Once again I find myself alone, contemplating life while sitting on brick red tiles that make the bathroom floor. Since the only thing that I am wearing is a T-shirt and g-string, the cold tiles feel so great pressed against my flushed and hot skin.

Thinking, I realize that all through my life that one constant and comforting thing is the hundreds of hours that I have spent in this tiny room shutting out everything. The place where plans are developed, decisions made and sins confessed. Also, where I cry, laugh and apply the makeup that hides the purple/blue marks that cover most of my body, the red lines caused from tears running down my cheeks non-stop. Or the true feelings that I spend so much trying to hide, the one place that I can be my true self and not feel the sharp hot sting of his slap.

I, like so many women, have learned that hiding is the way to live. Following every word of the man that we think loves us and for that love we live like prisoners locked away.

Melita is a participant in Megaphone’s community writing workshop program

Photo by Svein Halvor Halvorsen