A Nightmare Plays Out In Real Time – Part 3 – “Escape… or, More Imprisonment?”

I awoke to a loud banging on the front door.  As soon as I opened my eyes he was jumping out of bed and putting on his pants.  He whispered to me that I’d better not make a sound or come out of the room as he pointed the gun at me.  He left the bedroom door open just a  little and I could see the front door from the bed.  He opened the front door to a woman yelling at him about money.  He said something about his kid or kids and I got the impression that this woman was his wife.  I couldn’t hear everything they were saying, only bits and pieces of things here and there that I was trying to put together. From what I could tell they were separated and had at least one child together.  He never had the front door opened more than 6 inches or so… just enough for him to talk to her and hand her money out of his wallet.  I wish I could hear more.  I wish I could understand more of what I was hearing.

All of a sudden he was back in the room ordering me to get out of bed and telling me I had to leave.  Leave?  Hell, yeah!  That’s exactly what I had been wanting to do since he grabbed me.  He put the nightie back in the closet and made sure the living room was straightened up and plugged the phone back in the kitchen as he told me to call my mother to come get me.  I happily made the call and he gave her directions of how to get to his house.  I was finally going home.  I could finally see my kids.  Thank God!

As we waited for my mother to come get me, he was talking very sweetly about how happy he was that he was able to rescue me.  He kept telling me how lucky I was that he came along when he did.  He wanted to cook me breakfast, but I just wanted my mom to be there so I could get as far away from this man as possible.  He kept me busy with small talk and the time passed quickly.

As soon as my mom came to the door I was ready to walk out, but he had her and my kids come in.  What the hell?  He was being so sweet to them and it was making me sick not to scream out what he had done, but I had no idea how he’d react and now my children were in this house with him, too.  He had my mom so convinced that he was such a great guy that she was actually thanking him for helping me.  Thankfully, we were finally leaving.

As soon as we got in the car, I began telling her how I had no idea who he was and that he just “took” me in the midst of all the commotion.  I was so busy talking to her about what had happened that I didn’t bother to look at the address or even the name of the neighborhood we were leaving.

Soon we were talking about Harold and I wasn’t thinking so much of the race car driver.  In fact, with being able to focus on Harold again, I forgot about my kidnapper altogether.  That seems strange to me now, but I guess I was putting my energy where the most CURRENT threat was.  It was the last time I saw that man face-to-face.  But, his name would come up while watching a race and I would always wonder.  I settled for thinking that it couldn’t be him… that the man who kidnapped me was just using his name to try to impress me or something.  But, will I ever know for sure?

Mom and I thought it best that we take the kids to a hotel and hide out for the weekend so that Harold wouldn’t be able to find us.  I went to the ATM to get cash for the hotel, but Harold had already emptied the bank account.  We ended up at a hotel in Brandon far enough away from home that he wouldn’t think to look for us there, but close enough that if something happened we could get home quickly.

It was Mother’s Day weekend and I was spending it hiding out in a hotel room with my mother and children.  That day and the next I went to pay phones to call Harold’s family in NC telling them what happened and asking them to help.  Help us… and, help him.  Maybe if he went for a visit with them, it would help clear his mind.  Maybe they could talk to him.  Maybe they could convince him to get away from the drugs.

Apparently, he had already given them a very different version of the events that took place.  He had them convinced that even though he did what he did, it was MY fault and that I deserved it.  They wouldn’t even believe me that he was threatening our kids and my family, too.  How could they not believe me?  How could they think this was my fault?  I had always been extremely close to his family.  In fact, they kept in touch with me more than they did him.  I loved them so much.  I never thought of them as in-laws.  I thought of them as MY family.  They knew him.  They knew me.  How could they not believe what I was telling them?  How could they ignore the fact that he was so messed up on drugs?  I guess it didn’t matter.  I felt so lost.  I felt so hopeless.  I thought if nothing else, I could always turn to them for help.

Each time I walked out the hotel room door for food or anything else, I was scouting for Harold.  We spent that weekend in fear that he would find us.  Scared that he would carry out his threats.  There was no way for me to know that he was, in fact, about to carry out one threat he had made for years.

No way for me to know how drastically my life would be changing forever.