When the children cry
Here's the thing....
My mom was abused as a child, a lot. She never told my dad. As young folks, my sister and I were exposed to ideas far beyond our ken - from her, our cousins, perhaps even our aunt. Dad might have protected us, he 100% would have, had he known. My perfect mom isn't so kind or good. Go figure.
And perhaps Chris and Justin were as young and open and wise asnd we were all fools. Of course we were, jeez.
And perhaps Khai's dad was in over his head, a stranger in a strange land with way more baggage than anyone should travel with at such a tender age.
And Jef...ah, Jef... healing via a hoboprincess never works out well, does it?
*
Perhaps we were all idiots, in my mind at least.
And we can be forgiven. I've gotten more foregiveness than was my due, I suspect. I've given more, to be fair.
And I'd like to rewrite the story I have in my mind.
In my mind, Chris would've been there after the abortion. Justin would've never have insisted upon it. The parents would have been adults, more considerant than they could have ever managed. Loren (the dad) would never have tried to seduce me.
My sister wouldn't have tried to use her knowledge of it as a weapon against me, against my parents.
Our 'friends' wouldn't have pretended it never happened.
**
And yeah, Khai's dad was a bad idea, doomed to fail. Jef was never wrong about that. But I didn't know. I couldn't have. I still thought love and desire were longing glimples of dainty ankles or exposed wrists and kisses mere missed encounters. I still thought guys were sweet enough to kiss bulastrades where her hand had been... I still thought Rhett might come back rather than give in to his ego.
I did, I truly did. I still do, idiot that I am.
**
I still do.
**
I still dream men don't leave their children. I still dream they don't abandon women who carry their children.
I still dream men don't pretend it never happened. That I never happened, That our children never happened.
**
I still dream that when the worse happens, men will be there. And if not there, they will be there as soon as they can be despite - anything.
I still dream.
And I hate myself for the idiocy of hoping. My kid will misbehave on a collasic level and ... men will leave. My body will misbehave and ... men will leave.
Victor shouldn't surprise me... Khai got hard and he left. Brett did better...Khai got hard and he bore down til he realized he couldn't make a difference. I respect that. I'm not sure my admiration of Victor all these years has made sense.
You did the same...eager to help, til it became real.
I don't expect, much, superhuman acts like my father did for his girls... but damned.
And that is beside the point... the point is.
I got was pregnant at 17 and was railroaded into an abortion and Chris couldn't even wait long enough for it to happen til he made another child - who's mother he wed, a child he attempted to parent while labeling me hysterical.
And then Jef talked me into *casual* sex that resulted in my kiddo after two encourtners with birth control. And yeah, Jef was willing to accept the responsibility (god bless him) but... Khai's dad had a bigger stake and I couldn't not give him the opportunity. And I did, my family did.
He failed. He failed in ways that I still find difficult to talk about. The best I can manage is to share that he left the hospital after I gave birth to go *home* to sleep with our roommate.
And I swore to never, ever, ever, ever, again find myself in the place of having a child no one wanted. And I stuck to it...I rarely had sex, I had rules about it. And when I turned 40, I had my tubes burnt because I damned sick of being alone and damned determined to be such a goddamned fool.
And I am skipping the years of abortion trauma and fear of sex and fear of orgasms and what it took of me and of others to help me heal. People are so much kinder when you're broken except...when you become of an age when they no longer care...when you're less capable and innocent and then they don't care about your tender parts.
Til you.... you cared about my tender parts..till they became inconvenient.
And then I was inconventient....and my biggest nightmare became mostly true or true enough to be real and fuck you... either way, I deserved some tenderness. So did you, not that you would've allowed it.
We both needed it.
And I don't know how to forgive your lack thereof...your dismissal of...
or how I might find a way out of the pain a third time...
my ability to bear children has ZERO value.
I cannot talk myself into caring, again...and again...
You had a brilliant opportunity to share the minimal amount of care - there were no long-term consequencs, all you had to do was care... fucking care. And I would have had an entirely different narrative.
Instead, you have double and triple and quadruple -downed on being a fucking ass. 15 months later, you still deny I almost died...literally, metaphorically...
And somehow, I keep forgiving you, keep relating to what your family is going through, keep making that more important than me... keep dying inside because once again, I had a chance at something beautiful and it wasn't just ignored, it was pissed on as if the fire I was never mattered.
And I'm not sure how to live in a world where I have been treated so poorly after all these years and all the steps I have taken to never be so worthless, so human.
I'd rather lay down in the path of a car driven by a drunken fool than face another day like this... a day where I have to wonder how I have somehow evolved (or not) to be so less than worthy of basic fucking decency.
I am old and not up to the leaps of hope I had 30 years ago. I had all these years to get it right and I never did. And what possible fucking good am I to anyone? Evidence says... none.
**
I have managed for the past 20 years or so to quit spinning from hope to hope ... to value my my heart and other's hearts... to say no and no and no...and yes, but with all the rules. And even before that, to consider hearts before anything. Hearts last a lot longer than gentials (she says achingly).
So fuck you.. fuck you so much for destroying the tiny fragments of a self that thought my human bits were of value. I hate you for it. I don't now how to forgive, not really.