i found a sunny spot to sit
the kind that makes you glow a bit
the grass was cool, the light was gold
it felt like something i could hold

i stretched out like a lazy cat
no thoughts too loud, no weight, just flat
the heavy stuff slipped off my chest
the sun, for once, made all the rest

feel smaller — gone, at least awhile
i even wore a real-life smile
but shadows came, like they always do
and took my sunlight with them too.

Let’s not sugarcoat it.
You didn’t protect me.
You didn’t question it.
You didn’t even blink
when she took my life
and signed it over to stone walls and locked doors.

I’ve been made permanent, Dad.
Not “just until things settle.”
Not “a term, maybe two.”
Permanent.
She made the decision.
She made the call.
And you?
You just stood there like a ******* statue,
held together with whatever spine she let you borrow.

And guess what?
You still don’t know.
Because she has been feeding you her version of reality
while threatening me into silence.

“You’ll make things worse.”
“He doesn’t need the stress.”
“You’re lucky we even—“

Shut the **** up.

I’m done being lucky to exist.
Done being silent so your wife can sleep better knowing that I’m far away,
tucked neatly into a place she doesn’t have to see.

She calls it “what’s best.”
I call it what it is:
exile
with a pretty brochure.

She erased me, Dad.
And you handed her the whiteout.  

You think you’re keeping the peace?
There’s no peace here.
There’s just you
living a lie so loud it drowns out
the sound of your daughter breaking.  

Do you know what it feels like
to be warned not to tell the truth
because you might not believe me?

Do you know how disgusting that is?
That I don’t even trust my own father
to choose me
over the woman who’s been gutting me
with fake smiles and cold silences since
I was eleven?

Let’s not pretend anymore:
You let her win.
You let her rewrite what “family” means
until I didn’t fit in the ******* sentence.

So here’s your truth:
I’m not okay.
I’m not “thriving.”
I’m surviving on scraps,
packing trauma into a dorm drawer,
waiting for someone to notice I never come home.

And since no one will say it—
Happy Birthday, Dad.
Hope the cake tastes sweet
while your real kid sits miles away
eating silence.

Hope the presents are stacked high
while I unwrap another year of being invisible.
Hope her kids call you Daddy
loud enough to drown out
what you gave up.

But when the party’s over,
and the house is clean,
and she’s sipping wine on the couch
like none of this ever happened—
I hope it hits you.
I hope my absence rots in your stomach.

Because I’m still here.
Still screaming between the lines.
Still writing you into every ******* word
because I don’t know how to make you
look at me.

So yeah.
Happy Birthday.

You got your quiet life.
And I got forgotten.

They say I’m lucky
to be here.
Boarding school.
Safe.
Fed.
Books in my hands,
a roof that doesn’t leak.
But luck feels like a cruel joke
when you cry in a bed
no one tucked you into.

My stepmom’s voice doesn’t need to travel far—
it lives in me now.
“You’re too much.”
“You ruin everything.”
“No wonder your mother left.”
And I hate how fast I believe her.
How deep those words go.

Because my real mum did leave.
Not by accident.
Not by death.
She left because she didn’t want to be a mum.
Not my mum.
Not with me in the picture.
Fifteen years old
and I still wonder
what it was about me
that made her walk away.

Was I born too loud?
Too soft?
Too inconvenient to keep?

She sends postcards sometimes.
From places I’ve never been.
Smiling in sunglasses,
signing with love
like she remembers what that means.
But love doesn’t show up twice a year
and forget your birthday.

So I sit here,
in classrooms where no one knows
why I flinch at kindness,
why I don't raise my hand.
They don’t see the girl
who keeps herself small
so she won’t be sent away again.

I imagine the van sometimes—
that guy with the dog and the dust roads.
I imagine running,
not toward something,
but away.
From the house that wasn’t mine.
From the voice that broke me.
From the silence my mother left behind.

But what if I never run?
What if I just grow older
and colder,
wearing a mask that looks like success
but feels like surviving?

What if I stay here—
the girl left behind twice,
too scared to dream,
too used to being unwanted
to believe she could ever be more?

What if I don’t make it—
and no one notices
because they never expected me to
in the first place?

oh yay,
it’s happening again.
nature’s monthly gift,
delivered straight to my underwear
like a subscription box from hell.
no tracking number.
no warning.
just splat!
hope you weren’t planning on dignity today.
but it’s okay.

because this is beautiful.
this is womanhood.
this is the magical time
where your organs weep
and everyone tells you to smile through it.

and the best part?
it’s totally normal!
you know, just a causal internal bleeding event
that lasts 5 to 7 working days.

love that journey for me.

meanwhile—
boys get to walk around
untouched,
unpunched,
completely unaware that their insides
aren’t staging a revolution once a month.
“oh, i stubbed my toe!”
congrats, jason.
try bleeding from places you don’t talk about in science class
and still showing up to algebra.

and let’s not forget
the experts
the boys in gym class
who say “ew” at a pad
like it’s cursed.
buddy, you can’t even make eye contact with a ******
without flinching like it’s a hand grenade.

but sure,
go off.
tell me how strong you are
because you can bench 120
while i’m surviving a bloodbath
with a smile and a midterm.

also—
shoutout to the marketing team
that decided to name pads like
“whisper”
and “cloud comfort.”
what i need is something called
“armour of god”
or “crime scene control.”

but no,
let’s keep pretending
this is sacred.
let’s keep painting it pink
and telling girls
“you’re a woman now.”

oh, am i?
cool.
then where’s my crown?
where’s my painkiller budget?
where’s the week off from school
for bleeding and not burning the building down?

because if men bled once a month?
we’d have national holidays.
paid leave.
parades.
blood themed energy drinks.

but me?
i get called “dramatic.”
for bleeding.
from inside.

so yeah,
super fun being a girl.
five stars.
would recommend.
can’t wait to do it again
next month.

They cheered for them—
moms with cameras, dads with proud eyes—
I stood alone,
four medals in my hands,
three gold, one silver,
like they meant something.

I ran fast today.
I always do.
People say it’s talent.
My stepmom says
it’s because I like running from my problems.
She laughs when she says it.

She doesn’t know—
I run
because when I run,
the pain stays behind
for a while.

No blades.
No pills.
Just breath and burning legs
and the sound of my heart
trying to beat louder than the thoughts.

I crossed every line first
but still came last
in the only race that mattered—
the one where someone waits
at the end.

Sometimes I wonder
what it would feel like
to look into the crowd
and see someone who looks like love.
To have someone call my name
like it meant home.
I wish I had that kind of family—
the kind you don’t have to earn.