I read all three parts. Such a sad story, especially knowing that it was based on truth, even if the ending was changed to be positive. If I were able to legislate the justice system, I would pay battered wives a healthy bounty for killing abusive husbands!
Honestly, I felt it could have been told with a little more impact to the reader and to the topic. You used to let go and put sh.it in the readers faces. This story felt like you were being somewhat hesitant and not as forceful in your usual magnamatic point of expression, ya know? Does that make sense?
I'm sorry to read in the description that the story did not actually end this way.
Part three certainly gives the far better option and definitely would be a good ending to share with someone caught up in the vice of abuse.
On a personal note, I volunteered for a couple years in the 1980's with what was then called the State Department of Social Services. One lady who sat at the desk next to me had two detached retinas as a result of spousal battering. She had left that situation but was legally blind as a result. I still think of her and her story all these years later.
Thank you for sharing this three parter with us. I really liked too many lines in part three to even start quoting.
I was about to say, "aww," but then I remembered the description. What was the real ending? I like the one that's here, but now I want to know.
Out of all three, this part is my favorite (and that's saying a lot because I loved the other ones). It's so sad. No, the end isn't, but everything before the last stanza made me want to cry.
"He’d killed her long ago
And lived on without her"
How that can happen is amazing. Those are some of the best lines I've ever read.
"Eyes sunken in – bone poking through flesh"
Yikes. I love it.
This is one of those things that I see and say, "I wish I wrote that," ...which is excellent.
I'd make this comment longer, but I have to go put my dogs out so they sleep comfortably (it's past their bedtime ).