A single stream of light hits the dust that floats on the currents that drift around the darkness of my room. I shrink away from the lamplight, hiding my wet eyes from the world.

I don’t want them to see me, and I don’t want to see the world. That place hurt me too many times, burnt me, scolded me, cut me. I have the scars, see? They ache in my wrists and my ankles whenever I think of them.

Without looking I know that above my eyes is skin red raw from crying, and below the skin is tinted violet after hours of thinking too hard about the things they said. They never thought about my eyes, never saw how they tinted blue after years of nighttime sobbing.

But it’s the days that are the worst, when I – from time to time – must venture out for milk or shampoo, and they see me. The light hurts my tinted eyes, so I can’t see them, but I hear their tongues spur, ready for the attack.
And under the burning light, I fall into their created darkness.