Swollen

Tonight I cried until my eyes were just about swollen shut. I was standing at the entrance to our small kitchen, watching Adam do dishes as we argued. It was just an argument, but it wasn't. Baz was in the swing to my left, and for a good five minutes he had to listen to us go back and forth. We weren't yelling, but we weren't quiet.

Then it hit me. It hit at a somatic level, really, the body rather than the brain. 

This. This was my childhood.

Except my parents never thought to check on me. They neither looked left nor right. They only saw straight in front of them, and then never further than their own noses. They screamed. They threw barbs, accusations, insults. My mother raised her voice, my father his fists.

I took Baz into the other room. Then I found myself on our worn blue recliner, sobbing into Jack's fur. 

We do things differently. That's what Adam tells me time and again. We are not them. I can only have hope.