Laura looked around the room. She looked at where he had punched the wall, the clothes strewn all over the place. She saw the broken leg on the nightstand. This had been a bad one. As she got up, she groaned in pain. She was careful not to step on the glass as she walked over to the mirror that wasn’t shattered. When she finally got to the mirror, her eyes widened. She examined the marks on her neck. She turned her head and saw that she had a cut on her forehead.

“Normally he’s so careful about leaving marks.” she thought as she stared at the girl in the mirror.

She took a deep breath and decided she’d better start covering up the damage. As she gathered the make-up for her face, she thought about the first argument they’d had. It was about two weeks after their honeymoon. She could never figure out what she had done to upset him so much. She couldn’t even remember what he said that night. All Laura could recall was his hand hitting the side of her face. After that, she was ready to leave. She had told him that she was going to her parents’ house until he decided to calm down.

“You’re not going anywhere,” he snarled at her. “You’re going to go upstairs and pretend this never happened.”

She was so surprised; she had never seen this side of him before. So, she just wrote it off as a one-time thing, kissed him on the cheek and went upstairs.

Thinking back on that night, Laura knew that she should have gotten out then. As she started to dab at the cut on her forehead, the wheels in her head started turning. She put the rag down and stared at herself in the mirror. Then she heard the voice in her head start speaking.

“You’re pathetic,” it said. “The real you would never in a million years let a man hit you. What would your parents think? Here, they thought that they raised a strong girl who knows when something is wrong. Ha! How wrong they are! Look at you. Letting him manipulate you and control you. You know you’re stronger than that, Laura.”

Laura looked at her face, suddenly furious at him for making her look and feel this way. She whirled around and took a look at the room. She saw their wedding picture on the ground and slowly walked over to pick up the shattered frame.

“I’m getting out,” she said to the picture.

She walked to the drawer in the bathroom and took out a pair of small scissors. Then, feeling suddenly empowered, she cut the picture in half – cutting the bride and groom apart. Then, setting the separated picture on the broken nightstand, she took out her old suitcase and threw in all of the things that she could salvage. Zipping up the suitcase, she hesitated.

“Maybe it will get better,” she thought.

She sat on the bed and contemplated this for a minute. Just as she started to unpack the suitcase, the voice kicked back in.

“No,” it said, almost sounded angry, “you deserve better. Look at what this man has put you through. Get out now. You have no time to doubt yourself.”

Making a final decision, Laura grabbed her lipstick. She smiled as she walked to the bathroom mirror she wrote, “I’m Done.”

“It’s missing one thing,” she thought.

Feeling adrenaline running through her veins, she quickly smeared the lipstick on her lips and kissed the mirror. As she grabbed her suitcase, she took her half of the picture, and walked out the door.