Paperback
-
SHIP THIS ITEMTemporarily Out of Stock Online
-
PICK UP IN STORECheck Availability at Nearby Stores
Available within 2 business hours
Related collections and offers
Overview
At the age of sixteen, Melissa Montoya struggled through her sophomore year, not academically-she did well in that department. However, she being raised practically alone was forced to work just to make ends meet. At the age of seventeen, she was assaulted and raped. The trauma of the rape lasted for years, but she was resilient and she fought with her demons until she finally overcomes the trauma, as much as it was possible. Some things people never get over being raped.
Product Details
| ISBN-13: | 9781649084842 |
|---|---|
| Publisher: | Pageturner, Press and Media |
| Publication date: | 11/02/2020 |
| Pages: | 244 |
| Product dimensions: | 6.00(w) x 9.00(h) x 0.55(d) |
About the Author
Read an Excerpt
Love Has a Blind Eye
By Clarence Mike Dunaway
Trafford Publishing
Copyright © 2016 Clarence Mike DunawayAll rights reserved.
ISBN: 978-1-4907-7229-5
CHAPTER 1
Dangerous Liaison
* * *
At the age of sixteen, Melissa Montoya struggled through her sophomore year. Not academically — she did well in that department. However, being raised practically alone, she was forced to work just to make ends meet. It was almost impossible to believe the perseverance it took. She was relentless, and with a meager amount of help from friends, she finally overcame the journey. She did persevere and met her first goal head on by graduating from high school.
Melissa was forced to work cleaning animal trailers and bedding down with a new lady friend who lived in a trailer not far from the school.
At the age of seventeen, she was assaulted and raped. The trauma of the rape lasted for years, but she was resilient, and she fought with her demons until she finally overcame the shock as much as it was possible. One of the things people never get over was being raped.
Back in the fifties, a young lady about the same age as Melissa was savagely ravished. She lost her mind. The judge in her trial deemed her brain-dead, and the rapist was charged with murder and was put to death fourteen years later. Melissa was happy she maintained her sanity.
At nineteen, Melissa thought the perfect mate was in her grasp, and she married him. She thought he was everything she had ever wanted. The marriage was destined to fail from the start, and it lasted for only one year. There were insurmountable trials and tribulations this young lady had to endure. Looking back, Melissa thought the hardest years were behind her, but little did she know the road ahead had many obstacles she could've never imagined.
Melissa made her way through college and during those years found a young man who helped her in a manner she had never known before. He was kind and polite, and he opened doors for her that until now she never knew existed. It appeared as though things were going well. They dated a few times and then moved in together. One day, the man turned against her.
One night, she was sick in bed and was unable to pick him up from work, and he was forced to ride a bus. That irritated him to no end. When he arrived home, he was determined to get her out of bed. Sick or not, she had a tongue lashing coming just for being sick. You see, this young man had a severe injury and was in a wheelchair; he could not drive. It was up to Melissa to drive him back and forth to work, and being sick, she simply could not get out of bed and drive fifteen miles, and this angered him beyond comprehension.
He pulled her up from the bed, grabbed his phone, and called the police. There was a struggle for the phone, (It's a felony to remove a phone from anyone attempting to call 911.) During the fight, the phone pulled loose from his hand, flying upward, hitting an overhead fan, and ricocheting back down, hitting him in the eye. When the police arrived, they naturally assumed it was her fault, so they cuffed her and took her to jail. He claimed she threw the phone at him, purposely hitting him in the eye.
Melissa was incarcerated and booked on a felony charge, and she was sentenced to ten days plus probation which always follows an offense, thus making it difficult for her to find work.
Now alone and without work, she ended up in a shelter. She lived there for quite some time among drug addicts and alcoholics; you name it; it was a Heinz 57 variety. Everything you can imagine was there, maybe even a murderer hiding out in there somewhere; nobody knows.
Melissa continued through life dodging one disappointment after another.
One night, after passing through another year or more, she happened to run into a couple of her girlfriends from college whom she hadn't seen for a few years. Now in their mid-twenties, they reunited and began going places together. She even got a job working under Sharon Bradley, one of her friends, at an accounting office. I can only imagine the decisions Sharon's boss had to make; it was quite a challenge hiring a felon to work in such a place as an accounting office.
All three girls lived in or around San Jose, California. They decided to go out one night; clubbing, so to speak.
Melissa sat silently at the bar in the Pirate Club. Two of her girlfriends were sitting beside her, Sharon Bradley and Lois Martin. This was girl's night out. They were all beautiful women; Melissa had a dark hair cut short about halfway down her neck while Lois and Sharon had light hair by nature. Amazingly, they were all close to the same height. Their bodies varied in shape and form, but they were all nonetheless beautiful women.
At the end of the bar, a young man of Middle Eastern appearance sat alone sipping what appeared to be a mixed drink. Melissa made no effort to hide the fact that she had an interest in this young male with a slightly dark tan. She was sitting between the other girls, making it difficult to see around Lois, who was on the end next to her.
