The Poison Daughter

by Sheila Masterson

To all the versions of myself I’ve buried and mourned. And to the one that survived. I wrote this one for me.

It doesn’t matter that she can take care of herself. She’s my sister, and when someone puts their hands on her, I want to kill them in the slowest, most painful way possible.

There’s freedom in being a disappointment.

This is how it always is—him getting away with his violence and me waiting for my opportunity to do the same.

I cannot make him sorry, but I can make him suffer. And that will have to be enough.

I’ve turned my bad luck into other women’s good fortune. This world is plagued with men who only know how to speak with their fists, and I have made myself a monster for them.

They don’t know the way want sours into control. They’ve not seen how men use wanting to excuse their violence. They haven’t seen the things I have.

I don’t dream of being wanted anymore. I’d rather be feared.

In the absence of a conscience, men need something to fear. I’ve made myself their monster.

“You’re not a hero. You’re just another asshole impersonating a good guy.”

The worst thing I could be was a woman ungovernable of both mind and body.

True intimacy would mean allowing someone to poke around in my chest and explain why I’m forever riddled with this senseless agony.

That’s what it is to have a sister—to love her, envy her, and also be in awe at how much better than you she is. Having a sister is pressing your heart up against another heart and seeing how your hurt and triumph mirror each other. It’s saying, “There’s no pain you carry that I don’t carry too. As long as I’m here, you’re never alone.”

It took me years to understand that the strength isn’t in not wanting to give up, but in desperately wanting to and continuing to persevere.

It’s easier to lie to her than it is to lie to myself.

I stopped wishing when I stopped hoping for better and started making myself worse. If the men of Lunameade needed repercussions to behave, I would be the harbinger of consequences.

The question leaves me breathless, my rage a great wave that never seems to crest. It just rises and rises until it’s too big for words.

The hurt is not a dying ember—it’s the spark that helps you set this world on fire. The same place where the hurt seeps out is where the hope shines in.”

Most of all, I remember the helplessness, and I will not be helpless again.

your will must be stronger than what seems possible.

I’ve filled every empty inch of space inside of me with simmering anger.

He brushes his thumbs over the tops of my hands in a soothing motion that makes me want to shove him away from me. I don’t need his comfort. His contempt is much preferred.

I’m too afraid to want it—too terrified to lose again to let myself truly believe it’s possible.

I was very young when I learned not to expect any softness from life. Violence came for me the way it does for all women. It hunted me, and I let its blade whittle me into something too sharp to touch—so that no man could bleed me without getting bloodied too.

I’m homesick. This feeling is nothing new—the instinct to go home, but not to my home. Maybe it’s just the fleeting human impulse to seek shelter, to endlessly search for comfort even if you’ve never really known what it was to begin with. I’ve been hit enough to know that pain is not a home, but it felt like all I deserved. Over time, I started to believe it. Some old base instinct clings to the possibility of something better—the myth of it alive inside me, the way a story sinks into bones and becomes as real as the ache in your ribs when you watch two lovers kiss.

I’m not sure I know what love is, but I recognize the lack of it.

I can’t just hold on to something delicate. I have to crush it in my fist until it’s nothing but ash. My mind will always find the fastest path to distrust.

“Born to be a queen. Cursed to wrangle the egos of men.”

If I’m not careful, I might stop loathing my husband.

“Just because you can bear your pain better doesn’t mean you should have to.

I can’t believe I’m still dumb enough to trust a man.

I used to think I was justice, but now I’m afraid I’m just the soft touch born of many brutal beatings.

Some stupid, indestructible part of me wanted to believe tha...

He made me remember what it is to want. He summoned this forgotten longing to press my chest against someone else’s and whisper, “Love me”—as if one command from my lips coul...

I remember how badly I wanted a love I could feel. And then I learned not to want that because pain is a feeling, too.

“I belong to no man.”

I’m not surprised you used me. Truthfully, I’m shocked that I still have the capacity to believe someone would want anything but to use me.

A woman can never be too rich, too confident, or too knowledgeable about poisonous plants.”

It would be easier to give in, but I don’t need a hero. I have saved myself far too many times to need a man to do it for me.

When I was young and carefree, I aspired to that kind of closeness, but I’ve spent years trying to cut the desire for love right out of my chest.

But I have starved that dream so long, it has become clawed and clever. If given even a sliver of a chance, it will take root again and grow into something unstoppable. Wanting is a dangerous thing. It is perhaps the one thing I can’t survive.

Because it’s not enough to be guarded from men, just like it’s not enough to avenge myself against their violence. I have ingested it, sucked it from their marrow. I’ve become the monster. Because it’s not an appeal to their empathy that will make men fall in line. It’s the fear that they aren’t the most dangerous thing walking these streets.”

“All these years and you still haven’t learned. You’ve never stopped trying to break me. But I do not break. I am the breaker.”

To know you will always be okay alone should be comforting, but really, it’s just terribly lonely. I am so unbelievably weary.

He reaches out, tentative at first. When I don’t flinch, he tucks my hair behind my ear and cups my cheek. “What do you need, Harlow?” I can’t remember the last time someone asked me that and meant it. I’ve been asked so infrequently, I’m unpracticed at even assessing my own needs.

I’ve seen good examples of love, but I’ve never seen a good example of someone loving me.

I’ve spent my life trying not to feel the aching lack of love in my life because I knew if I found a romance rare enough to fit me, I wouldn’t be able to stop from giving myself over to it.

You deserve someone who will be a monster for you.”

My throat is so tight. I’m afraid to let Henry love me. Afraid that he will stop. Afraid that I will learn to need him and he won’t be there.