By August 2010, my marriage to Aeron was legally over, and after my argument with his mother, Aeron stayed away for the most part, coming and going as he pleased. We were right back to our old habits and the cycle of abuse continued. But that November, when Aeron invited me to join him at a listening party he was holding for the album he’d been working on since forever, I wanted to support him. He knew I never believed in his dream of becoming a musician and even though his voice was beautiful, he’d always been dated and uncool. He just didn’t have it. I was accustomed to running around with the crème of the musical crop and his incessant need to be an artist was embarrassing to me. To put it plainly, Aeron was just corny.
But he was just as obsessive about his music as I was about our relationship. So, I continued to vie for his approval by showing mine. I was excited to join him that night and rushed to pick up Naiim from school, shower, change, and meet Aeron at the Sunset Marquis Hotel in West Hollywood. There, just off the parking garage, is a recording studio they call Nightbird.
I walked into the studio and felt all eyes on me. I was still uncomfortable around people and was never good at making new friends, especially when everyone in the room was already judging me based on what they thought they knew about me.
Aeron saw me as I walked in and greeted me. “Hey, you want a drink?” he asked as he showed me to a seat in the far corner of the room.
“Yeah. Sure! Is there white wine?” I asked, being mindful to stay upbeat and smile in the presence of strangers. I sat in the seat Aeron appointed for me and waited for him to bring my drink. He left the studio and returned several minutes later with two drinks in his hand, neither of them a glass of wine. He walked in laughing with one of his friends before making eye contact with another woman who was sitting closer to the door. He handed her one of the drinks he held and stood next to her as they both began sipping their cocktails.
I just sat there.
Aeron never brought me that glass of wine, so eventually I stormed out of the studio and headed for the hotel’s outdoor bar. There, I met a couple of other patrons, struck up a conversation, watched the ball game playing on the television above the bar, and bought my own glass of wine. I must have been out there for over an hour and never once did Aeron call or text to see where I’d gone. I began to wonder why he even bothered inviting me to the event if he only intended to ignore me the entire night. I wondered—until I realized that was the reason he invited me.
By the time I made my way back toward the recording studio with the intent to get in my car and go home, I was tipsy and furious. As I made my way past the studio and toward the valet, I ran into Aeron, who coyly cackled as a woman draped herself over his shoulders. Aeron was a flirt and he never saw anything wrong with his overtly inappropriate dealings with women, whether in public or in private. He didn’t see the implications of it when he took those two women to the Why Did I Get Married premiere or when he carried on a relationship with an overweight sex-worker. It was all fun and games to him and it was all torture to me.
“Get the fuck off my husband,” I demanded as I charged the woman, removing her arm from his neck.
“Oh! I’m sorry,” she responded, genuinely shocked and bewildered. “I didn’t know you had a wife,” she continued, turning to Aeron in search of answers.
“What the fuck is wrong with you,” Aeron growled. “That’s my sister’s neighbor. She’s like family and I’m not your husband!”
I’d forgotten about our divorce. Aeron and I were still involved, still having sex, still sharing a bed, and he still inhabited my home when he felt the need, but he was no longer my husband.
“Family? Family doesn’t act the way she’s acting—the way the both of you are acting!” I belligerently rebutted. Plus, I recognized her. Back when I found the disturbing string of emails between Aeron and Felicia Fats, I also came across other inappropriate or suggestive emails and photos from several other women. This woman was one of them.
Before the situation could escalate, Aeron grabbed me by my forearm and pulled me toward the valet, ordering them to bring my car around. By this time, all his guests had poured out into the parking garage and stood idly by as Aeron and I began to argue. We shouted at each other as the valet scurried to deliver my car. As the Mercedes pulled up behind me, the valet opened the car door and left it that way. Aeron and I walked and argued until I stood in the open doorway, my back to the car. The argument became more and more heated and, true to form, Aeron pushed his large forearm into my chest and tried to force me into the car. I hit my head on the doorframe as I resisted his push. He grabbed my neck and continued to push me into the car as I fought back, screaming, begging him to let go of me.
