Logan is saved . He storms into Beth’s house and begins to throw his anger to her
in a intimidating gesture by balling his hands and staring at her. The following quotation is the continuing sequence of Keith storms into the
house with anger. In this conversation, it is obviously stated a conflict where Keith is trying to abuse Elizabeth. He does not notice
Elizabeth’s words which asked him to leave the house and leave her alone, and the worse he becomes
uncontrolled and keeps on giving threat to abuse Elizabeth. By then, she’d reached the corner, with noplace left to go. “Just leave,
okay? Ben’s upstairs and Nana will be back in a minute-” All I want is a kiss. Is that such a big deal?”
She wasn’t sure she’d heard him right. “A kiss?” she parroted. “For now,” he said. “That’s all. Just for old times’ sake. Then I’ll go. I’ll
walk right out of here. I promise ” Sparks, 2008:366.
Keith forces Elizabeth to have a kiss after storming to the house and puts his anger to Elizabeth because she still be with Logan. In this quotation it is obvious
that Keith still has the desire on Elizabeth, he wants the time they are still husband and wife where he could sleep with her. At that time, Elizabeth tries to move her
lips away from him and then she shouts at him to leave her. Keith threatens Elizabeth to use his power as a Deputy to make a report about
Logan as a psycho who has been looking for her because of Elizabeth’s
photograph that was found in Iraq during the duty tour. His threat is aiming on separating Elizabeth and Logan and also separating Elizabeth from Ben, her son.
It is a conflict because Keith threatened Elizabeth using his power. At that time she is paralyzed with the threat and all she can do is only wishpers to Keith that he
cannot do it.
“After all, I warned you about Thigh-bolt,” he added, “but where were you today?” At his place.” He shook his head. “That was a big mistake. You
see, it’s pretty easy for me to make a case that he stalked you and that he’s obsessive. Both of those things make him dangerous, but you’re obviously
ignoring it. And that makes it dangerousd for Ben to be forced to live with you
” Sparks, 2008: 367.
2. Man against Himself
In man-against- himself, there is a clash between character’s wills or idea and
the character’s own nature, such as the bad habits or the emotions. This kind of conflict occurs on the character himselfherself, and in this conflict the character
struggles to change hisher own nature Koesnosoebroto, 1988:43. The conflict of man-against-himself happens between Elizabeth and herself, which means that
there are two oppossing forces that have the same power and Elizabeth must choose one of the forces. Besides, she also has to fight her own desire on deciding
which forces she would better take. The conflict man-against-himself are stated as follows.
“I thought he was taking you to your grandfather’s house for brunch after
church.” “I still don’t want to go.”
I don’t want you to go, either, she thought. But what could she do?
Sparks, 2008:44. The quotation above is the conversation between Elizabeth and her son, Ben.
The quotation is about Elizabeth tol d Ben to go to his father’s house, and this has
been a routine for Ben to spend the weekend in his father’s house since Elizabeth and Keith have divorced. The quotation shows that Elizabeth has an internal
conflict where in her own desire she does not want her son to go to his father ’s
house, but she does not have any choice other than asking her son to go.
The quotation below is the conversation between Elizabeth and Logan about Ben’s routine for staying in his father’s house in the weekend. The conversation
reveals the conflict of Elizabeth herself, that she actually wants to set Ben free from the routine that he never wanted to do, but she cannot do anything on it just
because Keith has the law parental responsibility on having time with Ben in the weekend.
“Why do you let Ben go, then?” His gaze focused on her with suprising intensity.
“Because I don’t have a choice.” “There’s always a choice.”
“Not in this case there isn’t.” She leaned off to the side, plucking a marigold from beside the stairs. “The dad has just joint custody, and if I
tried to fight him on it, let’s just say the courts would probably rule in his favor. If anything, Ben would probably have to got even more than he
does now ” Sparks, 2008: 146.
The reality of Keith’s legal statement on having time with Ben makes Elizabeth has no power although she knew that Ben did not want to spend the
time with his father on every weekend, she can do nothing other than tries her best to lift up his mood because she does not want to loose Ben if she tried to let Ben
not going to his fahter’s house. Another internal conflict of Elizabeth happened which is also related to Ben.
