Reflections
As I woke up this morning, I felt the sense of ache. I think in some ways my heart was already broken in this regard, I had already come to terms that I am the villian in their minds. And though I am okay with that, it doesn’t mean the venom they’ve injected hasn’t reached my bloodstream. It doesn’t mean that I suddenly stopped feeling their knife in my back. I chose to stay silent after so long, to drift away, as how many times do I need to repeat to someone that they cause harm for them to actually believe it? Do I need to unstitch my own mending just for them to visually witness their effect? How many times do I need to put what they’ve done and said about me on a shelf so high, I forget I placed it there at all? How much must I hear about how my name spurs of the lips of another before I too am allowed to speak theirs’?
Where do I draw the line? Is it my fault for staying silent? Should I have continued to express that the words they speak bruise those who hear blue? Have I not been brusied enough that I am finally allowed to tend to my wounds instead of their’s? I chose to walk away because I saw no other option for my own sake, so now when I finally treat them the way the treat me, when I extend the effort thet extend to me (which is none at all), they tell me it’s all my fault. They spin a narrative so falsely delusional, they talk themselves into believing it’s the truth and force sympathy out of anyone willing to listen.
It’s painfully funny how that works, how people demand loyalty from others when they’re the leader of the coup aganist you. Right or wrong, leaders get praise and that’s all they want; love and acceptance, by any means neccessary, even if it means cutting off the head of their close friends in the middle of the village they overthrew just to manipulate others into thinking we’re the true evil. How can one ask for upliftment and grace in their behavior when they throw stones through the windows of your house anytime you leave? How can one be so unaware of where their arrows hit and how deep they penetrate when they hit the target they aimed for with arrows they created? Then have the audacity to say, “I didn’t know my actions were hurtful.” They come for blood then act surprised in the aftermath of the bloodshed they instigated?
It’s as if they stab once to see my reaction, to which I let the knife glide out peacefully, beacuse hurt people hurt people and I too am a hurt person, sometimes on both ends of that spectrum. But then they stab again, and again, and again. Waiting for my reaction, a reaction they rarely recieve. Because why would I spend any more energy on someone who is not only begging for my spine to finally give way but aiming to ensure I have no one left to break my fall when it finally does happen?
I’m slightly dumdfounded as how I can be the reason for someone’s entire misery, when I was the one trying to get them to be better and do better the entire time. I did not choose giving up on them as an immediate reaction, they rerouted me into that direction by speaking ill over and over while also still holding ownership of the blade meant for my bones. I was the one who said the hard things, they things they didn’t want to hear, I was the one who brought recognization of their behavior into the conversation, I was the one who forced responsibility on their part, I was the one who aimed to help them, I was the one who broke their fall over and over…
Yet now, because I’m also the one who handed them the mirror, I am too the reason they hate what they see in it.