Everyone watched.
No one helped.
I could taste blood in my mouth as the altercation continued. Eventually, one of Aeron’s friends pulled him off me and ordered him into his car. I scrambled for my phone and called the police as I watched Aeron and his friend flee the scene. Over the next fifteen minutes, while I waited for the West Hollywood police to respond, the hotel’s management ordered everyone else to leave the premises. All the witness left—all except for one man who stayed with me as I waited for the police in the hotel’s lobby. When the officers arrived, they took photos and video evidence of my bruises and helped me begin the process of obtaining a restraining order against my ex-husband. They asked if I needed an ambulance and I refused. Battered and broken, I just wanted to go home, curl up into a ball, and die.
Over the next several weeks, I did everything I could to build a case against Aeron. Initially, I was determined to fight back the only way I could—in court. I wanted to prove once and for all that I wasn’t the bad one in this relationship. I wanted to be vindicated against all the horrible things he said about me and all the lies he told people about our relationship. I wanted the world to see him hitting, pushing, and choking me. And all I needed was the hotel’s surveillance footage.
I visited the Sunset Marquis on two separate occasions after the incident to speak to the hotel’s manager, who was of no help to me. I asked if I could have a copy of the footage and was refused. I was told there was no footage, that there were no cameras in the underground parking garage where guests kept their expensive, luxury vehicles. I was told lies. No one wanted to help me. No one cared and I went back home, defeated once again.
In my mind, I’d already resigned myself to the fact that Aeron was eventually going to kill me and there was nothing I could do about it. So, on November 22, 2010, I wrote a letter to those I’d known professionally and personally and sent it to everyone on my contact list. I figured I would write the letter then, so that when they found me dead, they would know who did it and that I knew it was coming but had been too sick to stop it.
Domestic Violence: An Open Letter
I’ve been a victim of abuse all my life—literally, for as long as I can remember. It is my norm. Whereas most people would run in the other direction the moment someone physically, emotionally, or mentally abused them—I stay.
It’s a sickness and just when I think I am cured, the cancer spreads.
For the past several years, I have been involved in a highly abusive relationship. I have been choked, whipped with belts, thrown about, berated, belittled, raped, and disregarded as a human being. I have been abandoned and embarrassed, then loved and coddled.
I have been caught in a vicious cycle and have left on many occasions, just to return. I have found little support from my friends and family because I complain and I cry, then I go back for more. I go back knowing that, one day, he’ll kill me, but he’s all I have. He’s the only one who understands because he’s stuck in this cycle, too.
When I try to confide in friends, they ask, “Well, what did you do to him? What did you say to him?” They tell me, “You know how he is, he’s never going to change, so why do you stay? You know what you’re getting into. Don’t tell anyone because he’ll come out looking good and you’ll only make yourself look bad.” It’s always my fault.
No one understands—not even me.
So, I keep it all to myself and it continues. Then, we make up and vow it will never happen again—then it does and I feel so foolish for ever believing he can change or that we can change. Then, I begin to believe again. I believe even now.
I love him though it pains me to admit.
It sickens me to know that I will return to him in an instant and that the next time could be the last time and that breath, my last breath. Still, I hold out hope that one day we’ll learn how to love one another without pain. I pray that those who look on with smirks and judgments know one thing—domestic violence is very real and, at times, very final.
If you, or someone you know, has been a victim of domestic violence, please contact the National Domestic Abuse Hotline at (800) 799-7233.
I was dying and reaching out for help.
My letter reached a friend who worked with the producers of the Dr. Phil Show, and soon I was on the phone with one of the show’s producers, explaining my relationship and the abuse that plagued it since the beginning. Naturally, they wanted us on the show and I was just desperate enough to do it, if it meant I could shine a light on what was really happening in my relationship and in my life and if it meant that Aeron and I could receive some sort of help or that I could get away. I felt I would be better protected if more people knew—if the world knew. But, of course, when the producers contacted Aeron, he was not interested in the attention. He didn’t want anyone to know about the documented abuse and injuries I suffered at his hand and, without his participation, the producers of the Dr. Phil Show decided I wasn’t worth helping. Shortly afterward, sometime in December of 2010, Aeron wrote to me via email, It doesn’t matter who you tell. No one cares about you anymore. No one wants to hear anything from you anymore. And that was all he wanted, for no one to care about me. He resented my very existence and would have done anything to see it plagued or even ended.
