In some ways that’s where the abuse is. It’s not just about the times when someone drops a boulder on your head, it’s the times when they position you in the same place it happens and tell you to wait for it, it’s coming. And you wait, and wait, and wait, your fists clenched at your sides, and your eyes screwed shut and your whole body tense, preparing for it. And that’s the abuse. They may never drop the boulder on you, but you’re being abused right then while you prepare for what they told you will happen.

And now I’m waiting for that boulder. When I go to work, when I go home to my room. When I take a shower. When I go to the store, when I go to the bank, when I try something new, when I’m surrounded by strangers, when I’m alone with my body. I wait, and I bide my time for the moment that boulder will fall, as it has always fallen, as my brain has learned it is destiny, it is inevitable, it is because I am me that this boulder will hit.