Afterwards, when everything was out in the open, I sensed that the grownups around me were holding their breath, waiting for something to happen. They would say things like “don’t be afraid of your anger” and “expressing anger is healthy, just let it out”. It’s almost like they were expecting me to go off or explode at any second, that’s what a normal boy my age would do. You get mad, scream, maybe break a few things (or even better, you get into a fight at school and it’s ALL because of what happened to you) and then it’s over with and everyone can breathe a sigh of relief and move on. They made it sound so simple, so easy. But this “anger” they were talking about, it simply didn’t exist. I felt sad, scared, confused and very alone, but I didn’t feel angry at my parents or anyone else. Everyone’s talking about my anger, like they own it. Just ‘cause I’m a boy I’m supposed to direct the anger at other people and get in fights, not harm myself. Loud voices in class made me shrink in my seat, I couldn’t look anyone in the eye. I didn’t want to be noticed at all. No feelings, no thoughts, no sound. I wanted peace and quiet, I wanted everything to be clean, spotless like those blinding white sheets you see in the ads on TV. I wanted to sleep through everything like a small hibernating animal, wake up and all of a sudden winter has long passed and it’s spring. I wanted order, perfection and I wanted to be in control, I just didn’t know how. My body felt strange and unfamiliar to me, like it didn’t belong to me and I didn’t belong in it. It became a shell, my armour, a wall between me and the outside. You can punch and kick that wall all you want, try to tear it down, but you’ll never succeed. You’ll never find the person hiding on the inside. Grownups were hoping for this huge explosion of words and angry tears, when all I longed for, all I really needed, was the silence afterwards.
