Every Little Thing

If you know, you know. Of course you know you need to move on. Forward. And you want to move beyond it all. Beyond the flashbacks in your waking hours and the nightmares that awaken you out of an already restless sleep, your body drenched in sweat.  Beyond the fear of letting go and chancing to trust just one more time as you tremble to lower your big toe into the lake thinking that maybe the water is too cold.

To move beyond jumping out of your skin whenever someone unexpectedly approaches you from behind. To move beyond the panicked racing of your heart as a certain song begins to play and when a wiff of mint from the gum she's chewing blows  in your nose or when the wind blows strongly against the trees outside your window. To move beyond thinking you've just seen him walk into that store. Was that him? Was that him?

And of course you want to move beyond it all. And so....if you know, you know. You know that it permeates every part of your life. Whether you want it to or not. You know that the times you've taken the chance to share what really happened and what lives inside you, threatening to gush up and out of you like a geyser, you've been cut off with:

"That's too much..." 

So we turn it into poems and music and paintings and films. Or, some stuff it so deep down that it disappears into their cells growing into a cancer, or some ism. While still others choose sleep walking in a loveless marriage. Some never get to move beyond. They don't even realize it's an option. They don't even realize that happiness is an option on the table.

Moving beyond...

Moving beyond what you've always wanted—deep inside yourself—since you were twelve; for someone to say, "Tell me what happened. Tell me every little thing." And they sit there, quietly, and listen. They listen to the years of violation in detail, to all the horror, to every damning word, every refusal to help by every adult turned to, the silence and wrath of a mother, the closets, the tongues, the bleeding, the pain, the loneliness, the substitute teacher, the pastor of the church. You tell them every little thing. And they don't say, like every person has said to you since you first opened your mouth at the age of twelve, "That's horrible, BUT, you need to move on. You need to move forward."

Don't you know? Don't you know I know I need to move forward? Don't you know I want to move forward? Don't you know I've been crawling forward like a beast for all my life? Can't you see I'm moving forward in every day that comes and goes? Do you not see that I am strong?

But this person doesn't say that. They don't say anything. After you've told them every little thing, and you crumble into guttural sobs that do not sound like yourself, sobs that you did not anticipate happening, they move in closer and bring you in closer....and silently hold you tight. And they don't let go. And you don't pull away because you think they are tired of holding you while you cry. You believe them. You believe their kindness. You believe their safe embrace. You believe they know you are moving forward. You believe they know how strong you are even as you sob into their arms. You believe them because they silently listened to every little thing and they did not respond with, "...but...". By Erika L. Ganier