Vanessa - Nighttime Walk

Well, you didn't say no.

Maybe if you'd just done things differently, it wouldn't have happened to you. Maybe if you were more careful. But it just keeps happening. There's a reason for that, isn't there?

Extrapolations spiraling out from a few words in paraphrase which said so much - a phrase that summed up what she told herself constantly. For the past five years she'd been telling herself those things.

Well, she did say no, once, and see how that turned out?

Maybe if she was more careful. Maybe if she just screened people better, they wouldn't keep hurting her. Lying, cheating, abusing, r- well, wait. But she didn't say no.

Not in words - Right? But she did, and that was ignored. And then in non-words, in noises of pain, and those were ignored too. And then in action, in tension, avoidance, withdrawal. She tried and -

It wasn't enough - She didn't try hard enough. She replays the scenes in her head and imagines herself as her own superhero, fighting on behalf of her own honor, shouting defense of her boundaries. She'll do that next time.

No, she won't. She never does.

A hollow feeling hurts her gut. Her face burns. The twisting knife of sharpened words, used so effectively to shut her up in the midst of a criticism prior kept buried - Well, it's buried again now, she's learned her lesson. Her sensitivities are not welcome here. Her eyes sting.

An apology had come, sure, but a little too late to keep the truth of the dagger from sinking in. She's getting rather full of daggers, with apologies tacked onto their hilts like band-aids. She'd pull them out if she thought she deserved to.

She looks over the list of contacts. People she keeps forgetting to check back with. She shoots off several friendly messages. She can't be selfish, can't neglect them. She wants desperately to tell them all that's wrong, but all she does is complain, and people could really do without all her crying and arguing and discomfort she causes them.

She hesitates over a few. She thinks they might be sympathetic, but then she remembers she knows they called it all along, and this will only prove it. They'll tell her the same thing. She brought this on herself.

The hours tick by until she's somehow wasted her evening waiting on... what? Distraction? Validation? Proving she's a good person, that she's an attentive friend, that she does good things enough to not deserve those bad things, really? Or just some sense of comfort to fill the wounds, old and new?

Trying and failing hurts worse than giving up. She remembers clearly on nights like this.

So she does not say "no".

And once again, tonight, she does not say "help".