As she closed the door, it stuck (just as it had for the last 2 years, despite her asking for it to be fixed) and, with a sigh, she realised that this would be the last time that she would be disappointed by this place.

She pushed it back open, and took one final look: the faded carpet, the worn couch, the peeling Lino in the kitchen, the too-small table jammed in the too-small room… how had she made a home here for so long? She had scraped together the scraps of hope around her: perhaps the couch, like her heart, wasn’t so worn; perhaps the carpet, like her joy, wasn’t so faded?

Looking back now, they all spoke their truth volubly: there could be no home here. It had never truly been the fixtures: she saw now that they were some small comfort, rocks of stability in an ever-changing stream of misfortune and regret; and she, on the banks, variously parched and drowned, feeling her spirit slowly chewed away by insects and spite.

Yet each day, she had surfaced; she had brushed off the insects and tended her wounds (waking early, quietly), painted on the boldest lies she could bear, and tried again. She cleaned and cooked, and smiled and worked, and hid her distain behind gestures and pantomime. She knew this her, the Outside Her, was well-liked, and she despised Her for it. But she knew this suit was her safety, a fixture of stability as the couch and carpet, the Lino and table, so she held her enemy tightly.

Until one day, she realised that, if she let go, her tattered spirit could be lifted by the lightest breeze: somehow, cruelty and injury could be the agents of her freedom.

It was a thought at once foreign and completely at home. She woke even earlier now: to take it out, to play with it, to stretch and squeeze it, then swiftly hide away as the hour became too late. As the days wore on, though, she felt it still in her hands: small flecks caught between her fingers and under her nails. She was thankful, for the first time, for Her, for now She was a new safety, protecting this small, new hope.

And this morning, when she had taken it out, she knew she would no longer be able to hide it away. It flowed from her hands, covering wherever She had usually been, and she realised that she did not feel safe; she felt bold.

She turned away and pulled the door closed (in a final mercy, it did not stick), and walked off into the night.