia walked over and kneeled down next to him. She leaned over and softly kissed his cheek. My happiness was instantly sucked out of me faster than matter through a black hole, before I could finish taking a breath in. The sight of her sitting closely to him, staring into his half-closed eyes, a content half-smile playing on his lips that seemed to read, 'I wouldn't have done this for anyone else' was more than a little disheartening for me. More like heart wrenching.
"Your welcome." He turned his head and kissed her lightly on the lips. It wasn't the most pleasant of scenes for me, I'll be honest. In fact, it twisted my stomach into more knots than those in the baked pretzels sold at the local mall.
This is getting sick. Good indication that it was time for me to start collecting my stuff and head home. My sense of excitement from earlier was gone; I felt like a shallowed out hole. Empty, and not deep enough to be of much worth as the winds of life scattered debris onto me.
Stepping outside, the wind blew strongly against me, nearly knocking me into the side of the building. I stumbled against it in the process of getting out to my car, jumping in to avoid fighting to stand upright any more. I sat in my car until Taylor and Mia followed my suit, company policy when closing up the place. Not that I wanted to see any more of them together; I'd gotten my fill of witnessing Taylor be with other girls for the rest of my life after the last few weeks. For some reason, he'd conveniently show up at places where Mia and I were, 'surprising' her with flowers, gifts, and kisses.
I'll be the first to admit, just to myself, that it burned. This was nothing like the first time I had feelings for Taylor. Beyond the point of my bruised ego, he was deliberately trying to hurt me, and doing a damn good job of it. Resting my chin on the steering wheel, I watched out of the corner of my eye as he helped her into her car. After she rolled down her window and leaned out to kiss him goodbye, I sighed and turned the ignition key, thinking,
Time to go. To my horror, nothing happened.