Musing

Day 8- 04/01/2017

She held her head up high and listened to everything you spat out of your mouth. Every complaint, every reprimanding word, every piece of judgement that you spoke. She felt the room vibrate with the sound of your voice; the ground that shook was all she could feel with the numbness of her body. She stood there and took the heat for doing things with reasons, valid reasons. You screamed at her for not doing something of an honest mistake. You screamed at her for not doing something because when you told her, like you were supposed to, it was too late. After that she ran, with a tempting slam of the door, locked herself in the bathroom and cried. Cried as she remembered every hurtful word, every sacrifice she made that shouldn't have to, as every strong pillar in her mind that she built for the rest of them crumbled all over again. Did you know she went out with her friends to do things for her education so that you wouldn't have to? So that you wouldn't know? Did you know she held her siblings tightly as you screamed at the other in the next room? DId you know she bit her lip as it bled so that her siblings knew that it would be ok? So that she wouldn't break too. Did you know with everything you give her that she does so many small things to pay that off? Because she'd rather you spend on her siblings and yourselves than her. But she did it that way so you wouldn't know. So you wouldn't get stressed and worried. So you wouldn't lash out on the others and herself like what you just did. She cried in the bathroom so the others wouldn't hear. So they would never see you as the bad guy. So they would never realize that this is the man we look up to because they knew the whole story. And she still works for everything you "give" her. She works to deserve it, she works to pay you back, she works for you to be proud of her. But you don't see that.

As she stood there, absorbing every word you said. She looked and there, at the corner of her eye, the other one watched. She watched even though she knew the whole story, and the girl who watched? She was supposed to be the one that was strong and brave for everyone else. She was the one who had the responsibility, the job to stand up to the beast, to you. But she only cried every time and complained to the little ones. But who could blame her? It would've only made the beast louder. So, she didn't. But the one who watched, just watched most of the time, and when she would speak it was to defend the beast. She didn't see that the girl had done much more than she should ever be doing at a child of her age. The girl made her life much easier and little did she know, the girl that stood in front of the beast was strong for her too. But she don't see it either.

You, the beast, didn't see. She, the girl who watched, didn't see. The beast doesn't see and the bystander doesn't either. Not because they were blind or because they were ignorant and mean, but because the girl was very good at hiding if she wanted to be.

And to think, earlier that day, she said good bye to the people she hid from you with.