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I didn't realize our love was toxic until after he called me stupid for accusing him of cheating with Fiona Wilson.
It was the first time he ever laid his hands on me too and definitely not the last.
Leo Choi was an abuser.
I wish I had known this sooner.
My father hated him, often giving him sly comments and such, he expressed his emotions towards him after first meeting him.
"I don't like him, you can do better," I remember him saying after a dinner that night. I knew he was right but part of me wished he wasn't, Leo would cheat on my countless times and made me feel stupid for feeling the way I did after.
"Why would I cheat on you? You're not worth that trouble," he said after I accused him, "don't be a stupid little girl."
The good parts of our relationship were simply for popularity points—the cheerleader and the football player—the perfect match, right?
I did everything I knew to do to be the "best" girlfriend, I would spend hours on my makeup just to impress him, yet he always seemed to have someone else in mind. That day, I attacked that girl during lunch, I tried to tell myself that it wasn't anything, that I was a stupid girl, but after I saw the messages between them.
All I saw was red.
So I attacked her, which got me kicked off the cheer team, Leo was pissed and broke up with me for it. Telling me if I hadn't let my emotions get the better of me I would still be a cheerleader and his girlfriend, I cried for days, I remember my father begging me to seek a therapist.
"Please sweetie, I miss my daughter, you don't deserve to go through this pain." He said to me while I cried in my bed, I agreed and started seeing a therapist weekly, then eventually by some miracle Leo returned back into my life acting as rude as ever. Demanding I give some explanation for my behavior—I didn't have one.
We were back at square one, him cheating and doing whatever he wanted and me having to deal with it and being gaslit into thinking it was my fault because I wasn't good enough. When Maddy came into the scene I was pissed, I hated the attention he was trying to give her, yet when she didn't reciprocate his feelings I was actually happy that she wasn't taking his shit.
However my anger was still there so I just had to confront her, I needed answers, so I did what anyone would do and spoke to her in the bathroom, though I hadn't expected her to be able to stand up to me.
It pissed me off so of course I took my rage out by doing something I would normally do.
And that was volunteer at the animal shelter.
Okay, yes, I'm aware this sounds dumb but puppies calm me down and I'd much rather play with dogs and kittens then be upset. Besides my therapist told me that I needed to find something to distract me, I was greeted when I walked in and saw Carmen Jones sitting at the desk, she worked here, she saw me and smiled.
