[ic]
from the diary of Shilo Wallace
So STOP READING NOW...that means you, DAD. It's not like I can't tell when the LOCK has been broken!!!
I thought I wanted to write about this a few nights ago, but once I got going with it, I think I got scared. And sorry that I write in pen. So I scribbled it out and tried to start again. But then everything under the scribbles was still there and I was already starting to write the same things over again. I scribbled some more, but then the whole page just looked messy and I tore it out and threw it away because I wasn't getting anywhere. Also because what's the point in having a messy looking page sticking out of my journal, in the middle of a bunch of other comparatively nice ones? It's in the wastebasket, now. I might flush it down the toilet, later. I don't know.
But I know that I'm actually ready to start writing this again. Or trying to. And seeing as this is my diary, maybe I don't need to scratch anything out, anymore, because who else is going to know? (I don't really want to know the answer to that, but I have a really gross feeling that if I don't watch it like a hawk, I'm going to end up with someone else's notes in the margins and that's just embarrassing.)
The more I think about this, the more I want to apologize. You wouldn't think that someone who spent eighty-five percent of her life stuck in her room and probably about fifty percent of that time (that eighty-five percent, I mean) too sick to move out of her bed would know anything about what it's like to run away. I mean, I wouldn't, at least. Because when you're all but chained to your bedposts, where can you go? Well, I wasn't actually chained up. So, I mean, there were places. Even if it was just my closet, the bay window, the balcony. Under my bed, when I was small enough. (I'm still kind of small enough, but just a little too big for it to be comfortable, now.) I ran away from my dad, every chance I got, even if I stayed put. I tuned him out, I ignored him, I pretended to be asleep. I never confronted him. No, okay, I confronted him once. Mostly, I didn't. Mostly, I ran in the opposite direction, even if it was just in my head.
That's what was so great about Mom's crypt. That was somewhere to run away to. The cemetery. Where it was pretty and quiet and no one reminded me that I was sick and, for all everyone else there knew, maybe I was dead, too, and not to be bothered with stupid, worldly problems like dead moms, distant dads, blood diseases, no friends, forgotten birthdays, broken moth wings, worn-out skirt hems, wobbly gramaphone needles that can't be fixed until someone (see: distant dads) had the time to take it to get fixed. I could read, I could sing, I could dance, I could nap, I could make friends (...with...robberflies and cockroaches...), I could sneak treats (the good kind, not Dad's "cookies"), I could be in charge of everything. No one ever had to know, so I never had to deal with the problems. The fallout. The impending fights that always waited for me, just beyond Dad's stupid rules.
Somewhere along the line, I got too used to it. I mean, sure, now I know that it's probably an okay thing that I did, but I didn't know, at the time, that Mr. Largo wasn't going to help me. But as soon as I got upset...scared, really, I gave up and tried to run. Not even away, which is probably the worst part. I tried to run home. And I don't get that. When I'm home, I just want to go away. When I'm away...I just...want to go lock myself back up? I did it that day, at Sanitarium Square. I did it, again, when Mag came to visit. My favorite person in the whole world came to tell me she loved me and I tried to tell her to go away. Who does that? I tried to run away, again, later, but...well, you wouldn't let me. You were mean, but you wouldn't let me and that's probably more important than if you'd been nice and taken me home again.
That's why I'm trying to apologize. I tried fighting, over flight, once and it hurt. So I started running again and sometimes I don't think I can stop. Even if I should. Even if it's for something I want. You hold me down, sometimes physically. I like when you hold me down. ...Sometimes physically. I want you to keep doing that, for always, even when I learn how to do it to myself.
Do you think it's something I can learn how to do? Did you have to learn, too, or were you just born with a magic fight-only response built right in? I'd like one of those, one day. I want to be able to look searchlights in the face and yell at them, even though I won't make anywhere near as big of a noise as you do. (I'll probably look a lot sillier, too. I'm too small for that sort of thing, maybe.)
But. I'm sorry I keep trying to run. I'm sorry I don't know how to stop, yet, and let something out-of-this-world good happen to me. I'm sorry I'm afraid of everything and that you have to literally restrain me, sometimes, in order to...um. Well, you know. Get me to do lots of stuff. (Not even just the sex things that I'm still too embarrassed to talk about in the "privacy" of my own journal.) I'm sorry and I don't want you to stop.
I love you for all of this and a bunch of other things.
PS: Do you like how I stopped pretending that you weren't going to be digging through here, eventually? Just don't mark up my margins. Or tell me that you've been in it, again. Or even look at me like you might know.
