If I had the nerve or the courage that’s what I would say. But I am not courageous and only when backed into a corner does my fire show. But I must tell you before you go any further with your pursuit of me that I won’t be loving you. It has been decided.

At the end of 2013, after being involved in a relationship filled with lies, betrayal, and even to my own disbelief my acceptance of “hush money”, i.e. winter wardrobes, car notes, and rental payments in exchange for my silent agreement of late nights that turned into days out and the non-questioning of phone calls that required him to leave the room and sometimes even the house.

Walking into broken glass was not what I expected when I woke up that morning. It looked like I had a party and a really good fight. Or both simultaneously. I remembered then that I hadn’t had company and instantly my hangover head pound was more painful than the glass cutting my feet.

The rain came quickly, and we had to move the party from the patio to underneath my papa’s boat shed. We danced smelling of teenage spunk and anxiety with salty beads of sweat and warm rain running off our glittering skins.

Everything has a root, a beginning, and an end, even you. Your root is what has all the answers to your current behaviors. Most of us don’t know or won’t admit how we got this way, petty, small, and here’s that trendy word of the day again, savage.