Pretty Little Thing
Jan 8, 2016 15:16:02 GMT
via Tapatalk
Darastrix, adhesivepancakes, and 2 more like this
Post by avianthanatic on Jan 8, 2016 15:16:02 GMT
((tw for dysmorphia, emotional abuse, and sexual assault))
Vain wasn't the worst thing a person could be.
No, it wasn't, and Anthem Finestra knew this. In the swirling gray mess of morality that everyone liked to pretend was so much more clear-cut than it was, there were far worse things to do than admire your own reflection. There were far worse things to be than pretty. Especially when you felt like pretty was the only thing you had going for you. Especially when it had taken you fifteen years to even catch a glimpse of yourself that didn't feel like it belonged to someone else--to look at a mirror and see a person looking back at you whose body matched the person you were inside. It was understandable, then, to be proud of a body and a face that finally felt like it belonged to you--
--except that it didn't. No matter how many showers you took, even though showers meant seeing your body the way it curved under the carefully constructed clothing you used to distance yourself from the shape of it, because you couldn't wear your chest binder in the shower and it wasn't because you hadn't tried but because having to explain a cracked rib and a sudden fear of suffocation with the lame excuse that you slipped and fell didn't make any sense to anyone and you couldn't just stop taking showers entirely because even though they didn't help, even though it was years ago, even though nobody had so much as brushed up against you since The Fire, you still felt it on your skin.
Your body didn't belong to you. No matter how pretty it was or how much it had started to look like the person you wanted to be. There would always be someone who had liked it much more than you, long before you had the power to stop him.
Pretty little thing.
The words still echoed in your ears.
Why would a girl like you want to pretend she was something else?
You weren't a girl and you weren't pretending but that didn't matter so you stopped trying to say anything at all and you still wonder if you hate yourself for that any less than you hate him.
Pretty girl like you could go places. Shouldn't have to be locked away in an orphanage with all of these other losers.
They weren't losers they were your friends, back when you still had friends, back before you stopped talking because you knew what would happen if any of your words accidentally gave away that--
I have a nice place. I could adopt you. There's nothing here for you, Annie.
And he was right but he was wrong because there was something here, there was this, there was this awful thing every day with his hands on your skin and your clothes on the floor and other things you closed your eyes for because even though you knew you would feel it for the rest of your life you didn't want to see it, too, and--
Say that you're a girl.
But you weren't so you bit your tongue and
Say it.
You knew you weren't supposed to lie but you didn't think this was supposed to happen either so
Say you're a girl so I don't have to find someone else to have fun with.
I'm a girl, you lied, in a voice that felt like someone else's which came from a body that would never be yours again
Good girl. And remember, if you tell anyone else...
But he didn't have to finish because you already knew. If you told anyone else you'd be hurting dozens of children, if anyone believed you at all because who would believe that the owner of an orphanage could do such a thing and who would adopt all of these kids if the place got shut down and so you bit your tongue and it was the first time you ever learned about the Greater Good and if anyone asked why you were suddenly so quiet or why you stopped hanging around with them or why they weren't allowed to touch you anymore you just shrugged and went about your business and they all watched you as you left and muttered under their breath about how lucky you were to look so good and how the man in charge liked you best and you tried not to cry or to break under the admiring stares that followed you for the rest of your life.
Pretty little thing.
Vain wasn't the worst thing a person could be.
No, it wasn't, and Anthem Finestra knew this. In the swirling gray mess of morality that everyone liked to pretend was so much more clear-cut than it was, there were far worse things to do than admire your own reflection. There were far worse things to be than pretty. Especially when you felt like pretty was the only thing you had going for you. Especially when it had taken you fifteen years to even catch a glimpse of yourself that didn't feel like it belonged to someone else--to look at a mirror and see a person looking back at you whose body matched the person you were inside. It was understandable, then, to be proud of a body and a face that finally felt like it belonged to you--
--except that it didn't. No matter how many showers you took, even though showers meant seeing your body the way it curved under the carefully constructed clothing you used to distance yourself from the shape of it, because you couldn't wear your chest binder in the shower and it wasn't because you hadn't tried but because having to explain a cracked rib and a sudden fear of suffocation with the lame excuse that you slipped and fell didn't make any sense to anyone and you couldn't just stop taking showers entirely because even though they didn't help, even though it was years ago, even though nobody had so much as brushed up against you since The Fire, you still felt it on your skin.
Your body didn't belong to you. No matter how pretty it was or how much it had started to look like the person you wanted to be. There would always be someone who had liked it much more than you, long before you had the power to stop him.
Pretty little thing.
The words still echoed in your ears.
Why would a girl like you want to pretend she was something else?
You weren't a girl and you weren't pretending but that didn't matter so you stopped trying to say anything at all and you still wonder if you hate yourself for that any less than you hate him.
Pretty girl like you could go places. Shouldn't have to be locked away in an orphanage with all of these other losers.
They weren't losers they were your friends, back when you still had friends, back before you stopped talking because you knew what would happen if any of your words accidentally gave away that--
I have a nice place. I could adopt you. There's nothing here for you, Annie.
And he was right but he was wrong because there was something here, there was this, there was this awful thing every day with his hands on your skin and your clothes on the floor and other things you closed your eyes for because even though you knew you would feel it for the rest of your life you didn't want to see it, too, and--
Say that you're a girl.
But you weren't so you bit your tongue and
Say it.
You knew you weren't supposed to lie but you didn't think this was supposed to happen either so
Say you're a girl so I don't have to find someone else to have fun with.
I'm a girl, you lied, in a voice that felt like someone else's which came from a body that would never be yours again
Good girl. And remember, if you tell anyone else...
But he didn't have to finish because you already knew. If you told anyone else you'd be hurting dozens of children, if anyone believed you at all because who would believe that the owner of an orphanage could do such a thing and who would adopt all of these kids if the place got shut down and so you bit your tongue and it was the first time you ever learned about the Greater Good and if anyone asked why you were suddenly so quiet or why you stopped hanging around with them or why they weren't allowed to touch you anymore you just shrugged and went about your business and they all watched you as you left and muttered under their breath about how lucky you were to look so good and how the man in charge liked you best and you tried not to cry or to break under the admiring stares that followed you for the rest of your life.
Pretty little thing.