Dangerous Girls

Wouldn't we all look guilty, if someone searched hard enough?

Any one of us could be made to look a monster, with selective readings of our history.

I want to tell them all; the world is bigger than high school.

One moment. One picture. One glimpse—that’s all it takes to make someone think they know the truth.

..the truth is, we made each other, like we learned about in science class. Symbiosis.

My mom shows me her old yearbooks, and there are tons of people in there she doesn't talk to anymore. Old boyfriends, best friends… What do you think happened to them?" "Maybe they drifted apart." "That's stupid. You don't drift, not if someone matters to you." "So maybe they didn't matter, not really." "Anna?" "Yeah?" "I'd never do that. Leave you." "I know. Me either.

The truth is, it's not the act that I'm scared of, but giving myself so entirely to someone. As long as there are lines to draw and boundaries to cling to, I can pretend that I'm safe from the wanting that threatens to consume me. I'm separate, still all my own. But after... What then? What comes after, when he has that much of me, to do with as he chooses? When I have him. Will it ever be enough?

Now, for the first time, I wonder if this is how my mother felt. If cancer was her prison; the chemo treatments, torture. I understand it. I would rather die.

Do you love me?" "You know I do." "How much?" "Miles and Miles." "Deeper than the oceans?" "Yup. More than the wind." "Higher than Everest?" "I don't know, that's pretty high... Ow!" (laughter) "Admit it. You love me more than anyone." "Maybe." "What about you - how much do you love me?" "Enough." "Hey!" "You didn't ask, 'Enough for what?'" "Fine, then. Enough for what?" "For Anything." "That's Better.

I can’t help my mind skipping over the here-and-now and racing on, to what might come next. Consequence and regret and other might-have-beens: plotting out every angle and scenario, knowing all along that the path I take means missing something else.

After so many years drifting, not connected to anything, I'm finally tethered. Safe and loved, in the middle. We start senior year like kings, like nothing can ever tear us apart. We're wrong.

Wouldn’t we all look guilty, if someone searched hard enough?

Everything will be okay. Trust me. I don't know how many times he's said that to me, not just here in prison but my whole life. When I was scared for the first day of school, or stressed about a big test; when I fell off my bike in sixth grade and split my lip. When my mom got sick. I always believed him. He's my father, he wouldn't lie to me; he's a grown-up, he knows the truth. But now I see his promises for what they really are: hopeful prayers, a mantra he says as much to reassure himself as me. He can't fix this, not even close.

Any one of us could be made to look a monster, with selective readings of our history,

The truth is rarely pure and never simple. —Oscar Wilde

The night is still just getting started.