I saw
Him
today

He said “how are you doing”
He was the boy who so many times tried to take advantage of me
Who wouldn’t cease to corner me at every time we were alone
The one who took away what little sanity i had left
He touched me
On the shoulder
I wanted to cry
I was reminded of the car rolling over
I was reminded of the time he openly said
“God i don’t care how much alcohol it takes.”
I’d like to think that if maybe i just submitted and allowed him to have his way maybe things wouldn’t have turned out so violently

I was reminded of when i was happy, before the parties
When i didn’t have it play over again and again
90 mph
Swerve off the road
Flipping
Slide
Broken glass everywhere
The windshield was broken and so was reality
Covering his head with a rag, straddling him in the snow.
Repeating
“Stay with me, stay with me”
Until the sirens blared and the lights as red as the blood staining my head
He tried to grope the nurse thinking it was me.
At the hospital the doctor told me
“You have no damage aside from a few cuts, it’s remarkable. You’re lucky you’re alive.”
Little did I know the doctor’s statement was false
There would be a lot more damage
The damage was just a late bloomer.
The phrase
“I’m fine, i’m not hurt.”
Became my life preserver
While I remembered every night the difficulty of me falling asleep
I remember my head getting flung back and forth as we rolled
The motions always take over my body leaving me nauseous.
Like a ride at the fair that jars you around as if you were the sphere in the pinball machine
I can’t ride in cars anymore.
I panic.
I grab the handle and brace myself for oncoming impact when I surpass 40 mph in a vehicle.
god take me back to when I was free
Those days, those beautiful days
When i thought things were bad but oh, that was not even the start
Loud noises jump me as if i were some timid deer
I can’t concentrate
I’m prescribed adhd medication in hopes that will help.
I get more medication for chronic headaches
It’s the fault of my concussion
The outer damage begins to fade exchanging itself for internal.
I start to stay inside, shutting off the world
The real damage finally subsides and i’m able to go back to my routine life.
Things start to feel as normal as they can
Every night i have a nightmare of being with someone i love and crashing a car on a snowy night
It progressively gets more and more realistic till the point where i accept it
I ditch friends when they offer me rides to go places
I’m just a hermit at this point
Not a day goes by where I don’t think about it
And in that
Second
with him present
all I can manage
is a smile and a
“I’m fine”