i am soft because i chose to be

Why did you do that to me. I used to look up to you before you got into drugs. You said we would have been good friends if we were the same age. It all weighs so heavy. I try not to let it plague my mind as much as it used to but some days my thighs still burn thinking about your touch. What you said to me that night when we were alone. I just wanted to watch the fireworks. I have fucked up coping mechanisms when it comes to sexual relations just to try and “normalize it” in my own way. I keep thinking I’m glad it was me versus someone else but then I’m raised with the question of why it was me. When I tried confronting you, you brushed it off, like it was nothing. That you were just drunk and that you didn’t remember. But I keep getting plagued with the idea that you did and do remember and you just don’t want to face it. How do you think that felt for me? I tried putting your baby daughter on my lap to stop you from touching me. But you still did it to me anyways.

I feel like I can’t trust people normally now. If my body is a temple, it is sacrilege. I feel like no matter how far away I get from it, it still comes back. And you spoke to me briefly the other day because you still live with our grandparents and I just felt so shell shocked. I feel like I can’t tell anyone the depth of this pain and how much it takes over me. I thought I’d be fine but it feels like you took a part of me that day. My innocence.

I was just a little kid. 12 years old. It gets so muddled in my mind now trying to remember your age, but if I’m correct you were 26 at the time. What could I have even offered you. I’m your little cousin. Why did you think that that was okay.