I read the poems I used to write about him and I don't recognize myself. I read that I used to believe in my soul that he loved me and that he was the love of my life and somehow it is impossible to reconcile all that has transpired between the fairy tale and the fairy tale. The fairy tale where the prince and cinderella run off is the fairy tale I want to believe but my fairy tale ends with bloody feet and terrified screams. I thought he was prince charming but it wasn't the stepsisters that were evil in this retelling, it was him. My retelling hurts. My lack of a fairy tale ending hurts. Running away from everything that my twenty year old self thought was love hurts. It is no easy feat to retell a fairy tale, to make it beautiful when for so long it has been so ugly. But somehow, I have to believe it is still possible.















