You say I pulled away.
You're right.
But before I left,
I withered beneath the weight of your storm.

I didn’t mean to become the silence
you dreaded waking up to.
But every slammed door,
every name spat like venom,
taught me how to become invisible.

You think I planned it —
as if my tattoos were eulogies for us,
my piercings an escape route.
No.
They were armor.
Each needle a promise to myself
that I still existed
underneath the noise.

I loved you.
God, I did.
When we laughed,
it felt like we’d invented language.
When we touched,
I thought the world forgave us.

But I was bleeding
while trying to bandage your rage.
And in the quiet after your anger,
I started to disappear.

I wasn’t waiting to leave —
I was hoping you’d notice I was drowning.
But you were too busy
trying to prove you were already underwater.

And I know my hands weren’t clean.
I bit back,
with sarcasm, with silence,
with withdrawal.
We hurt each other
because we didn’t know
how not to.

You were my home.
But I couldn’t survive the fires
you kept lighting inside the walls.

So I left.
And I still ache —
because I wanted us to grow,
not burn.