A Flicker in the Dark

Text in black are quotes; text in green are my notes. I sometimes write in Spanish.

• And in that moment, the moment of the crash, it made me realize that monsters don’t hide in the woods; they aren’t shadows in the trees or invisible things lurking in darkened corners. No, the real monsters move in plain sight. #

• I understand the way the brain can fundamentally fuck with every other aspect of your body; the way your emotions can distort things—emotions you didn’t even know you had. The way those emotions can make it impossible to see clearly, think clearly, do anything clearly. The way they can make you hurt from your head down to your fingertips, a dull, throbbing, constant pain that never goes away. #

• On the one hand, my father had taught me that it’s entirely possible to love someone without ever really knowing them, and that thought kept me up at night. #

• I remember that statistic I learned in school, the one that made my blood run cold—forty percent of people who are abused as children will go on to become abusers themselves. It doesn’t happen to everyone, but it happens. It’s cyclical. It’s about power, control—or rather, the lack of control. It’s about taking it back and claiming it as your own. #

• It wasn’t until I found myself hovering over Cooper in my kitchen, looking down at his weakened body, that I had a taste of what it really felt like: control. Of not only having it, but taking it from somebody else. Snatching it up and claiming it as your own. And for one single moment, like a flicker in the dark, it felt good. #