Lois spoke. "Melissa, why don't you just go to the other end of the bar and introduce yourself before you break your neck?"
Melissa noticed every time she sneaked a peek that he would look back at her. Now, to most people, this would be embarrassing, but it was not so for Melissa. She was shameless; if she saw something she wanted, nothing this side of hell could stop her from attaining her goal.
The blind side of love takes on a multitude of illusions. For example, what she sees in this man may be altogether different than what he sees in her. However, there's a large playing field out there still unexplored. They might turn out to be just good friends. Don't count on it; perhaps they might even be lovers, and I'm betting that will also change. She saw a future husband, and probably in his eyes, he saw a one-night stand. Nonetheless, Melissa, with the balls, shuffled to the end of the bar and sat down next to him. And she opened up with a stupid cliché, "My name's Melissa. Don't I know you from somewhere?" Now that's original.
He replied with a similar remark. "No, not unless you've been to Pakistan. I've only been this country for three weeks, and this is my first visit to this establishment. But you can call me Ahmad, Ahmad Pasha. Have a seat, and I'll buy you drink." He suggested with a broken accent, "What's that you're drinking? It looks weird."
"Oh, it's called a blue dolphin. I'm probably the only one that drinks it. It's vodka and blue something or other. Pretty smooth. Try one," Melissa concluded. She spoke up. "Ahmad, huh? I guess I never thought of you being Pakistani."
Ahmad said, "I guess you might say I'm a mixed breed. My father is Afghan/Pakistani, and my mother's Syrian. My dad lives in Afghanistan. He has his business there. He was born on the border, but the village is actually in Pakistan. One day, during his travels to Syria, he happened into a haberdashery where my mother worked as a seamstress. Well, they just happened to hit it off, and voila, you are looking at the outcome."
"That is quite a combination," she said. "Perhaps I should refer to you as foreigner.
She asked, "Are you sure you don't want one of these blue dolphins?"
"No. If it's all the same to you, I think I'll just stick to what I know — JD and soda."
The girls began to get bored and decided to leave. They stopped by where Melissa was engaged in deep conversation with her new-found friend. "Melissa," Lois said, "Sharon and I are going. Are you coming with us?"
Ahmad nudged Melissa with his knee. "Stick around and have another whatever you call that blue-looking drink, and I'll drop you off later. What you say?" It sounded like he was begging; she wondered what he had in mind.
Well, whatever it was, Ms. Guts went along with it. She told the girls, "You go ahead, and I'll catch a ride home with Ahmad." Wonder what she had in mind?
The girls waved goodbye as they passed through the portal leading out to the street. It had begun to drizzle, and the girls were only wearing light clothing, so they made a mad dash for the car, which was parked almost a block down the street.
Back in the Pirate Club, there was a party going on and a kiss or two exchanged. It appeared that the party was about to heat up.
They finished their drinks; it was nearly 1:00 a.m. when they staggered out the rear door where Ahmad had parked his car. Funny, the girls never thought about the parking lot in the back of the building.
Melissa began to direct Ahmad toward where she and the girls lived, but he had other plans. "Why don't we stop by my pad? We can have another drink before I take you home. Of course, it won't be blue. I'm afraid all I have is Jack Daniel's and maybe a beer."
"I don't know we just met, and I know nothing about you. How do I know you're not a serial killer or an ax murderer?" she asked, giving the situation more thought now that it was after the fact.
"Don't worry, my pretty one. I am gentle as a lamb, wouldn't hurt a fly," said the man of many talents. So far he was all tongue. Talk that is.
Melissa was a bit reluctant to go inside the rather cozy-looking house with the young Pakistani being the only occupant. Something seemed fishy. However, old blood and guts allowed him to guide her in by the hand.
By the time they bedded down, she was so drunk she didn't have a clue what was going on, but you can bet your bootie Ahmad did.
When they woke, she was confused. She didn't know where she was or how she got there. But she knew one thing for sure: she had been taken advantage of and was infuriated that she allowed herself to get into a situation and couldn't find a way out.
Melissa didn't have to go far looking for trouble; it always managed to find her.
Time passed, and as well-educated as Melissa was, she went back for more and more until it became habitual. Eventually, the two moved in together, and that was the second biggest mistake, but this arrangement seemed doomed to failure from the onset. Soon the battle of the sexes begun; it seemed no one could do anything right. There were words tossed around that would've embarrassed a pirate.
After a year, Melissa got pregnant, and the fighting began to heat up. Barely into the second trimester, he booted her out, literally, right in the stomach, and she went down in agony holding her stomach with both arms crossed and pressed against her mid-torso. I don't think he was attempting to cause miscarriage; he wanted a family.
But now she would soon have a child to care for, or should I say the battle was over, and it would never end.
Ahmad wasn't the father Melissa anticipated. He turned his back on her and caused her bodily harm. He hoped perhaps to produce a debacle in the courtroom by blaming everything on her. However, she was rebellious; there was no way anyone or anything would ever take her baby from her. She battled copiously in court, but it was hard to beat a lawyer made of money, and Ahmad had plenty of that. He had everything but compassion.
