The Music Box, Secrets Revealed Behind My Door: A memoir reflecting the true essence of a battered woman's soul

By Amelia Michaels

The Music Box, Secrets Revealed Behind my Door, is an insight into my soul. I have written my real life struggle as an ordinary woman that has been forced to not only live through domestic violence but survive it. I could be anyone you know. Abused women do not always show physical signs of abuse. The signs could be so s

• Language: English
• Publisher: Amelia Michaels Literatures
• Release date: Oct 15, 2022
• ISBN: 9781956854404

Amelia Michaels

Amelia Michael's is a native of Eastern North Carolina. She still resides in North Carolina with her family. In addition to her memoir, she has written two fiction novels. Her fiction has been praised by Encore Magazine and Midwest Book Review. Mrs. Michael's is an avid equestrian often found riding when she is not working as an educator.

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The Music Box,

Secrets Revealed Behind

My Door

A memoir reflecting the true essence

of a battered woman's soul

The Music Box, Secrets Revealed Behind My Door

by Amelia Michaels

This book is written to provide information and motivation to readers. Its purpose isn’t to render any type of psychological, legal, or professional advice of any kind. The content is the sole opinion and expression of the author, and not necessarily that of the publisher.

Copyright © 2020 by Amelia Michaels

All rights reserved. No part of this book may be reproduced, transmitted, or distributed in any form by any means, including, but not limited to, recording, photocopying, or taking screenshots of parts of the book, without prior written permission from the author or the publisher. Brief quotations for noncommercial purposes, such as book reviews, permitted by Fair Use of the U.S. Copyright Law, are allowed without written permissions, as long as such quotations do not cause damage to the book’s commercial value. For permissions, write to the publisher, whose address is stated below.

Printed in the United States of America

Amelia Michaels

https://www.ameliamichaelsliterary.com/

Dancers are like the wind, they can glide like an elegant whisper, catch your eye as they blow across your path like vibrant leaves, or they can present as an aggressive Rumba.

Prologue

They were there, high up on the stage, where I could see them so clearly. The lady’s scarlet dress flowed all around her. Her back, slightly bent while her arms were stretched out and held by her partner. Radiant smiles upon their faces as the couple danced in triple time, turning rhythmically around the dance floor. Her partner was dashing with a midnight vest. My eyes were mesmerized by the waltz, the music. It was Blue Danube playing in the background. This magical world of the music box.

Watching the waltz and seeing the blissful couple twirl around the ballroom was a beautiful sight. The way the lady clasped the hand of the gentleman was exceptionally pleasing to the eye. The adoration in her partner’s eyes brought tears to my cheeks. The captivating way the man looked down at his lady with a smile of contentment displayed love. The marbled floor, the sophisticated, Doric columns… the serene hum of classical music playing in the background made the scene flawless. God help me, I wanted nothing more than to be on the dance floor with that gentleman, I wanted to call him my own. I would have given anything to have someone truly hold my hand and whisk me around the glimmering, breathtaking floor. Spinning across the beautiful ballroom, it would have been such a delightful way to spend an evening. Unfortunately, that was not reality for me.

The truth was, the music box on the shelf at the hardware store was nothing more than my fantasy. An easy one to have since as a child I longed to dance, but never had the opportunity. Reflecting back now over time, seeing these waltzers in the music box, my dreams became more of a desire crying out from my very soul as I have no such gentleman to call my own. I am not sure these gentlemen truly exist outside of the music box, which is now poised gracefully on my nightstand. Who would have imagined that handcrafted, wooden dancers could grant an escape into a world of peace? Do such gentlemen exist? Maybe? I know the answer lies only with time.

The depths of the soul can only help others once shared.

Journal Entry One

Heritage is more than roots, it is a pathway to understanding the way one’s mind and spirit processes. Yet, sometimes your intellectual capabilities and your inner self engage in battle against each other and lead you down winding roads. My footsteps to accepting who I was, who I am, and who I want to be have been arduous at times. Yet in the end, many enlightening aspects regarding my family, my character, and my sense of purpose have become clear.

In order to tell my story, there are pieces that trace back to my upbringing. Growing up in Eastern North Carolina on an agricultural farm is both a positive and a negative to a young, outgoing girl. With crystal clarity, I easily remember life on our family farm. The land where my father farmed had been passed down in the family for over a hundred and fifty years. My father mostly grew corn and soybeans; however, cotton and tobacco were also grown. When you stepped out onto our front porch, no matter which way you looked, you saw my father’s flat land. The soil was rich and dark, unlike the clay you find in central parts of North Carolina. The trees that ran behind our home were full of oaks, pines, a few walnut, just to name a few. We also had several substantial pecan trees in our yard. Our family was close enough to the ocean that often, during the summer, it seemed around four in the afternoon, more frequently than not, we would get a breeze that made its way inland sometimes bringing afternoon storms in the summer.

