Deliver Me

by Elle Nash

The punishment came no matter what crime I had committed, and it was never explained. It was automatic. I learned to lie, not about my faults but about everything.

Only when I compare myself with Sloane do I see my ugliness. Without her, I’m almost pretty, and I’m unconvinced there’s anything other than beauty that makes a woman valuable.

He’d just stand there smoking, put the blame on me, absolve himself of the contract people make when they’re supposed to be in love. I can’t rely on him to fix this.

What a man needs is different from what a man wants. All I’ve ever done is give people what they want.

We all live this way: things fall apart and their corpses rot in front of us as we adapt to a lesser way of living.

My inner monologue reassured me: Because you care about her and she’s your only friend. Sometimes you get confused about things, but just because she makes you feel something, a greed that runs from your tongue to the base of your spine, doesn’t mean you’re interested in her like that.

I swear, mothers fear their daughters only because they’re afraid of their own fucking deaths.”

I loved him like I loved a root canal: something painful but necessary. Like life was more painful without him.

I didn’t want to live according to the rules of good and evil anymore. All I wanted was for someone to love me, but I was always being replaced.

I want to be good. I do. I just need to live through this one last lie and never lie again. I could do that. I could just hold on to this one secret. You can still be close with someone, even with a secret, can’t you? It’s not like you can ever fully know another human—about what lies in their heart like a grave.

The truth was I was obsessed with death. It blotted out any other hobby or interest I had at the time.

I wonder in which ways I will imprint onto my baby. Will she feel alone like I do? Will she struggle with the same compulsions? Will she fall in love and hate her mother?

I’m drawn to him because of this lingering ferocity I see in men—the possibility of violence. The kind of man I prayed for all those years ago, I didn’t consider the other side of it, what the roots of loving someone like that would be, what it would grow into.

What a terrible grief it is to love even when you do not want to love; a hole is carved within you, and you become emptied of everything you have to give.

Sloane kissed me all those years ago not because she loved me but because I loved her.