I stare in disbelief.
My heart thuds. My mind reels.
It’s him.
It’s really him.
I still can’t believe that, after all this time, I finally found him.
From the dim interior of my car, I track him as he walks through the living room of his house. I watch his shadow move behind the artfully drawn sheers. Watch it pass the regal grandfather clock. Skirt the plush sofa. Watch it appear and disappear in one wedge of the dining room window before he ducks into a room hidden from my view.
Hot tears burn the backs of my eyes. I resist them, squeezing my lids shut. I begin my mantra—I will not cry. I will not cry. I will not cry.
He doesn’t deserve my tears. Not one more of them.
I’ve told myself that dozens and dozens of times—over coffee, at the grocery store, in line at the bank. And at every victim support group meeting I attended. I would listen as people around the circle told their tale, and when it came to me, I would smile a wobbly smile and say my piece. Hi, my name is Shannon Vogle. I was a victim of…of… My wavering voice would fail me, I’d tell myself I would not cry, I would not cry, I would not cry. But I would cry, and they would move on to another person, and no one ever got to hear my story.
That’s probably best, though. My story could’ve gotten someone killed.
But now, today, after all this time, my tears don’t fall. My eyes clear. And they burn with purpose.
I force myself to focus on the rage, and on the satisfaction that rests just beneath it.
I found him.
I actually found him.
It’s surreal. Even as I gaze into his home, into the place where he feels safe and undiscovered, part of me can’t believe I found him. There was a time when I didn’t think I would. There was even a time when I didn’t try. When I could hardly find the will to drag myself out of bed. But, in the end, I couldn’t give up. There was too much at stake. Weeks passed, but rather than dulling my need to find him, time only sharpened it. Too many late nights crying myself to sleep, and too many early mornings hoping it was all a bad dream.
Going to bed in devastation.
Waking up to desolation.
That became my new reality, and a reality like that can do things to your mind. Strange things. Awful things. It can turn a nightmare into an obsession.
And it did.
He made himself my nightmare.
I made him my obsession.
Once weeks and weeks of tears dried, fury set in. Scorching, tormenting fury. And desperation. And in the mad swirl of it, a new woman emerged.
I used to be easy-going. I loved to laugh, loved to love. I had no idea what I was capable of. I found out, though. I found out in a dark, dark room with no sound and no choice. I found out what I could do, what I would do if I was backed into a corner. Now I have to live with that, with what I’ve done. Every day. But I’m not the one who should be suffering sleepless nights and anxiety attacks. He is the one who deserves all that.
All that and more.
So much more.
Slowly, my nightmares turned into dreams, dreams of finding him, of running into him and exacting a brutal and fitting revenge. Of taking back my life and all that is dear to me. I began to wake with dried tears on a smiling face and wrath in my heart. No visions of sugarplums danced in my head. No, only visions of hurting him. Hurting him like he’d hurt me. Taking from him like he’d taken from me. So I started writing things down, things I remembered. No detail was too small, no fact too insignificant. Anything that pertained to him, to that ordeal, to that nightmare, I wrote down. When he took me, where he kept me, everything he said, that last night and how he dropped me off—I recorded everything that came to mind until I had enough to start a search.
And search, I did.
I searched until I found him.
It took me ten months, but I’m finally looking at the man who shattered my world. Who left me alive, but not really.
He destroyed my life.
Now I will destroy his.
I can’t forget what he did to me.
He’ll never forget what I’m about to do to him.