A Warning

I know you read this.

I know you’re watching.

I know you sweat sometimes, thinking of the secrets I hold. I know you think that just because you terrified me many years ago that I’m terrified now. There is, however, one thing you’ve forgotten.

Let me just take it from the top.

While you were busy fucking with those weaker than yourself, I was busy getting strong. Every time I hit the floor, it was only to get back up again. Every hit, every stab, every moment of abuse made me stronger. Did you not realize you were training me to become dangerous? Did you not think that one day, the small helpless thing you did whatever you wanted to would grow teeth and claws?

I got out. I got away. I glued the broken bits back together. The idiot stubbornness in me that kept me getting up off the floor every time you beat me down has become a bright polished edge. I wrapped my hilt with leather, I trained myself to push past the pain, I did what I never thought I could do. While you have contented yourself with fat laziness, carrion-picking at the bones of easy prey, I have become something else, whether I wanted to or not.

And I have been patient.

I have been so fucking patient for other people. The comfort of those still in your orbit has been my reason, because no matter how little I care for you, I care for them a great deal. I have kept secrets that eat me from the inside out like swallowed glass shards, for their sake. I have kept my mouth shut, I have swallowed rage and the unwitting insults of people who love me and just wish everyone could get along. I have relentlessly tried to be a better person than I ever thought I could be, because, after all, I did not want to be like you.

But you have gone too fucking far.

You make the mistake of thinking that because I am gentle, I am also stupid and harmless. You are, quite simply, wrong.

Here it is: you have been adrift in the shallow, warm waters of my patience. This is no longer the case. Put one toe over my boundaries again, disturb my peace, engage in that manipulation or that naked aggression you are so used to deploying, and you will no longer be in that safe harbour.

I am no longer a child you can injure with impunity. I am a grown-up. More than that, I am a mother, and my curses carry weight. More even than that, I have the ability to dial 911, and I have the ruthless willingness to do whatever is necessary should you trouble me one iota further.

I have put up with this for years. I am serving notice: that phase is over. You have been warned.

That is all.

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