Dear Traitor

Section Fifteen

You have already made it this far, so you might as well continue reading. You are entitled to your own feelings. You can despise me all you want, but it is important you read everything I have been wanting to say to you since 2020.

You and Portia always seemed to find something to complain about then put the blame on me. I could never appease either of you. I was doing everything I could, yet it was never good enough. I could never meet either of your standards. When I did not blind myself to your wickedness and perverse ways, I was suddenly the evil one. When I was no longer the innocent ten-year-old that could be easily manipulated, it put your reputation in danger. That's the reason you hate my mom so much. It's because she knows the truth about you. I then could no longer be used as a weapon. I would be of no benefit to you. Therefore, you could not just love me. You had to destroy me. You had to deceive me. I was the bad guy for seeing who you really were. You poisoned my thoughts. You made me used up all my tears. You caused me to have panic attacks. Yet, I was somehow the dramatic one.

I will never know why Portia despises me, but I have a fairly good idea as to why you hate me.

I remind you too much of my mother.

"But Holly- I love you."

No, no you do not. Do not ever tell me that again. Do not lie to me. Every time you look into my eyes, you see the woman you want to murder. Every time you hear my voice, it sends you into a frenzy. I sound like her. I look like her. I am a constant reminder of her. I have her brown hair from several years ago. I have her same mannerisms. I have her laugh. I am the embodiment of my mother. You do not love me.

"But- I do."

I think there may be a problem with miscommunication. When I think of love, I think of God. You always described love as a choice, but you need to know what love is first before you choose to do it. I am not sure emotional abuse and narcissism fall into the same category as love. Saying this, I believe we have two different definitions of love. Many people do. Love to someone could be the love their alcoholic mom showed them. That does not mean that their mom expressed true love, but that is all the child knows. To them, love is screaming at them while being drunk. To them, love is hate. You see how this is wrong? Giving this example, my question for you is who showed you love. Whoever told you how to love, they were wrong. Now, this does not mean I am blaming someone else's failure to show you love to excuse the way you treated me. That is the last excuse I need to hear from you. But remember how I said your anger was rooted from something much deeper? Perhaps someone treated you the same way you treated me. I have an idea as to who that might be.

Did your dad yell at you too? Did he give you lectures as well? Did he yell and scream in your face until you felt the need to shrink into yourself and disappear?

It is just a theory, though I could be wrong. Perhaps you were loved in all the right ways and still decided to become heartless.

As I hope you have seen throughout this book, most of your abuse was mental and emotional. However, one moment was actually physical.

You were driving and I was in the passenger seat of your truck. We were going down a road through the country. We were just about to past that white church with the huge graveyard. You were lecturing me, of course. I was not really listening. I was gazing out the window, wondering when enough would be enough. I was detaching from the world, being drained of all feeling. I do not remember what you asked me, but it was a yes or no question. Maybe you asked if I understood, because I answered yes. Next thing I knew, you abruptly jerked the steering wheel to the right. You had aggressively slammed on the brakes and pulled over on the side of the road. It all happened in an instant. It brought me back to reality. I remember hitting my head against the glass window and hurting my entire right side. Suddenly, my heartbeat was sounding in my ears. It scared me so bad that I thought we had a wreck. I then looked towards you to see what happened. If looks could kill, yours definitely would have. It was as if I were looking into the devil's eyes. Indeed, if the devil had a face, it would have been yours in that moment.

"That would be yes sir," you snarled as murder lingered in your eyes.

"Yes sir," I muttered, completely stunned.

You had always demanded my respect since you were the adult, but after that, I saw no need to show you any respect. Respect is earned, not demanded. You do not get a pass just because you are the adult, but I suppose saying that hurts your ego.

I remember being so shocked in the moment, that if I even breathed that I just might find the gun in your holster being pointed to my head. You had purposely hurt me. My heart was pounding. No one was around. The roads were deserted. It was just us.

After that, I never felt safe when alone with you.

That was the only thing you did physically besides spankings. Sometimes, I do admit, I wished you would have hit me or attacked me. Only because physical scars were easier to recognize than emotional scars. I wanted seeable evidence to present to people when they did not believe me.  I wanted people to hear me out without asking for proof.

Well, here's your proof I suppose.