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Trying to prove to myself that I wasn’t crazy, that I hadn’t invented it, that it counted. I wish people would talk about this more. I wish the media would put a spotlight on the ugly truth that kids can be victims of other kids, too, that trauma doesn’t wait until everyone involved is old enough to understand the weight of what happened. Maybe then I would’ve told someone. Maybe then I wouldn’t have spent years carrying something that was never mine to hold alone.

Some people might think I’m harsh for not forgiving him, because we were both children. But I wouldn’t give a grown man a pass for sexual assault, so why the fuck should I hand one to a boy who heard me say no over and over again and still chose to violate my body? Why should I excuse the manipulation, the lies, the way he made me doubt myself at every turn? A child can still make a choice. A child can still do damage that lasts. If anything, that’s the cruelest part—that something done by someone so young could leave scars this deep.

“Running isn’t giving you time,” I call out, my voice rough as I force the words past a throat that feels like sandpaper.

It comes out harsher than I expected, jagged and breathless, but I don’t care.

“It’s just slowing you down.”

My lungs are burning. Fuck, I am not built for running, not like this, not with rage clawing at my ribs and old memories snapping at my heels. Every step jars through me, heavy and violent, but I keep going. Pain barely registers when I’ve lived through worse.

Max is behind me. I don’t need to look to know that. I can feel him there, steady and close, probably watching me the way he always does when he thinks I’m two seconds from shattering. Part of me gets it. Part of me even wants to lean into it, just for a second, just to know someone has my back. But the bigger part of me hates it. Hates the assumption that I need saving. Hates that after everything, people still look at me and see something breakable.

I’m not breakable.

Not anymore.

He needs to understand that I am more than capable of doing this on my own, and I’m done wasting energy trying to convince him otherwise.

Danny glances over his shoulder, and even from here I catch it—the panic on his face, the stumble in his step, the way fear finally sinks its claws into him. Good. Let him feel even a fraction of what I felt. Let him know what it’s like when your body stops belonging to you, and your pulse turns into nothing but dread.

Soon enough, Max surges past me, which isn’t surprising. He’s faster, bigger, and less half-dead from the sprint. In the next second, he crashes into Danny’s back and sends them both stumbling forward. Danny hits the ground hard with a grunt, and Max is on top of him before he can scramble away.

For a second, I just stare.

Fuck’s sake. This isn’t how I pictured it.

Then again, I never pictured this at all. Never pictured my abuser being anywhere near me again, let alone close enough for me to hear his ragged breathing, close enough for the past to feel like it’s clawing its way into the present.

“Got him!” Max shouts.

I roll my eyes, breath heaving in and out of me. Like, I can’t fucking see that for myself.

I slow as I reach them, my boots grinding into the dirt, heart beating so hard it feels like it’s trying to crack my ribs open. Danny starts thrashing under Max, muttering something frantic, something useless, but I don’t hear the words. I only hear every no I ever said. Every silence that followed. Every night I lay awake wondering if it had really been that bad, if maybe I had made it bigger than it was.

No.

It was that bad.

And now he’s the one looking up at me.

For the first time in my life, he looks small.

For the first time, I don’t.

I step closer, close enough to see the sweat on his face, the wildness in his eyes. Close enough to watch recognition sink in fully, to watch him realize that I’m not the girl he could manipulate anymore.

“I told you no,” I say quietly.

The words hit harder than shouting ever could.

My hands are trembling, but not from fear. Not now. It’s because of those years full of rage with nowhere left to go. Years of swallowing it down, of making it palatable for other people, of trying to dress my pain up in language that wouldn’t make them uncomfortable.

“I told you no,” I repeat, louder this time, each word sharp enough to cut. “Again, and again, and again. And you still did it.”

Danny opens his mouth, maybe to lie, maybe to beg, maybe to do what he’s always done and twist the truth until it barely resembles itself.

I don’t let him.