"You’re the most selfish person I’ve ever met."
A tender hand reached out and brushed something wet from my cheeks. I opened my eyes; she looked scared, vulnerable, and slightly pleased.
“Go away.”
And the light fled with her.
I couldn’t understand why I still cried every time. I erected walls made of stainless steel but they stained anyway; they crumbled under the marring of the abusive temperament of this world that I strained to stand tall in. When I looked over my hands they were not covered in scabbing scars, but hideous burns, brown and blistering. They crept along my elbows and dissolved beneath my toes. I would press my fingers against them, but I had grown numb to pain—nothing hurt me anymore.
When he threw those words at me, I sat as straight as I could. I looked him right in the eye, and he couldn’t handle it. He shifted his gaze downward, still yelling. Warm tears ran like flames down my neck. I had won in my defiance.
I think he wanted me to bow my head a little in submission, to acknowledge my foolishness to his wisdom. But I would never give him that.
I am never going to give anybody that.
In this world of brutal ambition, I am never, ever, going to let anyone break me.