POETRY

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by the time they named her strong, she’d already lost everything else

This is what she looked like before.

Before the veil. Before the gloss. Before they praised her composure and confused it for peace.
Before she turned herself into armor.

Before the night Jimmy died.

She was Annabelle then. Not a symbol. Not a survivor. Just a girl who still smiled with her whole face, even when it hurt.
Who wore her softness without fear.
Who believed in mornings, in second chances, in love that didn’t need explanation.

Jimmy saw her.

Not the projection, not the potential—just her.
Hair tangled from sleep. Laugh like rebellion.
Questions that didn’t need answers.
He held her like she was real, and that was the most dangerous thing of all.

Because real things break.

And that night, something did.

She didn’t cry at first. She didn’t scream.
She went still.
Still enough to make a decision.

If softness got her here, she would bury it.
If love made her reckless, she would starve it.
If truth demanded grief, she would wear lies like couture.

So she did what women like her are trained to do.

She became someone else.

The world met her later—painted, polished. They called her elegant. Formidable. Composed.
They didn’t know she’d cut out parts of herself to fit that dress.
They didn’t see the ghost she carried in her mouth.

They just saw a woman who never cracked.

But some nights, when her reflection forgets to lie—
the voice inside her whispers:

Did you ever wish you were someone else?
Because I do.
She don’t belong here. She doesn’t belong.

She’s worn the mask so long, it’s started to feel like skin.
It itched at first; now it bleeds beneath the scars.
And she no longer knows where it ends, or where she begins.

But underneath, that other girl—the before girl—isn’t gone. Just buried.

And with her, the memory:

She was selfless. He was a true friend.
She should have been there for him.
Slow dancing until the crying eased.
Letting him collapse into her silence.
Being the warmth when the cold got too loud.

Now she speaks the unspeakable.

Jimmy is gone.
And she wasn’t there.

Not the way he needed.
Not the way he had been for her.
She should’ve been someone he could come to.

Jimmy’s watch ticks, ticks, ticks—a reminder that she is still alive.
She wears it now, not for timekeeping, but as penance.
It doesn’t tell time.
It tells absence.

She remembers who she was before they called her strong.
Before she survived by silence.
Before she was too bright to touch.
Before the grief calcified into poise.

She remembers Jimmy.

And tonight, she doesn’t want to be worshipped, or applauded, or envied.
She wants to be held.
She wants someone to say her name like it means something.
Annabelle.
Like it’s not just a title she wears in his absence.

Her thumb rubs his lighter—silver, worn smooth, still warm from her pocket.
She exhales her words into the air like smoke, like prayer.

“You saved me…
You saved me.”