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“Just Get Over It,” They Said.
It’s just in your mind, they said. They wanted her to somehow be able to relax there. After all, it was her childhood home.
A childhood home was supposed to be filled with warmth, good smells, hugs, and safety. Home was none of those things for her. It was dread. It was a trap. When she was home, she just wanted to leave. As a teenager, she slept in abandoned buildings and in people’s yards. They labeled her a problem child, lazy, and unappreciative.
Sure, it wasn’t all bad memories. But the good times had only been a life raft. You appreciate the life raft, but you still want to get away from the shipwreck.
They wanted her to sleep in the rubble with a smile.
They thought it had been a phase. It wasn’t a phase. The pain was all too real. She tried to drink it away, but then it manifested in her jaw pain. Her nerves. Her inability to even feel her privates.
Also, what did that even mean — a phase? By that definition, wasn’t all of life just a phase?
Here, then gone.
Weren’t feelings really the only part of the phase that mattered?
Get over it. Why? Why should she?
When they said that, they didn’t mean they wanted her to heal. They meant they wanted her to stop making them feel…
