All Chapters of Her Neglected Scars: Chapter 41

I stand on the toilet seat with my back against the cubicle wall and I listen to every single word and I do not make a sound.The worst part . . .The part that hollows me out completely, that takes the last thing I was holding onto and pulls it clean out of my chest . . .Is that I cannot find the place in myself to argue with it.I am too tired. I have been too tired for so long. And Irina is saying out loud, in this marble bathroom, in this warm and reasonable and devastated voice, exactly what my own head has been telling me since I was fifteen years old standing in front of a different mirror in a different house trying to breathe through a different kind of panic.You are your father’s weapon.Whatever you build is performance.The scars are the truest thing about you and everyone who matters has now seen them and understood.I stay on the toilet seat until the heels click out. Until the door swings shut. Until the bathroom goes so quiet I can hear the faint sound of the estate