Milly

It’s maths – my last period of the day, and the room smells like sweat and musky cologne. I sit at a desk in the back row by the wall. The one that always has gum stuck underneath it. The teacher is talking about the reproductive system in females. I should be taking notes. I’m not. All I’ve taken away so far is that the uterus can expand to the size of a watermelon. Shuddering, I look back to the teacher, trying to focus on what he’s saying. His voice isn’t his, though. It’s too sweet, too sickly. Too close to the way he used to talk.

I feel my hand move my pen across the page. I write the word “ovum,” then scribble it out. Then rewrite it smaller. Then smaller again.

In front of me, someone types on their computer too loudly. The click-clack makes me squirm.

The teacher walks past my desk and something – maybe the scent of his stale coffee, or the weight of his shadow – makes my heart slam against my ribs, wild and desperate, like a bird trapped in a cage, wings battering against bars that won’t give.

“You okay?” whispers Harmony besides me. She’s in most of my classes. Chatty. Caring. She must have seen me staring.

I nod, even though I’m not.

“Concentrate on your work, please,” the teacher says, and for half a second I swear he’s giving me that look. His look. It’s hungry, animalistic. It’s the type of look that c r a w l s across your body, leaving behind a trace of something rotten. It’s the type of look that makes you feel like you’re a thing, and not a person.

He isn’t giving me that look though. I’ve never seen it on him. He’s not him. Right? They just wear the same aftershave.

Still, I flinch when he walks by again.

There’s a worksheet on my desk. I haven’t touched it.

I draw a tiny box on the paper and fill it in, completely black. Then another. Then another. Little containers. Little cages. Neat. Clean. Empty.

I wish I could shrink myself small enough to fit inside one.

And for a moment, I do. Except everything is wrong. The desk I’m sitting at is different; smaller, and chipped at the corners, carved with initials I don’t recognise. My feet don’t touch the floor, and the air feels thick; stale, like it hasn’t been breathed in for years. The classroom is empty but somehow feels crowded. Cramped. Like the walls are folding in, little by little. A light flickers over my head, and he’s there, looking down at me. Smiling like we share a secret. I’m eleven again.

I slowly get up to leave, but he kicks me in the stomach and pins me down. He starts yelling at me, but everything is muffled, like my ears are stuffed with cotton. I lie there and let him do whatever he wants, like I always do. I fix my eyes on the door, just in case. But no one comes. No one ever does. I watch my body flop around, weightless and lifeless, like a dying fish. I don’t scream; I don’t shout. My mind slips out of me, and suddenly, I’m a wild horse galloping far, far away, feeling the frisson of joy that freedom bestows. I’m a seabird with wings so long I can fly forever. I’m the moon, tucked away in the night sky, safe and hidden from him.

Time slows down or maybe stops. My thoughts scatter like a plumage of feathers exploding from a gunshot wound midair. I can’t feel the floor. Can’t feel my body. Then something shifts and I hear a rustle of papers. The classroom sharpens around me. My worksheet is still blank except for the tiny black boxes I drew. I gaze around. No one’s looking at me. Everything is quiet. Like nothing happened. Like it was all in my head. I lock the door that keeps the bad memories away and stare at the ceiling. There’s a crack
running through it. I count to ten. Then to twenty. I think about what it would feel like to float through it, up, up, and away.

Harmony nudges me again. “Are you sure you’re okay?”

I nod and force myself to smile, pushing down the bile beginning to bubble in my throat. My mind starts screaming at me to leave, adrenaline pulsing through my veins. Without thinking about it, I’m on my feet. Walking. Running. The teacher calls out after me, but all I can see is the staircase ahead. I’m so close. I’m almost there.

I burst into the bathroom, shove open the door and run to the last cubicle, the cold tiles burning against my skin as I crumple to the floor. A strained gasp rakes its way out of me, my body lurching forward. All I can smell and taste is last night’s dinner.

Trembling, I lean against the door and draw my knees to my chest. One by one, the tears fall, each heavier than the last. My body accepts what my mind can no longer hold. Screams and sobs shake through me, sharp and suffocating. Grief slithers in, guilt close behind, both wrapping around my heart like vines, tightening with every breath. This pain isn’t just in my head anymore. It’s in my throat, my chest, my limbs, demanding its way out.

