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I grew up in a house that wasn’t a home, with walls that held screams instead of safety. My mother called me a drag, a burden and then told me to suck it up when I cried at her words.

They struck harder than her hands, though both left marks: bruises you could see, wounds you couldn’t.

My father wasn’t much of a father at all. He drank to disappear, and when that wasn’t enough, he left me behind with her. He moved on with another woman, but I stayed — a child scared to death, deeply sad, and ready to die.

From my earliest days, I learned to tiptoe through life, walking on the shards of broken trust and empty promises.

I was hit, beaten, and belittled until my sense of self became a ghost: something faint, almost forgotten.

I don’t have parents now, but looking back, I never really did to begin with.

— Lux