My heart slammed against my ribs so hard it physically hurt. I froze, the keys digging into my palm.
“Bruce, what are you doing here?” I managed to choke out.
“You didn’t answer my emails, Tanesha,” he said, his voice completely flat. “I just wanted to talk.”
“I have nothing to say to you. Leave me alone.” I practically ran to my car, slammed the door, and locked it. I watched in the rearview mirror as he just stood there, watching me speed away. I had to pull over three blocks down to throw up on the side of the road.
That was the day I realized my life was no longer mine.
I quit my job. Do you know how humiliating that is? To walk into your manager’s office, someone who believes in you, and say you have to leave immediately without notice? I couldn’t tell them the real reason. I felt so much shame. I felt like it was somehow my fault for going on that one stupid date. I packed up my desk in a cardboard box, looking over my shoulder the entire way to the elevator. I left behind a career I had worked so hard to build, all because a man couldn’t handle the word “no.”
