She was my cousin.
She was my friend.
A simple pinkie promise,
That's all I had to make.
To break it,
Meant an afterlife in hell.
Now what eight-year-old wanted that?
The "games" began each Saturday,
My parents would go out on dates.
At first it was the watching,
The naked bodies...
The rated x scenes...
Then there was the touching...
And so this twisted game progressed.
I thought every big girl did this
Until I found out they didn't
One Saturday she came,
As always my parents left.
This time I put my little head down.
Said I wouldn't be joining tonight.
I'd lock myself in my room
I'd pretend to sleep
Pretend to be tired.
As I cried the tears of a child's broken trust.
The year went on.
Alone in my silence,
Alone with my tears,
My guilt,
My sorrow...
My stupid pinkie promise...
Why didn't I say no?
Why did I want to do it?
The confusion,
The hate...
For my face,
For my body,
For my soul,
For all of me and none of her
Despicable to my very own eyes,
The mirror but a weapon of torture.
A year or more later,
As my momma cut my hair in the tub,
I began cry...
And cry....
And cry....
For what seemed like no reason at all.
I gasped through my tears the only words I could,
"If I break a pinkie promise,
Does that mean I go to hell?"
I heard what I've wanted to hear all along.
The burden was lifted,
The story was told,
But there would be no Hollywood ending.
By then,
It was too late for "fixing".
My mom wanted nothing more than to leave this behind,
To have me move on,
To let it be over
But it would never be over for me...
Nine years of my life were wasted...
With depression,
Self-hate,
Bitterness...
With darkness I couldn't quite lift.
Nine years later,
The anxiety remains.
But there's finally a beam of light.
Nine years later,
I begin to pick up my broken soul.
Nine years later,
I can finally feel happiness.
Nine years later,
I begin to learn to be a kid.
But even now,
As my life looks up,
And I begin to feel one with myself,
There will always be a part of me that suffers,
From the tears of a child's broken trust.