As a child, I recall running through the corn rows with my boxer, Max, and climbing trees in the woods. Many days I dug around the branch behind the house for shark’s teeth, upon which I collected quite a box full. Yet, despite the time running wild through the fields or digging in the woods, I was lonely. My sister was at home with me, but we were as opposite as the colors of a blood red moon on a rare eclipsed night and a pale moon on a dimly lit night. The crimson color was definitely in reference to me. Since the time I was born, I was the mischievous and adventurous sister. Whereas my sister, Angela, was quiet, shy, and never in too much trouble. We both did manage to find trouble from time to time as we had strict Christian parents, yet it was

THE MUSIC BOX, SECRETS REVEALED BEHIND MY DOOR

definitely more me. They raised us in a home to believe in Jesus Christ as Lord and Savior. We went to church every Sunday and to Christian schools for most of our K-12 education. School had too many rules and we both knew if we got into trouble at school, we would have more to worry about when we got home. I never recall Angela getting into trouble at school. As a four-year old in 1975 while in kindergarten, during chapel, I am not sure what possessed me, but I remember our class sitting in the front row during the weekly sermon that every class had to attend. Becoming bored, I took my Bible and tied it to my coat’s belt and began to swing it back and forth. Seeing that I was at the end of the pew closest to the preacher, it was just my luck, the Bible came untied and went flying into the air in the midst of the preacher’s sermon, on a topic I do not recall, and hit the preacher square in the face. The preacher’s wife, my kindergarten teacher, jerked me up from the seat and you can just imagine where it went from there (this is before we banned physical contact from schools). Needless to say, I was in even more trouble once mamma brought me home to daddy. I managed to get into messes again in the second and third grades. After this, I was smart enough to get more creative in my mischievous schemes whether at school or at home.

My older sister by three years was the lucky one who was able to do everything first; she always viewed me as just the annoying little sister. Hence, I did my best to live up to the title. When I was a preteen, I learned how to pick the lock on my sister’s bedroom door. She would always lock it to keep me out. Whenever she had her best friend or any other girlfriend come over to our home, I did my best to aggravate them. One time I hid inside her closet, after I picked and relocked the door. Then, I buried myself deep under a pile of clothes pushed to the back of the closet. I sat there for hours listening to all the deep, dark gossip on boys that the friends liked. When I thought I had just enough dirt to get them to allow me to tag along with them for a while, I revealed myself. Boy, were they mad, but I got to tag along for quite a while so I would keep their secrets. There was another time when my sister was having a sleepover that I hid myself behind a low riding couch and I perked up my ears and listened. Let’s just say, I had enough gossip on half the town to keep me tagging along for months. All I really wanted was to be included, because when they went off and left me, I was often alone. My best friend, Susanna, lived in Jacksonville, a

AMELIA MICHAELS

thirty minute drive away and we did not see each other much unless at school. My sister’s friends were about five or ten minutes away, it did make a difference. For the most part, my sister and I fought like crazy and did not get along until I was a freshman in high school and she was a senior. About the time we decided that we could actually enjoy one another’s company, she was applying to colleges.

When I was in high school, my parents had decided to move me to the county’s public high school. It was an enormous change from the Christian school that I attended. Jones Senior High School was the only high school in the entire county. We had approximately four hundred students in grades nine through twelve. The atmosphere of the school was so drastically different from what I was used to at Mary’s Chapel, the Christian school. I went from an all white Christian school to a high school that was predominantly African American. The boys at the school that were white, seemed to be hunters and fishers and you could see the guns on the racks of their trucks in the gravel parking lot designed for student parking. Many of the boys had their fishing rods in poles designed to hold them in front of their trucks. When you went to eat lunch, the majority of the students, both races, were out back socializing and smoking on the designated smoking patio. Quite a few of the boys had chewing tobacco in their back jean pockets that clearly outlined the skull butt pattern of the chewing tobacco can. When you went into the bathroom, you could distinctly smell the marijuana that was passed along to those who wanted a quick hit. This was all a huge shock to the country girl from the Christian school that mostly had silly pranks and gum chewing issues.

Soon after beginning my freshman year of high school, I became close friends with Daniel. In many ways, he became my saving grace and best friend. I had already known him a little since I met him years ago in the small town of Trenton, not far from our farm, but we did not grow close until high school. Daniel’s family had moved from the town to a tiny trailer down the road from our farm. He lived with his mom and younger sister. He was the true class clown, never failing to crack a joke and never letting you stay down. Daniel saw how uneasy I was with the transition to the new school and he made it his mission to make me smile each day. He would go out of his way to tell me insane jokes, juggle balls he kept in his backpack, and if that did not work, he would tickle me until I laughed. He refused to allow me to be too serious or

THE MUSIC BOX, SECRETS REVEALED BEHIND MY DOOR

too studious.

As the years progressed, I excelled academically and Daniel was repeatedly voted class clown. We became in my mind like brother and sister; however, he began to see me as more. It seemed that everyone except me saw how Daniel was feeling towards me. I was dating a boy named Luke. My feelings for Luke were not deep at all, I dated him just to be considered part of a certain crowd at school. In reality, if I had any romantic thoughts at all, it would have been for a guy named Miles.