I let it.

After years of holding it in, I let it pour out of me – loud, aching, and endless.
When it all finally stops, I’m still curled up, snot dripping from my nose.

It doesn’t feel like this is ever going to go away. He’s still here. He’s always here. I want to move on – I think I do – but I don’t know how to do that when he’s still living inside me.

My body doesn’t feel like mine anymore. I don’t know if it ever did.

He took and took until there was nothing left. Sometimes I wonder what I did to deserve it. Sometimes I wonder if I’m the dirty one, the disgusting one. And sometimes, I even question if it was really that bad. But when I slip into that trap, all I have to do is watch it happen again and look into that girl’s eyes; blank, dilated, gone.

Once I’ve gathered myself, I grab my journal and a pen from my bag and start to write. But getting it out is hard. I’ve rewritten everything at least five times. Crossed out words and changed some. Regardless, I put my pen down and stare at the open book. The mess of ink, the rawness. The realness of it. Then I hear a knock.

Harmony sits down next to me. “Are you okay?”

I hesitate. Then I nod. “I think so. Can I show you something?”

I hand the journal to Harmony. I want to pull it back, to keep it safe. But maybe for once, it’s okay to let someone else hold it. To let someone else see me.

I need help, but I don’t know how to fix this. How to fix me. I know now though that I don’t want to feel like this anymore. He kept me locked up for so long, I forgot there was a world beyond the walls. And now that I’ve finally tasted freedom, the fear of being trapped again is consuming me entirely.

You.

You made me believe I was something special, and in return, I gave you everything. Every part of me. But you destroyed me like I was nothing; just another little girl you could ruin. Now I can’t breathe without smelling you in the air. So tell me, what do I do with that?

For years, I’ve felt like pieces of me have been missing. Like parts of myself were thrown across the world, waiting to be found. But now, I think I can finally tell my story, because the rivers of my searching, once lonely and lost, are beginning to flow back into the ocean of who I am. The pieces are coming home. I’m returning to myself.

I’m still my brokenness. I’m still a scared little girl wishing I could make him go away. But I’m also grateful. And I’m starting to feel something I thought I’d lost forever, hope.

I’m learning that hope doesn’t roar. Hope doesn’t shout. Hope is quiet, like a washing machine, gently humming on an early summer morning. Hope is a gentle pulse beneath all the noise. It’s always there, like a thread I can hold on to when everything else is slipping through my fingers.

Hope looks like small things now. Like getting out of bed, even when memories of him cling to me like ash after a fire. Like stripping back my fear just enough to say, “I need help.” Like feeling safe enough to be touched. It looks like laughter catching me off guard, or moments of stillness that don’t feel haunted.

It’s not that the pain has suddenly vanished. It’s that I’m learning how to live beside it. To breathe through it. To look for the light leaking in through the cracks. I’m not whole yet, but maybe I don’t have to be. Maybe I just have to keep going.

Because somewhere beneath the pain, there’s a flicker – small, trembling, but alive. A flicker of something soft and defiant. Something that says, I want more. More than just surviving. More than flinching at footsteps and counting ceiling cracks. I want nights that don’t fade into fear. I want to smile and feel it spread through me. I want to be seen without having to tremble.

And that has to be enough. For now, that has to be enough as I begin to forget him. Because he doesn’t get to determine my story anymore. I do.

So I’ll write. Even if my hands shake. Even if my voice cracks. I’ll write the truth, and in doing so, I’ll stitch myself back together, thread by trembling thread.

I’m still learning how to live in a body that remembers his touch. Still learning how to love it. How to trust it. But maybe, one day, I’ll stop seeing his handprints when I look in the mirror. Maybe I’ll see just me instead.

When Harmony looks up, she’s crying.

“I didn’t know,” she whispers, leaning her head against mine. “That was… brave.”

I exhale, a breath sighing its way out. Like something buried deep is finally letting go. My shoulders drop, not all the way, but enough. It feels like standing in the debris and knowing the fire’s out.

And maybe, just maybe, that will be enough.