From my computer, I watched as gossip blogs made up stories about me, belittled and berated me, lying about my being involved with men and women I’d never even met, perpetuating the constant slut shaming I had endured since the onset of my career. I watched the world spin a fictitious web around me and the persona I created, and when a story leaked about the abuse I suffered at Aeron’s hands, it was reported that I deserved it.
I must have.
No one ever cared about me. No one ever loved me. I never had anywhere to go and no one to save me or help me. All I’d ever done was be honest about my life, who I was, who I wanted to be, where I wanted to go and my journey to that place, wherever it is. I never lied, not even about my worst mistakes, and I never made anyone look worse than I did. But I am a woman, and therefore my life is valued less than that of a dog’s.
This is what the world taught me.
And I couldn’t fight the world. I didn’t have the energy to order cease and desists on every blog and magazine that posted or printed scathing, defamatory falsities. I couldn’t stand up for myself in public—I was too busy trying to save my life in private.
Naturally, Aeron and I did not spend the 2010 holiday season together. But soon he and I would make amends and jump back into our vicious cycle. He continued to creep in and out of the house at his leisure whenever he wanted something.
And, as always, I was there to give it to him.
But I was finally nearing the end of my tether.
There never seemed to be a time I didn’t begin and end my day in tears. I was sick of living this way but was in too deep to see my way out. Once again, I found it hard to eat and I began drinking too much. I spent most of my days in bed or perched on the balcony just outside my bedroom’s back door, smoking cigarettes and ignoring phone calls from concerned friends, like Deneen. I’d been ready for a change for years and didn’t have the esteem, but now I would be forced to make changes because I was running out of money—and fast.
By New Year’s Day 2011, it was all over. There was only enough money in my accounts for one more rent payment, an astounding $6,000, and I wasn’t expecting another check until April. There was no way I could survive in that house for another three months and had no choice but to leave. I slept through New Year’s Eve and most of New Year’s Day, feeling listless and despondent, and then, on January 2, I awoke with a new resolve.
We were leaving.
With a fire I hadn’t known in years, I sprang out of bed and ran out my bedroom for the first time in days. I barged into Naiim’s room and announced, “Start packing; we’re moving.” He looked at me in confusion and, then, with a sense of relief. “I’m tired of everyone going about their lives and we’re just stuck here, watching them come and go. Everyone is having fun and living life and it’s like we’re living in a prison. So, let’s start by making a pile of things we’re not taking with us and throwing those things out. I’ll grab the empty boxes from the garage.”
Naiim didn’t hesitate.
This move was a long time coming.
Leaving the house, the mausoleum, the shrine I created and kept up all in the name of pulling a family together out of a million broken pieces, was more than a change of venue—it was an escape from Aeron. I started looking for apartments on the other side of town, out of the hilly suburbs and in the bustling city about thirty minutes away. I didn’t want to live in that neighborhood anymore; I didn’t want to see the same streets, restaurants, and stores Aeron and I visited over the past five years. It seemed as if every building within a ten-mile radius had a memory attached to it and I wanted no part of any of them.
In a flurry, I packed up the house and made arrangements for my furniture broker to buy back the majority of the furniture that filled its three stories. In the end, he bought over $30,000 worth of furniture for just $3,000—money I desperately needed. Even then, I still had to borrow money from friends to pay for the costs of moving and closing out my bills and the lease at my current home. I even got Aeron to shell out a few hundred bucks and pack a few boxes, the few times he came by to visit. Whenever he inquired as to where Naiim and I would be moving, I always told him I wasn’t sure and that I was still waiting to be approved for a place. It was never my intention to let him know where we’d be or to let him back into our lives once we moved.
I was looking forward to a new start.
Scared but looking forward.