Some time back during her college days Melissa was picked up on a battery charge, and she was given one-year probation. In Ahmad's anger, he reported her to the authorities for a minor offense. However, in the judge's eyes, it was sufficient to put her in jail for ten days, and she was left there to rot. If she wanted her freedom, there would be fine; of course, she had no money, so she served out her full sentence.
Not only was she booted from her residence, but she was also once again further victimized by having to live in a shelter with the less fortunate, some of whom were drug addicts, alcoholics, and prostitutes. The word poverty would pretty well sum it up. However, among this deprivation, there were some of the silent who were victims of oppression. Melissa fell into the latter category.
One day, while out roaming the streets, she came across a middle-aged lady of Mexican culture. They hit it off immediately, and this lovely lady allowed Melissa to move in with her for a short period.
Eventually, Melissa got back on her feet and moved into her own apartment, but the court battles were endless. Ahmad had the daughter on weekends and her on the days of the week so she could see to it their daughter made it to school; she would get an education at whatever cost or sacrifice. I am afraid this fiasco will end up with one or the other being murdered because of greed, anger, or jealousy.
The lady told Melissa, "Follow the Al-Anon guide one step at a time. If you ever felt that you are faltering, return and start all over." She did until she got it right and to live her life one day at a time. You need not be an alcoholic to follow the twelve steps.
Ahmad was an angry man, taking out his frustrations on gambling, drinking, and womanizing; he could sometimes get violent and do dangerous things and blame them on others — anything for revenge.
As fortune would have it, I met Melissa in the Pirate Club and struck up a conversation with her, and a new life was born. She was the nicest and sweetest lady I'd ever met. However, she was but thirty-eight, and I was eighty-two. I'm afraid there was too much distance in age to ever to be more than a lifelong friendship.
My name is Chuck Wilson. As I said, I'm much older than Melissa, but we weren't looking for romance; we were both talkers, and we did plenty of that. We never became romantically involved; we had become the best friend's possible, and we both needed that.
I was honored just to be in her presence. Being much older, I had experienced several years of life that she had yet to discover. And I was so proud that she confided in me and took to heart the advice I had given her.
Melissa was a very independent woman, yet I had the privilege of being her confidant, and I'll take that friendship to my grave. She told me things about her life she would've never disclosed to any other, and that made me proud — that I and I alone could one day hold the balance of her life in my hands. We had more fun and laughs than a pair of chipmunks.
As I said, Ahmad was a man of violence, and there was little doubt that one day, he would find a way to get rid of Melissa even if it took a bullet to do it. Melissa once told me that Ahmad had a butler who picked up and delivered the child to a safe house where the exchange took place. She was now nine years old. I took it upon myself to follow him to see if I could stop a murder before it happened.
I parked my truck on the street just a short distance from the safe house where the exchange was to take place. It was a Friday afternoon, and the butler pulled up in front of the building, let the girl out of the car, and waited. Soon Melissa came and took charge.
Melissa drove away keeping an eye on the butler; she told me she never trusted him; I'm not totally sure why she never gave me that information.
The Butler pulled away after Melissa was out of sight and drove about three miles to a bar. I waited outside for about an hour, and I decided I would try again next week. It was the same bar where I first met Melissa, the Pirate Club, which was a pretty easy place to find.
I stopped by a small restaurant; I didn't feel like cooking. I had a small steak and a glass of beer and headed home.
I never had the privilege of seeing Melissa except on weekends, and even then, it was only when it was convenient for her. The establishment where she worked was very particular, and I was afraid I might get her fired, and that would spoil everything. I needed her as much as possible if I were to get the information I needed. My PI efforts I never divulged to her. I was afraid she wouldn't allow me to continue, and I was determined to save her life in spite of her; hell, I would've even taken a bullet for her if necessary.
The following week, just as last Friday, I followed the butler. He went to the same bar as the last time. I have an idea this was a habit. He probably stopped there every night when he got bored staying at the house by himself. Ahmad was rarely home; he's a workaholic, and when he's not at home, he's out clubbing and looking for a sweet woman to ravish.
I decided to enter the bar and have a drink. Maybe with a little luck, there would be a vacant seat beside him. As luck would have it, there just happened to be an empty seat on both sides at the far end of the bar. I asked, "Sir, you mind if I sit in this place, or is it taken, or are you expecting company?" I knew he wasn't, but I asked.
"No problem," he said. "Take either side."
(Continues...)
Excerpted from Love Has a Blind Eye by Clarence Mike Dunaway. Copyright © 2016 Clarence Mike Dunaway. Excerpted by permission of Trafford Publishing.
All rights reserved. No part of this excerpt may be reproduced or reprinted without permission in writing from the publisher.
Excerpts are provided by Dial-A-Book Inc. solely for the personal use of visitors to this web site.