I don't know when the story went so fucked up.
And sometimes I think it wasn't so bad... that it wasn't that bad.
That you just exaggerate.
That you are emotional, intense, dramatic.
I repeat that to myself.
That's what I tell myself to breathe.
Because if I don't lie to myself even a little, I'll sink.
And I'm not ready to sink.
Not now.
I tell myself that you provoked me.
That you were looking for a fight.
That you were carrying things and I only received the impact of everything you brought.
I tell myself that anyone in my place would have reacted the same.
That I'm not a monster.
That we both screamed.
That we both cross boundaries.
I tell myself so many things that sometimes I believe them.
But then that flash appears...
You falling on the armchair,
You lifting your legs to slow me down,
You with that mixture of fear and surprise as if you couldn't understand who was the one in front of you.
And that's when the justification disarms me a little.
Then I put it back together, faster, stronger, because if I don't miss something I don't want to see.
I tell myself it was a moment.
An impulse.
One second.
A start.
I tell myself that you also said things that hurt me.
That you also knew you were touching a wound.
That you did it to hurt me.
And so, with that thought, I managed to cover the noise a little.
But it's not enough.
Because if it were like that,
If it were really that simple,
Why do I sometimes find myself looking at my hands and feeling a strange mixture of shame and anger?
Anray at whom?
Towards you?
Or towards me?
I don't say it out loud.
I will never admit it.
But there's a part of me that knows I've crossed a limit.
A limit that does not become the same.
Then the mind does what it can:
Justify.
Reorder.
Invent a story that is easier to bear.
I tell myself that I didn't hurt you so much.
That it wasn't that strong.
That they were taps.
That I controlled.
I controlled.
What a shitty word.
What a comfortable lie.
Because if I had controlled something, you wouldn't have stopped crying.
You wouldn't have snuggled up as if you wanted to disappear.
You wouldn't have said that phrase that still haunts me:
"I don't want to live like this...
That cut me off more than anything.
But I'm not going to admit it.
At least not out loud.
It's easier to get cold to me.
The one who doesn't feel.
The one who doesn't remember.
The one who "wasn't that bad."
And so I continue.
Hanging on that broken version where I'm not the villain.
Where you are exaggerated.
Where we are both to blame.
Because if I drop those excuses—
If I let go of that last thread that holds me—
I have to face what really happened.
And I don't know if I could stand it.
That's why I justify.
That's why I make up reasons.
That's why I look for any crack in you to cover mine.
Because the unjustifiable,
When you don't want to see it,
It becomes a perfect lie.
And I—
I'm living inside that lie.