Rihanna’s slow recovery

Rihanna would prefer never to hear the name Chris Brown again, said Jane Gordon in the London Daily Mail. It was just over a year ago that the 22-year-old R&B star was physically assaulted by then-boyfriend Brown on the way to a pre–Grammy Awards party, turning what was supposed to be a night of celebration into an ordeal that ended with Brown in handcuffs and Rihanna hospitalized with a badly battered face.

“I was very confused, because he was my best friend,” the singer says. “All of a sudden, one night changed our whole lives.” Seeing the media replay pictures of her bruised, swollen face was humiliating for her. “Every time I turned on the television, seeing it plastered over every news channel, I felt like it was a natural disaster happening.”

She admits she wavered over whether or not to forgive Brown. “I wanted to be with him again or get over him. It was either/or. I just didn’t want to feel the pain, the confusion.” Eventually, she chose to end the relationship, and has recently begun dating Los Angeles Dodgers centerfielder Matt Kemp. Still, she knows, the worst night of her life “is something that people will probably ask me about for the next two years, unfortunately.”

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