Peace Be Still

There are hard days. Days when I’m that little girl all over again with my mom coming to pick me up from school bloodied or with a black eye, still smiling, frontin’. Where I’m shocked and scared, embarrassed and confused, except about who did that to her again…this time. There are those days when I’m that baby again thinking everyone knows how poor I really am, where I live, and how I’m ashamed of my handmedown outfit and what Mommy couldn’t afford or had to sex for to buy, how I actually am sad when fighting, that my family and I are not safe most days, and how my fear of the dark makes me call out from my room to my mom in the middle of the night to go to the bathroom still. That I’ve learned to love an abuser and can’t protect the abused. Fear of being found out makes me tongue lash everyone if I sense an insult. I joke and talk too much in class, grow silent with Grandma and make myself scarce to hopefully not get hit again, act like a know-it-all with friends and get good enough grades to be considered bright. I pop off and allow myself to be easily provoked and I throw chairs and tantrums. That’s what some days are like. Like that terrified, once homeless, molested and trauma-enduring and witnessing little shorty. What follows? Rage or tears or both. I thought those were hard days. I had no clue being an adult would add more drama and pain. The hardest days now are when I’m that kid again and have no quick and calm exit. When this life seems to mimic that one I thought I left behind. When there’s no peace.