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I stand there for a second, then I follow the sound of silence into the living room. Mom is on the floor beside the couch. Her hair is stuck to her face, dark bruises across her arms and along her cheek. And there’s a thin line of blood that has dried beneath her noise. Some tears are still wet on her skin…The table has been knocked sideways and things are scattered across the floor. White powder again, some needles. Mom?

I kneel beside her, starting to do what I’m used to doing when she’s in that state. I check her pulse, but I can’t find it. I try to find some water next to me but there’s nothing.

“Mom?” Her hand doesn't move, nothing moves even when I touch her shoulder. “Mom, wake up.”

Nothing happens. The lighter slips from my hands and lands beside her fingers, so I pick it up again and put it in her palm. Maybe she’ll get angry and wake up.

Why is she not closing her hand around it? She always does that when I steal it.

I place it again in her fingers and close them back around it myself, but they slip open once more.

“Mom…” I say, louder. I swallow when she doesn’t reply, and wipe my face with my sleeve. Don’t cry…You’re a big boy, Damien. “If you wake up, I’ll be stronger.” My voice shakes, but she’s still not replying. “Mom, I promise I’ll get bigger, I’ll be stronger than him. Stop taking these…They make you sleep too much, you can’t protect yourself when you take them.”

I squeeze her hand once more, taking the lighter back in my pocket. “Nobody is going to hurt you ever again, not even drugs, I promise, mom.”

Open your eyes, please.

I don’t know if she can hear me, but I need her to know. I need…I need to tell her.

“I’ll be strong enough.”

I wait for her to answer, but she doesn't. So I keep holding her hand, because she needs it. She needs to know I’m still here. I still need her even if she’s never happy. I need my mom.

One day, I’ll protect you, I promise.

71

Mireya

Play - Breathe Me by Sia

Guilt is hope

I’m on the floor next to the bed when it happens.

Pathetic. Pathetic to be angry at myself for being myself.

The door opens wide and for a second, it doesn’t feel like my room anymore.

My back is pressed against the side of the bed, my knees pulled in like that might hold me together long enough to face him. Blue lifts his head at the sound, ears twitching and disappears beneath the bed a moment later. Now I’m all alone with the sound of footsteps entering the room.

My hands won’t stop shaking. Powder still ghosts the edge of the sink. I didn’t even clean it, didn’t care enough to pretend it didn’t happen.

I fucked up. I fucked up. And I’m still fucking it up.

Our eyes meet and something inside me stops trying to run. But then his gaze travels to the bathroom, then to the edge of the sink. Disbelief breaks inside his eyes, I see it, I feel it.

And I loathe it.

“Stand up,” he spits out. My throat tightens as his jaw clenches. “Stand up and look at me.”

I don’t, I just laugh instead. It comes out hollow at first and then it cracks in the middle and turns into something wet and stupid. I drag a hand over my face, but it doesn’t help.

Nothing helps. My skin feels too tight, and my thoughts are slipping away. I’m so so stupid… I’m disgusting.

“Fuck, Mireya—” His voice cuts off, and then he’s in front of me.

There’s a second, a single stupid second, where he just stares. Like he’s trying to make sense of what he’s seeing. As if maybe if he looks long enough I’ll rearrange into someone else, the person he thought I was. Sad, but brilliant, not breaking and weak.