Concrete

Home is not a structure. It lies beneath the skin, connecting people like beams of an attic. Home is not a place you simply inhabit; it is the aura that absorbs you, the comfort that keeps you going. We are the wooden panels, the bricks, the glass… we hold ourselves together with concrete glue. 

And you’ve cracked the concrete. 

My home is not between the walls you created. For too long I thought it was, but now I am sheltered in the love of people who truly care for me. People who truly value me, for all I am and all I want to be. 

You needn’t thank me for staying up late to wait for your drunken return. For leaving the lights on, for worriedly pacing, dishrag in hand, only able to sleep when I knew you were safe. You needn’t thank me for my care. For the meals and beds I made, the clothes I mended, the landscapes I carved for you. Just thank me for my patience; the thing that held the knife down from cutting our ties. I kept repairing the concrete, after every crack came back. You’ve positioned chisels everywhere, and with each wordy blow, you’re swinging a mallet and injuring this bond we have, over and over until I’m drowning in sand. Drowning in the rubble of the relationship I used to be proud of. 

Now I have a different kind of pride. The kind of pride you frowned upon. 

I gave you everything I knew how to give. I gave my body, my mind, my soul, my allegiance—everything you asked for—but we both ended up with nothing. You never treasured my sacrifices, so everything went to waste. I watched my talents fall from a great height and shrivel up on the floor, unusable. You made them unusable.

Home is not a place. It is a condition. One that you could have made for me, but refused to. You built a palace for you and only you, and cast me out like a stableboy to do your chores and drive me mad. And I worked, oh how I worked, until my fingers were dry and cracked like the concrete. 

I don’t like this concrete. 

I want something more than cracks to fix, fabric to mend, shoes to fill. In this new place, this real home, I had shoes fitted to me, and now I wear them well. I chose the laces. I chose the soles. I painted the sides with my name because this role is mine and it’s not conditional. 

I don’t want to be conditional. 

Spare me the rain. Don’t drop your mallet now. Don’t hide it away like you never held it at all. I’ve waited for you to admit to your weapons, but that is something you’ll never do, is it? You fawn over the power you have and nurse it with more passion than your mother nursed her young. 

I am too old now. I do not want to hurt anymore.

And so I ran into the arms of stronger concrete.