So STOP READING NOW...that means you, DAD. It's not like I can't tell when the LOCK has been broken!!!
I thought I wanted to write about this a few nights ago, but once I got going with it, I think I got scared. And sorry that I write in pen. So I scribbled it out and tried to start again. But then everything under the scribbles was still there and I was already starting to write the same things over again. I scribbled some more, but then the whole page just looked messy and I tore it out and threw it away because I wasn't getting anywhere. Also because what's the point in having a messy looking page sticking out of my journal, in the middle of a bunch of other comparatively nice ones? It's in the wastebasket, now. I might flush it down the toilet, later. I don't know.
But I know that I'm actually ready to start writing this again. Or trying to. And seeing as this is my diary, maybe I don't need to scratch anything out, anymore, because who else is going to know? (I don't really want to know the answer to that, but I have a really gross feeling that if I don't watch it like a hawk, I'm going to end up with someone else's notes in the margins and that's just embarrassing.)
The more I think about this, the more I want to apologize. You wouldn't think that someone who spent eighty-five percent of her life stuck in her room and probably about fifty percent of that time (that eighty-five percent, I mean) too sick to move out of her bed would know anything about what it's like to run away. I mean, I wouldn't, at least. Because when you're all but chained to your bedposts, where can you go? Well, I wasn't actually chained up. So, I mean, there were places. Even if it was just my closet, the bay window, the balcony. Under my bed, when I was small enough. (I'm still kind of small enough, but just a little too big for it to be comfortable, now.) I ran away from my dad, every chance I got, even if I stayed put. I tuned him out, I ignored him, I pretended to be asleep. I never confronted him. No, okay, I confronted him once. Mostly, I didn't. Mostly, I ran in the opposite direction, even if it was just in my head.
That's what was so great about Mom's crypt. That was somewhere to run away to. The cemetery. Where it was pretty and quiet and no one reminded me that I was sick and, for all everyone else there knew, maybe I was dead, too, and not to be bothered with stupid, worldly problems like dead moms, distant dads, blood diseases, no friends, forgotten birthdays, broken moth wings, worn-out skirt hems, wobbly gramaphone needles that can't be fixed until someone (see: distant dads) had the time to take it to get fixed. I could read, I could sing, I could dance, I could nap, I could make friends (...with...robberflies and cockroaches...), I could sneak treats (the good kind, not Dad's "cookies"), I could be in charge of everything. No one ever had to know, so I never had to deal with the problems. The fallout. The impending fights that always waited for me, just beyond Dad's stupid rules.
Somewhere along the line, I got too used to it. I mean, sure, now I know that it's probably an okay thing that I did, but I didn't know, at the time, that Mr. Largo wasn't going to help me. But as soon as I got upset...scared, really, I gave up and tried to run. Not even away, which is probably the worst part. I tried to run home. And I don't get that. When I'm home, I just want to go away. When I'm away...I just...want to go lock myself back up? I did it that day, at Sanitarium Square. I did it, again, when Mag came to visit. My favorite person in the whole world came to tell me she loved me and I tried to tell her to go away. Who does that? I tried to run away, again, later, but...well, you wouldn't let me. You were mean, but you wouldn't let me and that's probably more important than if you'd been nice and taken me home again.
That's why I'm trying to apologize. I tried fighting, over flight, once and it hurt. So I started running again and sometimes I don't think I can stop. Even if I should. Even if it's for something I want. You hold me down, sometimes physically. I like when you hold me down. ...Sometimes physically. I want you to keep doing that, for always, even when I learn how to do it to myself.
Do you think it's something I can learn how to do? Did you have to learn, too, or were you just born with a magic fight-only response built right in? I'd like one of those, one day. I want to be able to look searchlights in the face and yell at them, even though I won't make anywhere near as big of a noise as you do. (I'll probably look a lot sillier, too. I'm too small for that sort of thing, maybe.)
But. I'm sorry I keep trying to run. I'm sorry I don't know how to stop, yet, and let something out-of-this-world good happen to me. I'm sorry I'm afraid of everything and that you have to literally restrain me, sometimes, in order to...um. Well, you know. Get me to do lots of stuff. (Not even just the sex things that I'm still too embarrassed to talk about in the "privacy" of my own journal.) I'm sorry and I don't want you to stop.
I love you for all of this and a bunch of other things.
PS: Do you like how I stopped pretending that you weren't going to be digging through here, eventually? Just don't mark up my margins. Or tell me that you've been in it, again. Or even look at me like you might know.