I slept in my make-up, the mirror tells me that I look like I’ve been beaten.

I woke up today feeling ill at ease. My body is slow to respond with anything that isn’t annoying or hurtful. I must have pushed myself too hard dancing, or at least that’s what I’ll say if I’m asked as it’s close enough to true to count. I would be lying if I said I was well, if I denied that I feel ill or that I would rather live today in silence. There’s no one here to talk to though, they left sometime in the morning when I wasn’t aware to the world at all. Maybe if I knew how to get angry pointing outward, maybe if I knew how to complain without being hurtful and cruel to myself when I’m upset, I would be able to keep down something more substantial than a glass of juice. I’m not used to stress, I’m not used to lacking words. This clamp beneath my skin is punishing and constrictive. I wish I could take my heart out like a glistening wet jewel and unfold it to show where it’s been wounded. Prise the angle of hurt from the evidence to puzzle together a picture of the weapon. I want to give it into his hands like torn origami of the most exquisite sort, lit from within, lined by shattered crystal like safety glass fractured.

I’m in a queue, waiting to take my vocabulary back.