A Love So Dangerous
One woman’s story of being shot in the head by her lover, and how she lived to tell it
Trigger Warning: This story contains scenes of extreme domestic violence.
I met Joye Matthews a few years ago. She was a feisty, mouthy blonde with an infectious laugh. She had a big gap-toothed smile to go along with that laugh, and it lit up her whole face.
In 2021 she began dating a man that would end up coaxing her into moving away from her friends and family, to Greenwood, SC, which is almost five hours away.
She says that the abuse started pretty quickly after that, getting slapped and threatened became part of her daily routine, but isolated in this town where she didn’t know anyone, Joye didn’t know where to turn, so she tolerated it instead. A decision that she would later come to regret.
On the morning of April 13, 2021, which was a Tuesday, Joye remembers that they went out for a ride on her partner’s motorcycle, she remembers getting home and walking with him up the driveway to their house. Her next memory is of coming to in the hospital three days later, disoriented, confused, and in great pain.
Joye’s partner, a man named Scotty Fowler, had shot her in the side of the head at point-blank range. Initially diagnosed as having no upper brain stem activity, and in a coma, Joye somehow fought her way back from the brink of death.
The woman sitting before me now is a very different creature than the one I knew before, but I catch glimpses of that other one peeking out from time to time. This is the first time I have seen her since the incident occurred, and the changes are both more and less than what I had imagined.
No longer able to walk, Joye sits in her wheelchair, looking uncertain and a little nervous. Her speech has been affected by brain damage from the shot, and she visibly struggles to find her words at times. She has lost the use of her right arm, and it’s folded in on itself and resting in her lap.
She talks to me about the accident, and what changes have occurred because of it. “ I haven’t left my house since I got home, except for one trip to the pharmacy,’’ she says, looking embarrassed. It’s hard for me to be out around all those people.”
“So, if you follow the school of thought that everything happens for a reason, what’s that for you? Or is there none that you can see? I ask her this candidly, and she answers in turn.
“Well. I’m a lot more patient now. I have learned how to slow down, and people who have stayed in my life have learned how to slow down, too. I can’t think about hurrying when my brain struggles just to make a sentence sometimes. I’m not hurrying anymore.” Joye confesses to me that this has opened the door to healing some of her familial relationships as well, and speaks of her father and how he has made sure she is being taken care of.
“I also think that I’m supposed to help other women like me; women that are stuck in situations that they don’t know how to escape from, as their self-worth, self-esteem, and even their personal identities get taken away from them, bit by bit, every single day.” At that she looks up, tears glistening in her eyes.
“But I’m not ready yet.” She almost whispers this last, like it’s something to be kept secret.
There are times while we sit talking that she seems very placid and wise, older than her years, and in the next breath might come off as very child-like. Her memory has been permanently affected as a result of this ordeal, and she becomes visibly frustrated at times when trying to put a name to go along with a person in one of her stories or another. “My brain won’t always let me remember,” she tells me, apologetically.
The man who shot her has been incarcerated since the day it happened, and his trial is set to begin on May 9th, 2022. Joye looks forward to the day that she gets to face him in court.
When I asked her if she was scared to see him, she smiled and said,
“No, I’m not afraid of him anymore. If anything, I want him to see what I’m like now- want him to see and deal with how my life has been changed so completely by him and his gun. And I want to be there when the jury tells him he has to pay for what he took from me, from my friends, and from my kids. Maybe I’ll tell him how grateful I am for the fact that he left me alive. Or maybe I won’t,’’ she shrugs with a slight grin. “I just want him to see what he and his gun did.”
With that, Joye seems to withdraw, probably tired, and ready for a little solitude, most likely eager for her nosey friend to call an end to our visit. I begin gathering my belongings, telling her goodbye, and voicing my appreciation for telling me her story as I go.
On my way out the door, and as I look back at her sitting there in her wheelchair, looking out her window, I think about how grateful I am that her life was spared, as well, this friend whom I admire and would hate to lose.
At the same moment the old Joye peeks out one last time, seeing me on my way, and she makes it ok for me to continue on out the door until the next time.
