Those words pierced
Me
My soul
My heart
How could he?
And yet I knew that’s what he thought
He reaffirmed my fears
My fears that because I lived where I did I was not
Good enough
That somehow if he had gotten shot at it would have been
My
Fault
Not his
Not the person with the gun, who pulled the trigger
Mine and mine alone

My fears that where I lived made me different
Made me dangerous
Made me lesser

Those lips
Those lips that meant so much to me
That had kissed me and told me I was beautiful
Reaffirmed my fears that I was not good enough
That he did not see me as equal
He saw me as different
In that moment I was not a girl he was driving home from a date
I was someone he was driving to Bridgeport
To the unknown
To “danger”

And he thought it was funny
He laughed as I wanted to cry
And I laughed to
I joked
I agreed.
I believed that I was lesser

He had everything that I wanted
A perfect house
A perfect car
A perfect life
He was not satisfied with it and yet
I thought that if I was in his shoes I would be perfect
I would be happy
He had everything I wanted and he reaffirmed that I did not have it
I will never have it
I will never have grown up in a perfect house in a perfect neighborhood in a perfect little town
And in that moment it hurt
but I know that I would never in a million years give up the last 17 years
to live some other life that my parents cannot give me
I love who I am because of where I have been

I hate him
For ever making me feel less
For ever making me feel different
He knew how I felt about him
And I thought he felt that way about me
We had joked but this
This was not joking
This was real
This was personal
This hurt
This still hurts