“Mother, I swear it’s milk!” I pleaded, my wide and innocent eyes doing their job -to convince my mother, or anybody else, really- that I am a pure, sinless being, untainted by the dirt and filth crowding the earth.
But she -my mother- stared at me, eyes horrified -what of, mother?- as if I am not the one she raised for the last sixteen or so years.
But I am! I am, I wanted to scream, at everyone, at the world. That I wear pink and rosaries hanging on my neck and stuffed animals crowding every fucking inch of my bed.
I am a child. I am sixteen. I am pure, innocent little girl. So please stop looking at me like I’m not! I wanted to shout angrily at them who look at me like I’ve known the sins of the world -because how could they know?- Have I not done a magnificent job at covering every inch of my scarred bleeding skin from the judging eyes of society? Do they see my scars and flinch at the marks and bruises? Do they fucking flinch at the sight of me?!? But it’s only me, I pleaded, begged, it’s me!
-but dear, who is it you’re trying to convince?-
Why? I demanded, why couldn’t anybody believe me, that it’s just fucking milk? What have I fed myself with beside milk?
-vodka, whisky, cigars, lies of pretty-eyed boys, the girls insults, chokes of sobs, more lies, trauma, and godknowswhatpills-
“I’m not Ally Lyons.” Liar. Deceiver. Choke on your lie!
All the lies and excuses, trauma rotting in my bones, bitterness spreading like weeds. Oh god make it stop!
And I don’t know which hurts more -the fact that she knows I take Xanax everysinglefuckingday to help me sleep, or that once upon a time I tore my skin with blade I stole from biology class, or that I sleep more on his bed because mine doesn’t feel safe anymore and it creeps the fuck outta me, or that I know am not a tad better than those girls who killed Amanda Todd.
Or the fact that my own mother doesn’t believe I drink milk. Maybe that. Maybe it’s the goddamn fucking milk.
I am Ally Lyons.
You want so badly to be pure again, you call yourself a doll, a lamb, an innocent little thing.
But the color pink doesn’t wash away sin, and rosaries don’t make you any less sacred of god.
