Day 2: The Rageful Inner Child

She is fourteen, maybe fifteen. I don’t recognise her at first, but something about her feels familiar. The way she sits, the slump in her shoulders, the guarded stillness. Then I see it, her eyes. They’re mine. Only hers are red-rimmed and filled with tears. Her hair is the dark brown I once grew up hating. She sits at her desk, alone in her room. Blink 182 plays softly through the grainy speakers of an old hand-me-down computer.

I hover in the doorway, afraid to approach too quickly. She’s fragile, like a small bird that might flee if I move too fast. She doesn’t see me yet. Her mouse clicks softly as she scrolls through pages of quotes about feeling numb, saving them into a folder she’s titled art references. She’s building a collage, piecing together fragments of other people’s sadness, trying to understand her own.

I step closer, the floor creaking underfoot. She freezes. Her tears stop mid-fall, as if being caught crying is a sin. I speak softly, careful not to startle her. “What are you working on?”

She minimises the window without looking at me. “Nothing. Just... something for school.” Her voice is flat, tired. She stands abruptly, wiping her cheeks with the sleeve of her oversized t-shirt. “I need to go bath my sister and get her ready for bed before Mom gets home.”

Her words hit like a wave of memory. The routine. The responsibility. The exhaustion. I remember all of it. “Can you sit with me for a moment?” I ask. My voice is gentle, pleading.

She hesitates. There’s suspicion in her eyes, but also something like longing. She nods once and sits back down. I sit on the bed beside her, close enough to feel the weight of her sadness. I take her hand, my hand, and squeeze lightly. She startles at first, then softens, tears welling again.

“I know,” I whisper. “It’s a lot.”

The house hums with the low noise of a distant television. Somewhere down the hall, a cartoon theme song drifts into a space too quiet for a child’s laughter. My chest tightens. She stares at the floor, her voice cracking. “My sister needs me. Homework’s not done. Lunches. It’s just me and her tonight.”

Her voice lowers to a whisper. “We’re waiting for the car again.”

I follow her gaze to the window. The streetlight flickers, and the sound of a passing engine makes her flinch. She’s listening for it, the familiar rev of an engine that signals he’s circling the block again. My mother’s stalker. Our shadow. Watching. Always watching. The air grows heavier, the kind that sits on the skin and seeps into bone.

I want to tell her that she’s safe now, that the locks are different, that the car never comes here anymore. But she doesn’t live in now. She’s trapped in then. I reach out and place a hand on her shoulder. She breaks. Her body trembles as she crumbles into my arms, sobbing into my chest. I hold her tighter, whispering, “You’re safe. You’re safe.”

She shakes her head. “It’s not safe. It’s never safe.”

Her voice is small but furious. “Why didn’t they love us enough to keep us safe?”

The question slices through the air, sharp and clean. I want to answer. I want to tell her that they were broken too, that they didn’t know how to love properly, that they mistook survival for care. But I can’t find the words that would make it fair. There aren’t any.

Before I can respond, a small voice calls from the hallway. “Come on, bath time!” My sister. Three or four years old. Still in her Barney phase. My younger self wipes her tears quickly, forcing composure. “I’ll be back,” she mutters, though we both know she won’t. Duty first. Always.

I watch her go. The room feels emptier without her. On the computer screen, a half-finished collage flashes, a grainy quote that reads, I’m fine, just tired of everything.

Later, I find her again. She’s curled in bed beside her sister, the purple glow of Barney filling the dark. Her little sister’s eyes are closed now, soft with sleep. My younger self stares at the ceiling, eyes glassy, until she forces herself up. She quietly leaves her sister’s room and goes back to her own. There, she lifts the spare mattress and pushes it against the window, blocking the view from outside. One more layer of false safety. She sends a text that will go unread.

She lies down but doesn’t sleep for long. The church bells chime outside. One, two, three. She counts them softly under her breath. Her eyes flutter open just as the front door creaks. Slurred voices. Shuffling. Laughter that sounds more like breaking glass. “Just a few drinks,” they said. It’s never just a few.

She hears the raised voices start, the argument building like a storm. Her sister stirs in the next room. My younger self climbs out of bed, heart pounding, and goes to fetch her. The shouting gets louder as she scoops her up from her own bed and carries her back down the hall to her room, hoping to go unseen. But the fighting spills into the hallway. My mother’s voice, my father’s anger, both filling the small house. She stops, shoulders trembling, caught between wanting to protect and needing to disappear. Her mother turns suddenly, words slurred, eyes glassy. “You’re not her mom,” she spits, voice thick with drink. The words slice through the air, a reminder of everything she already knows but never deserved to hear. My younger self flinches, tightening her hold on her sister, swallowing the hurt so it won’t be seen.

When she finally crawls back into bed, her sister curls into her side. They listen to the muffled fight through the walls, the music from the speakers drowning out the chaos. Blink 182 plays again. She closes her eyes, counting the seconds between shouts. When it’s quiet, she lets herself cry silently. She doesn’t want to wake her sister. She never does.

I visit her again. This time, I knock on the door. She looks up from her desk, startled, then whispers, “You came back?” I nod and open my arms. She hesitates, then runs into them. I hold her, rocking her gently, the way no one did then. “You’re safe now,” I whisper into her hair. “You don’t have to manage anyone’s emotions anymore. You don’t have to listen for cars.”

She shakes her head, tears streaming again. “But if I stop, who takes care of her? Who keeps the peace?”

“You already did,” I tell her. “You kept her alive. You kept both of us alive. You can rest now.”

She sobs until her chest heaves. Then, slowly, the sobs fade into trembling breaths. When she can finally speak, she asks again, “Why didn’t they love me enough to keep me safe?”

This time, I answer. “You deserved safety. You deserved love. You deserved care. What happened to you was never your fault.”

She nods, the understanding painful but freeing. The weight begins to lift.

Her anger is not loud. It’s quiet, trembling, soaked in tears she was told not to shed. She doesn’t scream; she collapses. Her rage has lived inside my body for years, masked as anxiety, as control, as the fear of being out of step. Every time I flinch at raised voices, every time I over-explain, every time I rush to keep the peace, I am her, trying to prevent another explosion.

But I am not trapped in that house anymore.

If I close my eyes, I can still feel her heartbeat against mine, the shaking slowing as she realises she is finally safe. I wrap a weighted blanket around us both. We breathe. We exist without rushing, without apology. Maybe we watch a movie. Maybe we paint, or write, or sit in silence. I show her pictures of our life now, my husband, my children, the colour and laughter we built from the ashes. It’s everything she thought she didn’t deserve. I tell her, “You do. You deserve to be loved, to be treasured, to be safe.”

When I see her again, she’s standing outside. The air is warm. She closes her eyes and listens, not for cars, but for birds. She breathes deeply, shoulders straight, eyes bright. There’s paint on her fingers. She smiles easily, freely. She looks young again. Whole.

She’s still here, inside me, but she’s resting now. And for the first time, I think, she believes me when I tell her, “You’re safe.”