Each summer, I worked as a lifeguard at the local country club. He lived back in a wooded area not far from the club. He would come over and see me often when I worked. He was not a member, but I always let him in. We met one another when I was fifteen at the Dairy Freeze in Jacksonville, a local town, where he worked. He actually had a girlfriend that he saw off and on. We had something off and on for years through high school. Nobody ever knew. The two of us would sneak away sometimes. He had a Ford Mustang with tinted windows. He would park down the street from my house and we would sneak off occasionally to the beach. He would tap on a window to let me know he was there. He was just plain fun to be around. I told no one about him and he told no one about me. The closest I ever came to telling anyone was Daniel. But I even held back from him. The reason I held back was that one day Daniel asked me to go with him to the fair. I agreed, as he was my friend. I thought nothing of this trip.

When we arrived at the fair, it started with us doing what all good people do at the North Carolina State Fair. We sought out the food stands to see how much fried and unhealthy food we could partake of quickly. There were funnel cakes, fried Oreos, apple dumplings, fried turkey legs, country ham biscuits, just to name a few foods we indulged in. Of course we rode the rides, especially the Ferris Wheel because of the grand view of not only the fairground but of the surrounding area. Overall, the day was beautiful. We spent time together talking as friends, yet, when we began to walk through the arboretum area at the back of the fairgrounds where horticulturists came to show and sell their gorgeous blooming plants with vivid colors, everything changed. This is where he swung me around and kissed me. For Daniel, there was passion in the moment. For me, the connection, the intimate embrace and feeling simply did not exist. All I felt was disappointment that my

AMELIA MICHAELS

friend had taken our friendship and tried to bring a new level to that bond. I viewed him as a brother, nothing beyond that feeling existed for me. From that instance on, our relationship was strained, our trip to the fair ended. He took me home in silence. Afterward, we remained friends, Daniel still sought me out throughout our senior year of high school and even asked me to marry him in my yearbook, but I just brushed it off. I only wanted friendship. So, after we graduated, and I gave our high school Valedictorian speech, he went to a college in Raleigh and I went to a college in Chapel Hill. We were thirty minutes apart. But it seemed like much, much more.

Change resembles the wind. It can blow from the north, the south, the east, or the west. This transformation can silhouette your introspection, emotions, yearnings, and sometimes, it can distort your views about your life.

Journal Entry Two

Since I was a young child, I wanted to attend the University of North Carolina at Chapel Hill. There really was no other university that I even considered. My blood ran Carolina blue from the time I could say Tarheel. Having grown up in an agricultural community, most people back home were North Carolina State University fans, not me. All I ever wanted was to attend college at UNC-Chapel Hill so that I could walk the streets of the oldest public university in our nation. I wanted to drink from the old well, attend football games at Kenan Stadium, and more than anything, I wanted to see a basketball game coached by the legendary Dean Smith. I had grown up watching my team beat N.C. State and Duke, our two most detested rivals all my life. My time had finally come to attend the college I had dreamed about and to watch Coach Smith bring our team to victory as a college student. This fantasy finally became a reality in August of 1989 when I was almost eighteen years old and I began my freshman year of college.

My first year was an eye opening experience. Most undergraduate classes at UNC had more people in attendance than my whole high school. At first, the experience was quite an adjustment, but within no time, life picked up a daily routine of going to class, making new friends, studying all hours of the night, and working part time to make extra money. I saw a few of my friends from high school, but not too often. Daniel came to visit and we called some, but we began to slowly drift apart. He was not adjusting to college life as easily as I did my freshman year. He started to hang out with a band and he even played the drums, but along with the band and the drums came the drugs for him. This pushed us further and further apart. In my mind, our friendship, our bond was becoming more and more strained, I began to walk away from him more and more. Overall, I wanted to break away from many parts of my past and go on new ventures and new avenues. In some aspects this was joyful, in others, it brought much pain.

Real change occurred in my life during my sophomore year of college. It was a year that marked the beginning of enormous turmoil, conflict that not only seared my soul but transformed me in beautiful

THE MUSIC BOX, SECRETS REVEALED BEHIND MY DOOR

yet somewhat frightful ways. In that year I had signed up to take Marine Environment, Geology 24. The subject was chosen as one of the two science electives needed to graduate with my undergraduate degree. Having grown up near the eastern seaboard of North Carolina, the Carteret Coast to be specific, I was a strong swimmer and loved marine life. This seemed like the perfect science course for me. However, it turned out that the course itself was not what truly held my interest. The reason my attentiveness was so attuned to this class completely revolved around a teacher assistant named Miguel.

The Marine Environment course had several college teacher assistants that were working on their doctorate degrees in marine studies or oceanography. Miguel was one of them. When Miguel and I met, we should not have begun a relationship. We should have waited until the course ended. It could have caused issues for him, but the attraction was too strong for us both. From the moment we met, I fell in love with his charisma, intellect, humor, and we both simply loved the sea. He always told me my chameleon eyes, my dimple when I laughed and my fierce spirit drew him to me. All our free time was spent together talking, taking walks around the campus, and going to the marine ecology lab which was located in Morehead City, North Carolina. We even took time for a campus dance. This night will always