Shout

by Laurie Halse Anderson

we must be gentle with the living, but the dead own their truth and are fearless.

This is the story of a girl who lost her voice and wrote herself a new one.

He beat her. But beatings didn’t fit in the fairy tales she liked to tell herself so she sugarcoated the story to make it easier to swallow.

I learned then that words had such power some must never be spoken and was thus robbed of both tongue and the truth.

Once branded, the feeling of stupid never fades no matter how many medals you win.

The taste of shame smells like stubborn vomit in your hair lingering no matter how often you wash it sometimes you have to shave yourself bald

Broken children can see each other from miles away, the original mutants, X-kids abandoned to their confused scars and rages.

untreated pain is a cancer of the soul that can kill you

Home was still hellish, afire with the painful realization that no matter how much I loved my parents my love could not fix them

Most relationships come with expiration dates just like milk and bread. Some go sour before you can taste them.

too many grown-ups tell kids to follow their dreams like that’s going to get them somewhere Auntie Laurie says follow your nightmares instead cuz when you figure out what’s eating you alive you can slay it

Censorship is the child of fear the father of ignorance and the desperate weapon of fascists everywhere.

The opposite of innocence is not sin. Dearly beloved, the opposite of innocence is strength.

This is not a resting bitch face This is a touch-me-and-die face