*this is just a story–

In just as quick as a whip,
He snaps
The blow is felt, it can’t be undone
The adrenaline rushes,
Panic sets in
Life is changed forever

The unimaginable happens
Fear takes hold
Survival is all that enters her headspace

The moment is realized
Sorries quickly appear on lips that just spouted hate

The trembling begins

Morning light wakes her
The aftermath weighs heavy on her brain
With each movement her pain twinges reminding her to be still

She prays for silence in her head as the past nights words pulsate in her mind as if hearing them for the first time to do more damage that the physical couldn’t reach

She contemplates every move
Strategizes her placement
The battle is not yet won nor will it ever be
She continues on

In the mid-morning air and sometimes late at night…you can hear her
She cries out for her dead mamma’s help
hoping she will be blessed with a way out
something better, something different, but not the same

But then her cries are quickly muffled into silence because she suddenly is afraid to breathe
She holds her breathe, tightly squeezing her body to herself because if she shows no life, perhaps he will simply pass by

Her muscles begin to relax as she is taken back to another unwanted breathe

He said to her’ No one cares… you have no friends, even your family hates you’
He told her it’s all her fault that she is to blame ‘so go ahead and try to get help, there will be none for you’

She tried to ask, so many times without complete understanding, every one passing the buck and blaming it all on her.

So she tried… they told her its not her fault, they told her she isn’t responsible… but all she hears is his words in her head saying no one will believe you, it’s all your fault.

She sits in a gown contemplating her next move…isolated as if a prisoner. Strategically watching because If she doesn’t… she will lose.

She catches her breathe and with every pain she feels… she plans her escape.

He started in again… she wouldn’t be able to handle it again… she would have to give in…
But not even that was accepted… it was do or die…
911, police, fire or ambulance…

Those words reverberated in her head over and over and over… and in an instant she was saved…
Or so she thought, because in this land, it’s he said she said and it not always what happened.

2 new sets of bracelets cling clang clung

What? she said. I did what I had to do to survive.

In the aftermath and glow of the past few days, she lays there with no sleep in sight, exhausted, sad and confused.

The air so quiet she can hear her own heart beating,
reminding her of her own existence
Her eyes struggle to stay open, and her mind soon drifts away…

Her emotions, erratic, none consistent, none understood, too many to count, to hard to pinpoint.

Trust but verify, she remembers in the back of her mind… mystified about what is to happen now. Lost but finally in control… she wonders what is to be.

What if I can’t do this? She says to herself with each step forward she makes. Tears of sorrow fill a her eyes… she so wants to go back, to never have tried…

She wakes with tears in her eyes still. She wonders if she is even thought about. What the whole point was. So quickly discarded…

What now. She has no path in front or behind. It’s all gone as if she’s on a piece of land floating in mid air that she can’t step off of.

She wonders what’s the point.

Each day she wakes with hopes of finding hope. She does for a brief moment and then reality sinks in. She doesn’t know what’s real and what’s not.

Breathe a little, cry a little, do it all again tomorrow.

…and then just like that, she was given the gift of insight. A brief look into what she is, what she has come from, what she has overcome and what she can do.

She is strong and brave, and even though, now alone, she will go on. She will continue in her journey and her heart will prevail.