Elizabeth was once thinking of taking Ben to move away from the town and start a new life, but she realizes that her attempt would be useless because the Claytons
would use their power to find them and made the situation becomes worse. The conflict is Elizabeth wants to have a new life by getting away from the town but
on the other hand she can do nothing because she realizes that when she do the plan of getting away their life would be hard. So, in the other words Elizabeth is
in a dilemma on taking a decision whether to move away with a risk or stay in the town but not so happy.
Part of her wanted to take Ben and simply move away. Relocate to another part of the country and start over.
She had the guts, it was everything else that made the scenario impossible. Even if Nana was healthy enough to handle things on her own-and she
wasn’t-Keith would find her no matter where she went. Gramps would insist on it, and the courts, including Judge Clayton, would intervene
Sparks, 2008:202.
B. Domestic Violence Revealed through the Conflicts
In this second discussion the writer is going to relate the conflicts experienced by Elizabeth, which have been discussed previously, with the issue of domestic
violence. In this discussion the writer uses two theories from two different sources in order to get clear perspective on the issue of domestic violence. The theories
from different source have their own function, the first theory focuses on the definition of domestic violence and the second theory focuses on the types of
domestic violence. The issue of domestic violence is a pattern of coercive behavior used by the
person’s spouse, former spouse, partner, former partner with the aim to control and subordinate another in an intimate relationship, while the behaviors include
physical, sexual, emotional, and economic abuse. The violence itself is used to create fear in the victim so that the victim obeys the perpetrator McCue, 2008.
The conflicts experienced by Elizabeth show domestic violence that happens between partner who are divorced which means that the conflicts mostly happen
between Elizabeth and her ex-husband, Keith. The conflicts experienced by Elizabeth are categorized in domestic violence of physical abuse, sexual abuse,
emotional abuse, and psychological abuse. The following discussion is about the kinds of domestic violence that revealed through the conflicts.
1. Physical Violence
The abuse that categorized to this category is the abuse that aims to destruct the victim’s body, or make an uncomfortable interaction to the victim’s body with
a purpose to make the victim obeys the abuser Hanson, 2013 . The conflict
experienced by Elizabeth that show the physical violence is after Elizabeth and Keith have
arguments to each other about their son’s bruise on the eye, Elizabeth is leaving Keith and just wants to get into her house because she does not want to
talk further with him, at that time Keith blocks her way into her house by holding her arm and spats at her Sparks, 2008:192.
Keith’s act on holding her arm is categorized into physical abuse because in that situation Elizabeth is
s exhausted after arguing about Ben’s eye and then she is leaving Keith because she does not want to have the quarrel got further.
Furthermore, Keith spats at Elizabeth not to leave and he grabs her arm, the action of grabbing her arm shows the physical violence because Keith unintentionally
has hurt her and he also has blocked her way to go. Another conflict experienced by Elizabeth that shows physical abuse is when
Keith storms into her house acts that it was his own place and then he forces Elizabeth to have a kiss with him. In the sequence Keith corners her or in the
other words he blocked her way to be free Sparks, 2008:366. Elizabeth is cornered while Keith keeps on forcing her to give a kiss to him and a way that
situation become a physical abuse is based on Keith’s way of forcing Elizabeth to
kiss him that by cornering her so that she cannot help to run away from him or at least to keep a distance.
The two situations above are categorized into physical abuse, although the situations do not show Keith hit Elizabeth or he harmed her physically. The
situations are categorized into physical abuse based on how Keith treats Elizabeth physically, the situations show how Keith has treated her physically such as
grabbing her arm and cornering her. Both of the situations are done within a force that makes Elizabeth as the victim is abused physically and she cannot have her
own freedom to move or to do any defense. Moreover, the understanding of the definition of physical abuse is not merely
the act that harms the victim. The act of blocking victim’s way to move and cornering the victim are also categorized as physical abuse because the victim was
put in the situation where the victim can not do anything to defense herself.
2. Sexual Abuse
Actions that categorized as sexual abuse are forcing the intimate partner to do any sexual contact without the permission or desire from the partner.
Moreover, the force that hurts the sexual organ is also categorized as sexual abuse Hanson, 2013
. The conflict of Elizabeth related to sexual abuse is not literally about having sex. In the conflict Elizabeth is forced to kiss Keith when he storms
into her house. In that situation Elizabeth is cornered in the kitchen, she tries to warn Keith to leave her house but he does not notice it and furthermore he asks to
kiss her using a force that he only would go if she would kiss him Sparks, 2008:366.
