Page 133 of Haunt Me

Will never meet the real me

The me that was supposed to be,

But instead will be stuck with the me you turned me into.

You took the little me and turned me small.

Of all the things you did to me

The worst was that you ignored me

You ignored me and ignored me and you didn’t do it on accident

You weren’t too busy too distracted too inexperienced

You ignored me until I became smaller

You ignored me to make me smaller

On purpose

And every time you ignored me

(Which was my whole life)

I kept diminishing

Extinguishing

Vanishing

Disappearing

Smalling

Oh how you succeeded in stealing me

In ignoring me in starving me in eliminating me

In not touching me, in depriving me of everything, even air

In making me smaller.

And now I don’t know how to make myself unsmall again.

thirty

“This isn’t good, Isaiah,” Faith says.

We’re back inside, and Eden has gone up to her room to nap. She nearly fell as we were going back up the stairs, she was so emotionally spent. Manuela went up with her.

“You think?” I snap at Faith and, as usual, regret it. “I know it’s not good. Do you have her therapist’s number?”

“Of course. But Eden… Eden needs you too.”

I nod. “I’m not going anywhere. I’m staying.”

My brother’s phone keeps blowing up with messages and missed calls, and I look at him anxiously. He looks like he doesn’t even notice it lighting up every two seconds, even though it’s clasped in his ringed fingers—but I know him. He notices everything.

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