Memories In Forgotten Boxes

I thought that distance changed a life, could cut a wound as clean as knives. I thought one door would close the past, that freedom, once reached, would finally last. I dreamed of this for years on end, the place where all my hurt would mend. Those dreams kept breathing through each night, but morning never matched their light. I've grown so much, or so they say, yet still feel lost most every day. I've carried more than twice my years, yet somehow I'm "too young" for tears. I escaped the walls I called my home, but never truly left alone. You packed yourselves inside my head, then watched me leave while there instead. I fill my days with noise and light, arcades, laughter, crowded nights. Because when silence finds my room, your voices always follow too. They sound like mine now when they speak, they call me foolish, small, and weak. It's strange how echoes learn to hide inside the voice they grew beside. I thought that running meant I'd heal. It didn't change the things I feel. Some memories refuse to fade— they simply wait where they were made. A child of four still lives in me, holding what no child should see. A brother should have meant "safe place," not something I can barely face. I miss the person I hoped he'd be, then hate myself for missing he. The hardest grief I've ever known is mourning someone never grown. Your divorce taught the ground to shake, that love could leave without a break. Now every change becomes a storm, because disaster feels like normal. You called me "tomboy," laughed it through, until I finally found what's true. Then taught me hiding was the cost of being someone you had lost. You said you loved me all along, then treated truth like something wrong. What kind of love demands disguise, then blames the child for all the lies? Your drinking taught my skin to fear, I still flinch when hands come near. A high-five shouldn't make me freeze, but memory lives beneath the breeze. You chose a bottle over me, and somehow I still couldn't see that children shouldn't have to fight for scraps of love most every night. You pulled me from the world outside, said truth had something there to hide. Called me confused, called me unwell, then built my entire life from doubt itself. You read my thoughts before I could, then told me none of them were good. Each feeling turned to "talking back," until my own voice faded black. You called me ugly, called me fat, I still remember hearing that. Now every meal becomes a war, because hunger feels familiar more. You'd tell me I should paint my face, take up less room, know "my place." Even now, when I dress like me, your words still steal what little's free. I left your house. That's true enough. But leaving wasn't leaving us. You built yourselves beneath my skin, and every day I pull you in. So don't mistake my pain for youth, or call my wounds dramatic truth. I'm not behind because I'm weak— I'm healing what you chose to keep. You gave me fear before my name, taught my nervous system shame. Depression settled, anxiety stayed, PTSD became your gift repaid. But even now, through all of this, through every wound you still insist should somehow prove I turned out wrong— I'm here. I'm still moving on. The child you buried still survived. The boy inside me stayed alive. And though you'll never understand, he's finally becoming who he planned. Maybe you'll never call me son. Maybe you'll never see the one I've spent my whole life fighting for. But he is here. And he's worth fighting for.