The most difficult part of leaving the old neighborhood had to be pulling Naiim out of school and away from his friends. Even though he loved our home, he was ready to move on from what it represented and the energy that lived there. What he wasn’t ready to do was change his life completely and move into the city for the first time in his nearly thirteen years. Sure, we could have easily stayed in the suburbs. God knows it would have been a lot easier and cheaper, but I couldn’t bear the thought of wallowing in the same town for one more day.
I really just wanted to be happy.
I really just wanted to be free.
So, with our bravest faces painted on, Naiim and I walked through his school, getting all his teachers to sign him out of their classes, returning his textbooks and turning in the last of his assignments. All his friends, many of whom he’d known since kindergarten, wished him good luck and told him good-bye. He was so strong and I knew he was doing it for me. But the moment we got back in the car and shut the doors, my son broke down and sobbed.
Tears flooded from my eyes as my son grieved the life he was leaving behind and questioned the life ahead. I held onto him and tried my best to assure him that we would be okay, that the move would be tough but that it was necessary for us to start completely over.
“I’m so sorry, Naiim,” I said as I held my son, kissing his face. “I know this isn’t easy but we have to do it; we have to move on with our lives and try something new. This place is killing me and that’s hurting you. Just think of it as a new adventure, a new life for us— just you and me. I promise, I’ll make everything okay.”
As I dried his tears, I hoped my son believed me; I hoped he trusted me, and more than anything, I hoped everything I told him was true. I didn’t know what was going to happen next. I didn’t yet know where we would end up and if anything I was doing would be the right thing. All I knew was that I’d fucked up our lives and I wanted to fix them.
I searched for the right apartment in just the right neighborhood, with an appropriate rent and a feasible move-in cost. I called around and visited a few properties until finding the perfect one, and by January 14, Naiim and I were moved out of the prison we inhabited and settled into our new apartment—all without telling Aeron where we were headed. By that time, after years of carrying such a heavy financial burden, my credit was shot. And between the closing bills at the house, the move-in costs at the new place, the price of the movers, and the storage needed to keep things that didn’t fit into the tiny 1,250-square-foot apartment, I was all out of money. Still, Naiim and I were headed to our new home and a new chance at life. I was finally going to start over and make right all the bad decisions I’d made since 2007.
I was exhausted during the last night of the move and happy to be just three blocks from my new place with the last set of boxes piled into my Mercedes. Behind me, one of the movers was driving my SUV, also packed with boxes, while the other two trailed behind in the moving van. Naiim and I were almost home. Driving on a busy city street, lined with restaurants and night clubs, we whizzed past one of many valet stands when suddenly a parking attendant opened a car door wide, hitting the passenger-side rearview mirror of my car, snapping it.
This was the last thing I needed.
I’d recently made arrangements to return both my cars to the dealers, unable to afford the $3,000 monthly in payments. I was trying to simplify my life and downsizing was the first step. But now, with the mirror broken, there was no way I could return the car and incur the outrageous dealership fees from having their technicians fix the damages. It would cost me less to have the mirror fixed myself, but I couldn’t even afford cheap labor at that point. I tried for the next couple of weeks to raise the money, to no avail, and I was just weeks away from having to return the car to the dealership.
I needed help, and every time I felt vulnerable, I always reached for Aeron. I tried so hard not to do it this time. I tried so hard to depend on someone else, but after shutting myself away from the world for so long, there was no one I could call.
Desperate, I called Aeron.
It was a bad decision and I knew that as I was making it. Moving was my first real attempt at leaving Aeron and my life with him behind and I fucked it all up. I was so different from that girl who drove herself to the emergency room that I didn’t know who I was anymore. He was all I knew at that point and as much as I wanted a life without him, I didn’t know how to go about getting it.
Aeron was happy to come to my rescue. I sent him directions to my new apartment via email and, anxious to know where I’d moved, he came right over. A few days and six hundred dollars later, the mirror was fixed, and even though he was the one who paid for the repairs, I was the one paying the heftiest price.
It was February 2, 2011, and Aeron was back in my life.